{"id":23128,"date":"2019-10-21T14:26:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-21T07:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/?p=23128"},"modified":"2024-08-14T15:51:13","modified_gmt":"2024-08-14T08:51:13","slug":"the-hidden-tigers-of-southeast-asia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/news\/industry-news\/the-hidden-tigers-of-southeast-asia\/","title":{"rendered":"The Hidden Tigers of Southeast Asia"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-post\" data-elementor-id=\"23128\" class=\"elementor elementor-23128\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<section class=\"elementor-section elementor-top-section elementor-element elementor-element-8e9f611 elementor-section-boxed elementor-section-height-default elementor-section-height-default tm-col-stretched-none tm-bg-color-over-image\" data-id=\"8e9f611\" data-element_type=\"section\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-container elementor-column-gap-default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-column elementor-col-100 elementor-top-column elementor-element elementor-element-fb4afe9 tm-bg-color-over-image\" data-id=\"fb4afe9\" data-element_type=\"column\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-wrap elementor-element-populated\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-ed571df elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"ed571df\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t<style>\/*! elementor - v3.13.3 - 22-05-2023 *\/\r\n.elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-stacked .elementor-drop-cap{background-color:#69727d;color:#fff}.elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-framed .elementor-drop-cap{color:#69727d;border:3px solid;background-color:transparent}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap{margin-top:8px}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap-letter{width:1em;height:1em}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap{float:left;text-align:center;line-height:1;font-size:50px}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap-letter{display:inline-block}<\/style>\t\t\t\t<h3><b>The Hidden Tigers of Southeast Asia\u00a0<\/b><\/h3><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">21 Oct <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">2019<\/span><\/p><p><strong><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"825\" height=\"510\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-23129 size-full\" \/><\/strong><\/p><p><b>PART <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">1: UNCOMMON ENCOUNTERS\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Northeast of the port city of Dawei, a single, dusty road takes you inland toward the vast forested wilderness of Dawna Tenasserim, a mountainous range straddling the international border between <a href=\"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/resources\/destination-guide\/myanmar\/\">Myanmar<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/resources\/destination-guide\/thailand\/\">Thailand<\/a>. After two rickety hours bumping along in a 4&#215;4, pausing for passing pythons and stopping to cool down in ramshackle roadside shops, a relatively flat landscape of rubber, betel and mango plantations gives way to the foothills Dawna Tenasserim. Nestled on the verge of this wild landscape is the village of Kyeik Pi Lan. Tiger encounters in this village are rare, but not unheard of.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Saw Kyar Thein is the village pastor in Kyeik Pi Lan. Sat at a teak dining table outside of his surprisingly ornate home on the village outskirts, he wears a broad smile and traditional longyi.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;It was 1991,&#8221; he says, &#8220;I was walking two cows that belonged <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">my grandfather to find fresh pasture, just there,&#8221; he adds, pointing toward a clearing in the forest.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;Suddenly the cow walking behind me began to pull. When I turned around, I saw it was wrestling with a tiger! I ran and I didn&#8217;t look back. The next day, I found the cow&#8217;s body on the side of the road&#8230; the tiger couldn&#8217;t finish his dinner,&#8221; <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">he <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">chuckles. When asked if he had been scared, Saw Kyar looks thoughtful,\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The elders <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">taught us that <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">we <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">can live together in <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">peace <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">with <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the tiger, because the tiger is loyal. <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As long <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">as we respect <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">tiger, tiger respect us<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"825\" height=\"510\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-23129 size-full\" \/><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The men who met tigers: Pastor Saw Kyar Thein sits\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">outside his village home as he recounts his encounters\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">with wild tigers\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">WWF-Myanmar\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not everyone in Kyeik Pi Lan shares his outlook. 74-year-old Saw Phoe Zet also lives in Kyeik Pi Lan. He&#8217;s a farmer. Around the same time he spotted a huge tiger &#8211; 12 feet long he estimates &#8211; as he walked beside the Nag Yant Ni stream after dark. Terrified, he pulled out his Tumee gun and shot at it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;I don&#8217;t know if I hit it,&#8221; he says, &#8220;but I didn&#8217;t dare <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">go back.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The tiger <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">was <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">screaming loudly, and <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">felt very afraid. Since that day <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">haven&#8217;t seen another. They <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">aren&#8217;t any <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">left <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in this\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">area<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The men who met tigers: Saw Phoe Zet takes a break from a bamboo construction workshop to recall the time he spotted a wild tiger in the dark \u00a9 WWF-\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Myanmar\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Though the lush green hills surrounding Kyeik Pi Lan give the illusion of forest, <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">it <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">is mostly agricultural land. The endless rows of white spotted rubber trees are a tell tale sign <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">of <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">cultivation. Myanmar&#8217;s growing population, rapid development and burgeoning demand for products like rubber and palm have rendered much of Myanmar&#8217;s once wild landscapes unable to support tigers, who need a large prey base and vast, unfragmented territories to survive. Deforestation in the south over the past couple of decades has been particularly extensive, prompting concern over the existence of any remaining tigers. But in 2014 something remarkable happened. An hour&#8217;s walk away from the village of Kyeik Pi Lan, Saw Kyae was fishing by moonlight on the banks of the Banchuang River when he heard something in the bushes behind him.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;When I told the <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">rest <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">of the village what I had seen, they didn&#8217;t believe <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">me. <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The next day <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">we <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">returned to the river and that&#8217;s when they <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">knew I wasn&#8217;t <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">lying,<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8221; he says.\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The men who met tigers: Saw Kyae sits on the bank of the Banchuang River, where he came face to face with a wild tiger in 2014.\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">WWF-Myanmar\u00a0<\/span><\/p><p><b>CLICK TO LISTEN TO EPISODE #1 TO FIND <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">OUT <\/span><b>WHAT HAPPENED\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Hidden Tigers of Southeast Asia\u00a0 21 Oct 2019 PART 1: UNCOMMON ENCOUNTERS\u00a0 Northeast of the port city of Dawei,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23129,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[74],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry-news"],"wps_subtitle":"","rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-300x185.jpg",300,185,true],"large":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"post-thumbnail":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-672x448.jpg",672,448,true],"logixs_wp_thumbnail_height":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-600x510.jpg",600,510,true],"logixs_wp_thumbnail_height_400":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-400x510.jpg",400,510,true],"logixs_wp_square":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-550x510.jpg",550,510,true],"logixs_wp_landscape":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"logixs_wp_portrait":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-550x510.jpg",550,510,true],"logixs_wp_huge_square":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"logixs_wp_square_150":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"logixs_wp_small_height":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-150x180.jpg",150,180,true],"qi_addons_for_elementor_image_size_square":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-650x510.jpg",650,510,true],"qi_addons_for_elementor_image_size_landscape":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false],"qi_addons_for_elementor_image_size_portrait":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1-650x510.jpg",650,510,true],"qi_addons_for_elementor_image_size_huge-square":["https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Saw-Kyae_WWF-Myanmar-825x510-1.jpg",825,510,false]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"atadmin","author_link":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/author\/atadmin\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/category\/news\/industry-news\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Industry News<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"The Hidden Tigers of Southeast Asia\u00a0 21 Oct 2019 PART 1: UNCOMMON ENCOUNTERS\u00a0 Northeast of the port city of Dawei,...","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23128\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiantigersgroup.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}