This is the story from the times when Tigers did not have stripes and when they were just plain bright orange.
Once upon a time, Mr and Mrs. Tiger and their son, Little Timmy were travelling far and wide in search of a new home. They came across a big forest. The forest had lush green trees, tall and soft grass, fresh blue water, cool breeze and delicious food to eat.
In it lived many animals-little ones, big ones, not so little and not so big ones, short ones, tall ones, not so short and not so tall ones, long ones, stout ones, not so long and not so stout ones, slow ones, fast ones, not so slow and not so fast ones, wriggly ones, crawly ones, winged ones and scaly ones.
The three Tigers loved the forest and decided to make it their new home. When Little Timmy went to the forest school all the other kids marveled, “Wow. You are so bright and so orange!” Soon Little Timmy had made friends in his class-Jim the elephant’s kid, Henry the Giraffe’s kid, Zazoo the alligator’s kid, Trippy the pythons’ kid, Billy the hornbills’ kid and everybody else.
The kids’ favourite game was hide and seek. Henry the Giraffe would hide behind a tall tree, Billy the Hornbill would go behind a big leaf, Zazoo the alligator would slide into the water, Trippy the python would slither in the tall grass and Jim would pretend that he is a big rock. There was hardly anyone who could seek anyone. The kids loved the game as they would all hide and giggle till the seeker found them.
Little Timmy would always be found first. It was so not difficult to see Timmy who was so orange. Poor Timmy would dive into the water yet everybody could see his orange coat. When he would hide behind the leaves the seeker would say, “I had never seen a flower so orange. It’s not a flower, it’s Timmy Tiger!” and then Timmy would have to come out. When he would pretend to be a rock everyone knew no rocks were orange in colour. They all would have a good laugh. Little Timmy didn’t know what to do, “I always get found first. Oh! What do I do?” Little Timmy would feel very sad.
One day his father found a sad Timmy in his bedroom. “Son, why do you look so sad? Why aren’t you out playing games with your friends?”, asked Mr. Tiger. “Why are we so orange and bright? I can’t hide anywhere and I always get caught” cribs Little Timmy.
Mr. Tiger exclaims, “I know what we can do!” Mr. Tiger goes into his workshop and gets a tin of black paint. He then paints long stripes over Little Timmy’s coat and says, “Now, this will do the trick!”
That evening when Little Timmy went out to play hide and seek no one could find him. When Zazoo the alligator saw an orange flower on the tree he said, “I know it’s you Little Timmy.” But it wasn’t!
When he checked behind the trees he couldn’t see Little Timmy. Instead he found Trippy the python. Soon Zazoo the alligator found everybody but Little Timmy. They all called out, “Little Timmy, where are you? We all were found. You won!” Out jumped Little Timmy who was hiding behind his black stripes and the dark green grass.
From then on it wasn’t easy to find Little Timmy anymore. He could hide and play hide and seek without being found. He was the happiest and so were his friends.
Now you know how tigers got their black stripes. But if you see an orange tiger without any stripes, oh please do be kind to paint some for him :)
© Amruta Pradhan.
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