This recent podcast from Jeff & Casey about airport security reminded me of our current relocation ”issues”. Thing is, we have two guinea pigs at home. Yeah, the same fluffy animals as in G-Force. And apparently it’s next to impossible to move them to another country in an airplane. Dogs? No problem. Cats? No problem. You can take those as hand luggage provided you use an appropriate bag. But for guinea pigs, niet, verboten, forget it.
Of course we got a bit puzzled by this apparently bizarre racism against those cute, innocent rodents. So we asked. It turns out guinea pigs are forbidden in airplanes because they “could escape and eat the cables”. That’s it, that’s the only answer we got.
Hmmm. I don’t know. Are you telling me that the integrity of the airplane can be jeopardized by attacking a maverick cable in a corner, left so unprotected that it is vulnerable to a fucking guinea pig ?!
July 25th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Yeah, we had two guinea pigs too when we moved from Canada to the US and they had to go with our luggage. As opposed to cats and dogs, guinea pigs cannot take sedatives, so the trip was extremely stressful to them.
July 25th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Sounds like you are going to have to put them up for adoption… or, I’m sure there are ways to ship live animals, pet stores have to do it. Could be awful expensive for an inexpensive pet.
Any idea where you are going to end up at?
July 26th, 2009 at 5:44 am
John: I have some ideas where we’re going to end up, yes. But from the 19 original options there are about only 3 left, and the final choice is not made yet.
Maybe we’ll take the one less stressful for the animals, that would be awesome. Like, sending an email to company X afterwards saying: “Sorry, can’t move to your country, your airlines refuse to fly guinea pigs. I know you had this great relocation package, annual bonus and whatever, but what about the really important issues? No guinea pigs? No deal!”
July 28th, 2009 at 6:26 am
http://gosouthamerica.about.com/od/cuisine/a/cuy.htm
(sorry Jasmina!)
March 25th, 2010 at 7:30 pm
Hi, so maybe this is unappreciated, but i’m moving with two guinea pigs in a week and everyone is telling me they’re going to die. It seems like there are two of you who have tried it and I just want to know what happened. did your pigs live?
April 7th, 2010 at 1:45 am
Ah, sorry Felix, we gave the guinea pigs away before relocating. So I don’t know if they would have survived…