Melvin Durai
Atourist named Pablo Garcia recently shared an Instagram video that he titled, “India has the best surprises.” The video, taken from an auto-rickshaw travelling down a busy road in Bangalore, shows another auto-rickshaw carrying a fairly large passenger: a calf. The calf is sticking its head out while being held by someone in the backseat. It’s not everyday that you see a cow — even a baby cow — being transported in an auto-rickshaw, so the video was widely shared and received many likes and comments. My favourite comment was this: “Why should dogs have all the fun?” Indeed, another video shared on Instagram shows a dog sitting calmly on the roof of an auto-rickshaw as it travels down a busy street in Pune.
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Don’t ask me why the dog was on the roof. Perhaps the auto didn’t have enough space for it, or perhaps the dog just wanted to do something that dogs don’t often get to do: look down on humans. Dogs have been known to travel in every mode of transportation possible. Many of them routinely travel in cars, of course. They love to put their heads outside the window and feel the breeze. They especially love spotting other dogs on the street and barking at them: “Ha ha! You’re walking!” Dogs have also travelled on motorcycles, on buses and trains, and on bullock carts. They’ve taken many flights, mostly on planes, but also on helicopters. The only type of travel that dogs do not routinely attempt is space travel.
Dozens of wealthy people have become space tourists in recent years by spending $450,000 or more for short trips into space, but dogs do not have that kind of money. It’s only a matter of time, of course, that a billionaire takes his pooch on a space flight. Whichever dog becomes the first canine space tourist will be following in the footsteps of Laika, the first dog in space. Laika was a stray mongrel taken off the streets of Moscow and sent into space aboard a Sputnik 2 spacecraft in 1957, becoming the first animal to orbit the Earth. The Soviets were using dogs to observe the effects of spaceflight on living creatures.
Unfortunately, Laika did not survive — she died of hyperthermia during the flight. But she will always be remembered as a pioneer of dog space travel. If dogs ever create a Canine Space Agency, you can bet there’ll be a statue of Laika outside the headquarters. I’ve tried to tell my dog, Lulu, about Laika, hoping it will inspire her. I don’t want her to travel into space — I just want her to travel down the road in a car. But Lulu has a fear of cars that I just can’t overcome. Whenever we want to travel with Lulu, we have to struggle to get her into our car. She pulls back on her leash and tries desperately to run away. If we do manage to get her into the car, she sits nervously in the backseat, drooling continually, looking like a death-row inmate being driven to the gallows. If we give her something to eat, even a special treat, she doesn’t touch it. Some humans suffer from a fear of flying. My dog suffers from a fear of riding. I’ve shown her videos of dogs travelling blissfully in cars, trains and planes, but Lulu just gives me a look that says, “You expect me to believe that you didn’t create this with AI?”
