I was attacked by a jaguar

My near death experience at a Chinese Zoo

My attention grabbing headline aside, I also wanted to say a few words about the state of Chinese zoos.  First, I really was attacked by a jaguar at a zoo in Suzhou. 真的。Let me back up a few years by saying, before my trip to China the only zoo I ever visited was the National Zoo here in DC.  Overall I would say the animals are well treated, well fed, and the cages are bolted in place.  The only disappointment at the National Zoo is the fact that the lions and tigers are in pits very far away from visitors, and you can’t get a close up view.

Not so in China.

The zoo I visited was in Suzhou, a garden city situated along the Grand Canal.  There are plenty of regional opera styles in China, and Suzhou opera is famous for horrific tragedies.  My potential fate at the paws, claws and jaw of a raging jaguar would have been fitting material.

Chinese zoos are depressing to begin with.  The animals are mistreated, starved and neglected.  Overall it is a dire situation, nearly as dire as the shoddy infrastructure containing the animals.

The saddest panda in the world, for instance, lives at the Suzhou zoo.  He was enormous, and my veterinarian friend informed me his size was due to malnutrition from not eating the proper bamboo.  He was dirty, and barley had enough energy to lift his hefty paw up to scratch his belly.

And then I visited the “wild cat” section.  I have never been face to face with giant cats before, I mean literally face-to-face.  The only thing separating me from the wild cats was a pane of glass.  Right away I should have noticed two things about the jaguar.  He was very thin.  He was also listless, pacing back and forth in his small rectangular cell.

In hindsight I know that means he was starving, and anxious because delicious human meat was passing his cage all day.

I did something stupid.  I sat down on my haunches, waved my hand at the jaguar, and said “hello friend! How are you? I’ve never seen anyone like you this close before!”  And then the jaguar smashed his entire body, with all his force and fury, against the thin pane of glass separating the two of us.  He was going for my face.  The thin glass pane shook, it seemed to bend outwards, and I saw, inches away from my face, the inside of the jaguar’s mouth.  In gory detail before me were his yellow teeth, quivering nostrils, and cold murderous eyes.

A raging death machine

 Image from worldwildlife.org

There would have been no contest.  None at all.  I can only imagine fending the starving jaguar off with my arms as he leapt on top of me, swiping away my pitiful defenses before having his fill of Montie meat.

The pane held, and I survived unscathed.  But the experience made me think: there must be incidents at zoos all across China where big cats break out and devour people.  Those statistics are people, and they probably suffered the scariest demise.

Needless to say, my advice for future zoo goers in the Middle Kingdom is straightforward: don’t get too close to the jaguars, the cages may not hold.