Lulu has been terrified of snakes all her life. But strangely, her oldest son has been obsessed with them since he was two. So to understand his fascination, she called a snake expert who might also be one of the least afraid people on Earth: Gowri Shankar Pogiri.

As a kid in Bangalore, India, Gowri was his neighborhood's resident snake-catcher — wrangling seven-foot snakes and motorcycling into the sunset with the serpent draped around his neck so he could release it back into the wild. In college, he'd skip school to look at snakes for hours at the zoo.

And the day he met his first king cobra? He became completely entranced. He started working as a professional herpetologist, and became one of the first researchers to track king cobras in the wild. He’d spend his days in the rainforests of India, following the giant snakes as they climbed trees, swam across streams, and hunted prey. Until one day, when a dramatic encounter with a king cobra nearly ended his life.

That remarkable story, plus a last-minute marriage proposal, a heroic bag, and how the only thing that Gowri is truly scared of might just be what Lulu, and all of us, are most afraid of, too.

Terrestrials was created by Lulu Miller with WNYC studios. This episode was produced by Alan Goffinski with sound design by Mira Burt-Wintonick. Sarah Sandbach is our Executive Producer. Our team also includes Ana González, Tanya Chawla, Natalia Ramirez, and Joe Plourde. Fact checking by Sophie Samiee.

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