Life of Pi 2

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When the captain of the HMS Bounty was set adrift, I doubt his experience was fun as Pi's.

Reading Pi's epic journey of survival is rather refreshing a second time. In my first reading I was rather apathetic to Pi's outcome and his situation. Now, with a little more experience in my life, his story is rather remarkable. I think anyone reading about Pi's ordeal will often wonder the same thing: what would I do in this situation?

I can tell you in confidence that I would not survive this situation. I would not have the resourcefulness to make do with the limited resources available to me. I see the ocean as a large liquid desert. I would imagine being stuck on a liferaft with little food or water would be the worst way to die. The sun constantly beating down on you, the seawater tempting you to drink it as your parched lips crack open to let out your last breath. Miserable.

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The added drama with Richard Parker makes the ordeal that much more fascinating. I said that Pi's somewhat winded musings on life in the family of zookeepers in India would be important to understand Pi's actions later in the novel. While a deeply religious and compassionate individual, pushed to survival Pi will do just about anything. His wonderfully unfazed descriptions of eating sea turtles was particularly awesome for me to read; it almost vindicated much what I said in last semester's DBs. When Pi states "I whiled away many a pleasant hour gnawing at a flipper joint of splitting open bones and licking out their marrow" (Martel 268-9) I actually chuckled to myself. As a self avowed turtle fan, it was quite humorous to imagine this skinny, peaceful Indian kid chewing mercilessly on my favorite animal. Is that so wrong to laugh at? I hope not.

Regardless, the absurdity of the tale takes a bit of the weight off the story, which I really enjoy. The situation is almost comical as Pi's unique take on his situation provides an interesting look on a mind going slowly mad. For instance, while marveling at Richard Parker's regal appearance, Pi remarks that he is lucky to be with such a majestic creater and that "What if I had ended up with a creature that looked silly or ugly, a tapir or an ostrich or a flock of turkeys?" (Martel 220) Pi's humor lends the novel to a real entertaining adventure, rather than a desperate and depressing account of a survivor slowly descending into madness.

So the question remains, what would I do in this situation? Its hard to imagine myself killing and eating a turtle, any turtle, for that matter, but as I have argued desperate times call for necessary and desperate measures. But there is one thing I can say with a certain confidence that I would not do: I would never, EVER, coax a large tiger on to my small lifeboat.