The Grizzly Man

Sunday, June 18, 2006

One of the craziest or shall I say daring things I saw recently was a man called Tim Treadwell who chose to live amongst Grizzly Bears in the Alaskan Peninsula for 12 straight summers but during the 13th summer he and his girlfriend were killed by the same grizzlies he chose to live around

There was a documentary called GRIZZLY MAN that chronicled his journey and after watching it I don't know if I should call this man brave or stupid or both

His friends didn't think anything was wrong with him living with bears but all the experts knew that something isn't right when you're living with Bears and you think you are a bear which Tim thought he was, he thought he was actually the Bear bodyguards and protectors

There were many perplexed moments in the documentary but the one that stuck out to me was this: he would set the camera up in the middle of a Bear mating area and talk to the camera--he would give these running video commentaries--and there were many moments where a Bear would come up to him while he was talking to the camera and nudge him and Tim would turn around and defend himself by hitting the Bear on the nose and each time the Bear looked at him like he was crazy

Now there are 3 major things you Don't Do In Life...you don't hurt or kill people, you don't break the law and you don't hit Bears on the nose...turtles-okay, dogs-maybe but Bears-NOOOO! He would get so upset at the Bears that he would combat the problem by hitting them and that would be his form of discipline

Now here's the thing you can't get upset when you are clearly living in a Bears world, you are in their environment so you have to play by there rules. Now if you were to go to sleep tonight, wake up in the morning and take a shower and when you got out of the shower and a Bear was staring at you through the window then you have reason to get upset but until that happens stay the hell out of Bear-Land and hopefully we all can get along

He said it was his goal to protect the Bears, you know what I say go to any alley in any major city in America and protect the stray 'cats' and 'dogs'...they need a lot of help. The Bears can fend for themselves...

He got what he deserved and what he so desired; he died by the big paws of a Grizzly Bear who had yet retreated to hibernate, the Bear had one last meal before he left and that meal was Tim Treadwell