Tigers, the biggest of all big cats, have always fascinated poets and writers, and many of us remember Shere-Khan, the tiger in the novel The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. Also, societies that live near these cats have many legends about them. For instance, according to an old Sumatran legend, tigers are very intelligent and a long time ago humans made an agreement with them: people would leave the tiger alone in his territory and the tiger would stay far from the villages.

In Sumatra today, villages still have rituals to commemorate this agreement. A buffalo is sacrificed from time to time and is left outside the villages for the tiger as a sign of respect. Also, people say that, when a tiger is near a village, it is a sign that someone has broken a law. Then, the villagers punish the suspect and bring meat to the forest to show the tiger that the crime has been punished.

Tigers are solitary creatures who live in big territories and they usually eat small animals. The truth is that there are very few man-eating tigers. However, some years ago, surprisingly, tigers started going near the villages and killing people in India and Bangladesh. Tigers usually attack from behind, so people started wearing a mask of a human face on the backs of their heads. The method worked for several years, but the tigers have started attacking again.

Why are tigers attacking more and more people? Is it simply because they are hungry ? Or is it that they have gotten angry? The tropical forests are getting smaller, many wild animals are being hunted in big numbers and tigers themselves are in danger of becoming extinct. Maybe the tiger is just punishing us: we humans have broken the agreement of mutual respect that we made with the wild beasts a long time ago.

PART ONE: READING COMPREHENSION

1. Answer the following questions according to the information in the text.

1. What famous fictional character is mentioned in the text and from which literary work?

2. What method was developed in India and Bangladesh to prevent tiger attacks on humans?

3. The text gives us three reasons why tigers may be angry. Which ones?

4. Which of the following sentences (a, b or c) summarises the text best?

a) The great majority of tigers are big, solitary, dangerous animals that usually attack men from behind when they are in the Indian and Sumatran forests.
b) According to an old legend, tigers may be attacking more humans now because human beings have lost respect for them and are making their lives difficult.
c) Tiger attacks on people are more frequent because tigers are hungry and people do not leave buffaloes for them outside the villages.

  PART TWO: WRITING
Choose ONE. Write about either 1 or 2.

Option A: Imagine you arrive at a small village in Sumatra and you meet Konish, an old man who starts telling you stories about tigers and the legends that he believes in. Write down your conversation with him.

Option B: In all cultures and countries people have legends and tell their children fairy tales about animals. Write down one of the legends or fairy tales with animals that you know, as if you were telling it to a young child.

3. Vocabulary

Explain next words in English, write the phonetics and also an example: to claim, to tend, research.