Priceless. Give them a medal.

For what it's worth i will chip in with a bit of personal experience.

A now considerable  number of years ago a bloke who was as high as a kite on something attacked me with a knife in Warren Street tube station. After the initial shock of fending him off the adrenaline kinked in and I chased him. This was witnessed by a plain clothes policeman who also gave chase, apprehended the still knife holding attacker and in the struggle to disarm him put a hell of a beating on him. After pinning him to the ground a van turned up to cart him off and the kicking and biting which accompanied trying to get him in the van was reciprocated by the four officers now present with blows and kicks. I traveled in the van to the police station, a short journey during which a succession of verbal attacks and lashing outs were met more thumps. By the time he was literally thrown out the back of the van  onto the ground he must have been is a very bruised and bashed up stare. I didn't enjoy any of this - including the initial assault on me - but I felt he got what he deserved and if they had beaten him into a coma I would not have objected.

When giving my statement at the police station I was shown the knife. It was a very sharp nasty weapon and if he had lined me up accurately he could have killed me easily. At that point I had an overwhelming desire to find him and give it back to him point first.  

If this makes me a bad person so be it. He was eventually sent down.

Hi Harry -

Amazing story, and a great example of how our world view can become shaped by our own personal experiences.  

About 25 years ago, the Mrs. and I were walking from the theater back to our car, and were accosted by a nasty, drunken street person.   The threats were very ugly, but never rose about verbal.  But had I reacted with anything other than silently standing my ground, it could easily have become physical.  I was 30 years old, 6'4", 225, and in very good shape.   He was smaller, but he also had what looked like a metal pipe in his hand.  I was livid, my temperature was boiling, and I very much wanted to give the guy a beating.   The Mrs. grabbed my arm, and in a very calm voice whispered "If he hurts you, I will be defenseless".   We slowly made our way to the other side of the street, and moved on past him without incident.  I called 911 when we got home (no cell phone back then), but doubt that did any good...

But for years, I mentally replayed the scene, with me given the pathetic creature a good thrashing.  For years, I fantasized about him meeting that, or some other horrible fate.

It took a long time for me to finally mature to the point where I realized the Mrs. was 100% correct.   In addition to being drunk, he was probably mentally ill.   Attacking him would have been pointless, and wrong.  Eventually I let my anger go, and realized it was all about my ego and pride.  My only thought today is I hope the guy sobered up, got some help, and got off the street....before someone else killed him.  

I consider myself fortunate that this was the one and only time in memory where I felt physically threatened.  But to be honest, I am pretty sure that if that confrontation had become physical, then my views and attitudes towards the down and out would be very different than they are today.

Hook

Yikes. 

On our visits to the Kruger Park, we have never the left the safety of the rental car, except on the few occasions where we spent the night in one of the rest camps.   Once had a mother elephant mock charge the car, and that was plenty scary enough...

So, the obvious question Tony:  did you stare the lion down, and finish your wee? 

Hook

and employ a more observant guide.... 

John

I was once on a bush walk in Etosha when we had a 5 minute eyeball to eyeball with a lion,  then his nerve broke & off he went.  Nice nuts.

The Mrs. just reminded me of a lion story from our first visit to South Africa in 1985.

Her brother-in-law's sister lived in Malelane, next to a huge private farm that, among other things, raised lions to stock the park.   This was back in the bad old days of apartheid, and of the Mozambique civil war.  There was no fence between the South African and Mozambican sides of the Kruger Park, so lots of refugees tried to cross the park to escape the violence.   A lot of times they poached lions.  Other times, they were poached by lions.  

Anyway, this farm had a small pride of lions in a large, fenced enclosure. The brother-in-law wanted to impress his American counterpart on his first visit, and arranged for me to watch the lions being fed.

A couple of the farm workers went through a gate, and quickly tied a recently killed rooibok (impala) to the trunk of a tree using a steel cable.  Moments after they closed the gate to the enclosure, two females came out of the bush and started tugging on the carcass.  A couple of minutes later, the much bigger male lept from the bush and after a brief tussle,  chased them away.   The male grabbed the rooibok, leaned back on his rear legs, and whipped his head and body to one side.   Amazingly, the cable snapped with loud twang.   And off he went into the bush with his "kill".

I was shocked by what I saw, and so was the farmer.   We were just on the other side of the fence, no more than 20 feet away.  He said that this had never happened before.  One of the workers retrieved the cable to show me that it was in good shape (it was steel, maybe a 1/4" thick).   The funny thing was, the farmer was very apologetic, and thought he had cheated me out of a good show -- it was all over in just a couple of minutes.   I reassured him that seeing the male's display of strength was one of the best shows I had ever seen...in fact, it was freaking amazing.

Hook