Piscine Molitor Patel aka Pi Patel was born into a family who owned a zoo in Pondicherry, India. As a boy, he was deeply religious and spiritual. He enjoyed his childhood roaming around the zoo and learning about animals. Later the family decided to move to Canada for better prospects. They wind up everything in India and board a ship to Canada. On their way their ship sank. Pi was left alone with a Bengal tiger in a lifeboat- how he survived in a lifeboat with a tiger and made it to the other side of the Pacific Ocean is what this book of Yann Martel about. While telling this extraordinary story of courage and faith, Martel discusses god, plight for survival, kindness, love, solitude and much more- his method of storytelling by weaving a story inside a story is incredible. And at last he leaves it to the reader to draw his own conclusions. This is one of the good books I have ever read.I put the book aside few days ago, but I am still with Pi sharing the pain he endured in that lifeboat in the vastness of the ocean, alone and helpless but trying to find meaning in what he does at that moment. Isn’t this life is about too? Many a time don’t we feel ourselves in this situation? Alone, surrounded by emptiness and only a faint hope remaining?
The transition of Pi from an innocent vegetarian boy who couldn’t kill a fish to use as bait to eating raw fish and drinking blood of tortoise towards the end of his journey is a tragic tale of what one can change to under the circumstances to survive.
Pi’s faith in god is the reason that sustained his life through the ordeal. He believed in himself and did all he could to survive, he tried to find a meaning in his suffering, he went about his daily business in the lifeboat and all the while his faith remained unshaken.
Read this book if you are ready to share the suffering with Pi, but I promise you that your suffering is not going to be in vain. You will look deep into yourself, you will go searching for your god, you will enjoy the humor and above all it will arouse the tender feeling of love, compassion and kindness.
