The Lion That Made Me Cry

Watch this video - although the footage is more than three decades old, it was released only recently on YouTube.  It made me cry and I believe you will cry too! 

Read the story here.

It’s an absolutely touching story right?  Thanks to Otterman, my heart feels really heavy now. 

The touching video is one thing.  The story of George Adamson (the bared-bodied man in the video) is another.  It also left me teary-eyed.

I had heard of Adamson a long time ago when I was in school, but had never really bothered to find out in detail what he did.  I wished I had, as at that time, Adamson would still be alive and the stories would have been more current (if you know what I mean).  I vaguely recall reading about his death when he was brutally murdered by poachers, but it didn’t affect me at all then.

But after reading so much today through the endless links on the internet, I feel really sad and pensive.

How can anyone ever measure up to him?  Why can lions, an animal of a species so different from us, trust Adamson, a human, so much, while many of us can’t even trust our own brothers (I’m not even going to mention fellow human beings)?

Sigh!  Such is life, huh?

But on a brighter note, the international Born Free Foundation continues to perpetuate Adamson’s legacy by  working throughout the world to stop individual wild animal suffering and protecting threatened species in the wild.

And now, I can’t get the theme from the award winning movie Born Free (about George and Joy Adamson and their lioness Elsa) out of my head (I remember hearing this when I was really little):

Born free, as free as the wind blows
As free as the grass grows
Born free to follow your heart…

I remember how the song and its music always made me feel as if I’m some place else – it made me feel a breeze, transporting me to the long green grasses of the African savannah and its huge open spaces.  It’s little wonder why John Barry has won awards after awards (can’t help digressing here – but he’s one of the greats).

I’ll see if I can order the DVDs for Born Free and other Adamson stories on Amazon, and watch them with my family.

Incidentally, the lion is Little Guy’s favourite animal and I hope he gets inspired by Adamson!