Riding the Tiger

The Quick Study Series : VIII

The Special Commissioner of the US to the Straits Settlements and Siam in 1889 ...  Mr. Rounsevelle Wildman … wrote of his adventures* … while staying in Malaya for 9 years. Of the many incidences … he referred to … was the story of … Baboo's Good Tiger … in which a young Malay boy … reported to be snatched by a tiger in the Malacca forests … was discovered later … to be playing with the tiger … by the rescue team headed by the Commissioner.

 

The Commissioner inquired further … to discover that … the tiger had attacked Baboo … in the forest … and injured him. Baboo had responded by … poking the tiger in the eye. Having let go … the tiger … in a blurred vision … had encountered a seladang that nearly gored him. Baboo had chased the seladang away … and saved the tiger. Hence … they were thereafter … playing together.

 

Indic text depict … the lady Durga … riding on a tiger … as she bestows on the individual … the benefits of being in contact with a force …  powerful … that would otherwise not be handled well … by men.  The message is a simple one … women create a greater acquiescence to the vagaries of life … men do not.

 

The issue then returns … to the matter of taking on the mightiest forces in the universe … by the living mind of man. How to do it … without cultivating … a relationship with it? The preferred instrument of the male is … a trial by combat … winner takes all. It is the premise of the Indic Mahabarata and Mallory's Le Morte d'Arthur.

 

Elsewhere … David … in meeting Goliath … simply brought a stone on a sling … to hit the mighty giant. Goliath fell. It's gravity. The mightiest power in the universe only learns to relate to the forces of gravity … through the mind of man. It reflects somewhat on the way science tamed the world of the barbarians and introduced the civilizing idea.

 

But more than that … it reflects on the ways of man … in his life on earth … of the basis of gravity … in all that we do. For instance …  the fact that birds fly … men don't … is an important facet of our behaviour … in the way we shape and fashion our personality. It has far reaching implications in our daily life … and in the way we organize our societies. It reflects itself in our values … good and bad … and the notions of fair play.

 

To suggest that a man … relies on … the intrinsic notions of women to do that … give voice to her experience … is perhaps too strong … especially after our wars of tribulation in recent times. But today … where that field of engagement is in the home … the nature of the encounter … must of necessity ...take on new forms. We are no doubt viewing these alternatives … even as we speak.

 

Mr. Wildman went on … in his career … to be appointed as US Consul in Hong Kong … after the Malayan posting. His adventures here brought to me … the memory of my own service … as vice-consul in the Malaysian Consulate …  to the American republic. He mentions in his book that Americans would wish to hear of his adventures here. I guess I'm doing some of that myself … if I can persuade the folks here … to stop playing with the tiger.

 

 

*Note : Wildman, Rounsevelle, Tales of The Malayan Coast " From Penang to the Philippines, Lothrop Publishing Co., Boston, 1899