AT THE FAG end of 2021, a momentous event took place in the history of humans’ tryst with space travel. Nearly a decade after the US space agency NASA retired its space shuttle programme in 2011, Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa took off from the earth on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft for a 12-day self-funded round trip to the International Space Station (ISS). Accompanying him were veteran Russian cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin, who led the mission, and Maezawa’s production assistant and videographer, Yozo Hirano. Before embarking on that trip, Maezawa said, “I’m so curious, ‘what’s life like in space’? So, I am planning to find out on my own and share with the world…” And share he did.
But that trip was just a trial run for Maezawa’s bigger ambition. His bigger dream is to travel around the moon on an upcoming mission that he calls dearMoon, for which he has already
