A Dream

During a time when I was a child I developed a fancy for reading Tiger stories. I read stories about Man eating tigers being shot by Jim Corbett and became so fascinated that whenever I was free I was reading Maneaters of Kumaon written by the famous hunter turned writer, Jim Corbett.

I read stories like Bachelor of Powalgarh, The Chowgarh Tiges, The Kanda Maneater, The Thak Maneater.

I used to imagine how the famous hunter Jim Corbett used to track and shoot maneating tigers armed with his rifle and a dead accurate aim when these tigers became a menace and started killing people apart from lifting goat and cattle from the villages in Almora, Nainital.

The Government at that time used to request Jim Corbett to hunt down and kill the Maneater so as to free the villages in Almora and Nainital from the menace.

My thoughts about Tigers became deeper and deeper after every story that I read and I was quite fascinated by them.

I remember an instance when during my sleep on an occasion, I started dreaming about a tiger hiding behind a tree at night, its eyes shining like light in the darkness and as I tried to hide behind an old well to save myself from being seen by the tiger & mauled, just then the tiger saw me and came charging after me.

I was so scared that I started trembling with fear and then the realisation dawned on me that it was just a dream and not a reality. I woke up with a start and found myself actually trembling with fear and my shirt dripping with perspiration.

I thanked God that this was just a dream and got up from the bed to prepare myself to go to the school that day.

Thanks for reading !

Zafar Siddiqui (Mob# 9871378510)