Exotic Pet

On a dusty day in the northern-most Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah, 40-year-old Jasim Ali wrestles playfully with his four-legged friend Teymour over a chew toy. But Teymour is not a dog -- he's a fully-grown African lion.
"There is a special language, I can say, between him and I," said Ali.
Ali rescued Teymour from a farm where, he says, he was a neglected pet. "I treated him differently than how he had been treated before. So, a love story began between us. He would only eat if he saw me there. If I wasn't there, you would feel he was upset. He would wait for me."

With an African lion, love can be tough. Ali said he's been bitten several times -- always during play --- and although he trusts Teymour implicitly, he always treats him with caution and respect. Ali's main concern during playtime is that one of Teymour's claws may accidentally come out. "He could tear my flesh," he said.

Ali manages the Ras Al Khaimah Wildlife Park, set up a few years ago under the patronage of Sheikh Taleb bin Saqr Al Qasimi, one of the Ras Al Khaimah's royals. He has been adopting neglected and mistreated animals for more than 15 years.
Many of those animals, including Teymour, are endangered or exotic, and were initially bought on the black market.

Owning an endangered animal as a pet is illegal in the United Arab Emirates, a signatory of the Convention on the Illegal Trade of Endangered Species (CITES). However, the trade in endangered wildlife remains a problem in the Gulf, where owning expensive exotic pets, especially big cats, is the ultimate status symbol. A rare white lion sells for around $50,000 on the black market, Abu Dhabi Wildlife Center.

None of the pet owners we approached would speak on the record about illegally purchasing exotic animals, but many amateur videos uploaded online attest to their popularity among young men in the Gulf.

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Everyone is born equally capable but lacks equal opportunity. Pierre Omidyar