Hi,

Two new articles from me in the STV contest have gone up. I need you to read them and post comments on them (on the STV site) to help me…

One article is on our attitudes to space travel, sparked by me reading about the death of a cosmonaut from the 1960s, and the wife of a current astronaut giving birth while he was in space:

Astronauts article

The other article is about a Canadian singer called Justin Bieber tweeting about a personal appearance, which led to a crush. Because “his people” initially refused police demands to tweet telling the crowd to disperse, an executive at Def Jam records was arrested:

Power of Twitter article

Teddy x

Si il lasam acolo!:))

Hangtianyuan

Astronaut

Cosmonaut

According to Wikipedia, the word “astronaut” has a special translation in China: hangtianyuan (航天员). In Taiwan and Hong Kong, it is often called “taikonaut” (太空人). The later was invented perhaps by Chiew Lee Yih or Chen Lan. In fact, Chen Lan indicated in his blog that it was his invention. But who invented the word “hangtianyuan”? It was unknown for a long time.

On Oct 31, China’s father of space program Qian Xuesen (钱学森) died at the age of 98 sparked a huge amount of articles in memory of him. I myself wrote one too: “Father of Chinese Space Program Qian Xuesen Died“. One of the articles gives the answer: It was Qian Xuesen. According to the story told by the first Chinese astronaut Yang Liwei (杨利伟), Qian Xuesen favored the word “hangtianyuan” which translates “sailing personnel in space” literally. His reason was: In China, we used to distinguish the space (天), the sea (海), the sky (空). He believed that the word “hangtianyuan” made more sense.

Aviation Week has an obituary on Qian’s death. It says “According to the physicist Theodore von Karman, Qian was ‘an undisputed genius whose work was providing an enormous impetus to advances in high-speed aerodynamics and jet propulsion.’ But the U.S. government suspected him of communism and arrested him in 1950 — though the suspicion seems unfounded in light of his subsequent attempt to stay in the United States rather than go home and help China.” Finally in 1955, Qian was deported, “happy to go home and happily received by China. There he became the central figure in the creation and administration of a scientific and industrial complex which, with Soviet help in its early stages, grew from virtually nothing in 1956 to launching a satellite in 1970.”

(WIRED Science) – It’s not just NASA that’s hip to the social media game anymore. Now, the Russian space agency Roscosmos has one of its own blogging from the International Space Station.

The blog, as translated by Russia Today, includes pictures from the ISS — and covers a much different array of topics than you usually see in NASA press releases or Twitter feeds. A recent post detailed the “holy symbols” in the Russian area of the station, illustrated by photos of icons and crucifixes floating in zero gravity.

via Russian Cosmonaut’s Blog Much Funnier Than NASA | Wired Science | Wired.com.

Am fost într-un loc unde am primit costume de astronauti. Un nene ne-a povestit despre călătoriile cu racheta. Am sărit pe un fel de saltea ca să ne gândim cum e imponderabilitatea. Cuvântul ăsta l-a scris tati, e complicat. Am făcut si poze. Eu si Carina.

Harry and Horsie is an intergalactic journey of stellar friendship. After a restless night, Harry and his plush friend, Horsie, seek out the Super Duper Bubble Blooper. The Blooper’s bubbles freely flow until suddenly, they begin to buoyantly carry everything in their wake-including Horsie! As Horsie floats further into space, Harry sports his best cosmonaut gear and races his rocket towards the stars. Author Katie Van Camp’s weightless and fluid story is colorfully complimented by illustrator, Lincoln Agnew’s retro graphics. The “blooping” of Harry’s toy and the “zoom” of his atomic rocket splash across the pages in cosmic comicbook imagery. Van Camp’s story is an ode to every kid’s wish for a space odyssey which Agnew wonderfully renders in the poster art spirit of 1950’s sci-fi. Harry and Horsie shows that facing the final frontier may be a feat but going to the ends of the universe for a friend is truly heroic.

This past weekend I received a package from Montreal containing three author copies of a PistolPress anthology entitled The Future Hygienic.  This was a welcome surprise, as I had received no communication from the Pistol Press gang in many, many months and was concerned that the anthology would never see the light of day.  I was doubly psyched to see that a pal from back in the day, Miranda Mellis, was also in the anthology.  I would tell you to go buy a copy but there is no sign of it on the PistolPress site.  It has a nice feel, though, and is loaded with worthwhile material.

Oh, right.  I have a story in this anthology, entitled “A Woman in the Snow” – it’s the second part in my Cosmonaut trilogy.  Part One was published in the Columbia Journal a few years ago.  Don’t worry – you won’t understand Part Two any more having read Part One.

This is my proposal for a new cover for Ugo Litorina’s The Dream Factory, if and when anyone ever gets around to taking it off the shelf and printing a few million brand new copies. Of course, I have to admit it’s been a while since I last read this one, so I might have misremembered the color of the skies of Peregrine, homeworld of the Oneiromancers. Anyway, Factory’s the middle book of a trilogy which is itself the middle trilogy of a cycle of nine books about the Selenite space adventurer Esteban Volapuk (who had blue skin, by the way, ten years before the Draags of Le Planète sauvage). I should point out that this book shouldn’t be confused with the The Dream Factory: Alessi Since 1921 by Alberto Alessi, which is also a very good book, but is mostly about teapots, clocks, and collanders instead of spaceships, androids, and weird-shaped warps in spacetime.

See yesterday’s blog post to know how I was able to get these GREAT anecdotes from my Kazakh students…

Yessengeldy – I’m a person who loves sport till death. I used to do Judo, it is wrestling and I took part in these championships 3 times in my city and area.  To tell the truth, I didn’t succeed in them, but once I had a victory, I made a through on a main jppon.  It was a clear victory, people approved me, my friends were inciting: “Now it’s cool.”  This throw is called urivadzhe, one of my favorite ones.  So now I’m playing American football, soon we are going to have a game against Krygyzstan.  Yes, I’m glad about these sports events, but I should choose my position, whether linebacker or whether lineman.  I still can’t find my position maybe after watching the movie “Rudy,” I will choose.

Gaukhar D. – I have a dream that is unattainable for me now.  Maybe one day in the future I can make my dream come true, but I can’t do it right now even if I want it very much.  My dream is to be able to fly a plane, or in short, to be a pilot.  I want to have my own small and lovely plane where I can fly anywhere I want.  I like this feeling of freedom, when you are flying.  It makes you just feel like a bird.  I’m not afraid of heights and I want to fly.

Down side of dreams, unrealized dreams

Almas – My brother tried to enter an America’s MIT for three times, on the fourth year he graduated from another university, which is also very good.

Aizhan – I have never dreamed about that would be unattainable, I try to be realistic.  But I had a friend, who is 10 years older than me, who has been dreaming all his life to win something in a lottery, which I think is impossible.  And once he won a washing machine, which made him very happy.  But he never stops playing that, I think it’s crazy!

Diana – Every person has a dream, for someone it is good, for someone else it is not. I had a dream to become a cosmonaut, to go to the moon, but it was in my childhood.  Now I know that it was just a dream, not a good idea and not so real.

Ruslan – I had, no, I HAVE a dream to be a racer of Formula 1.  But, unfortunately, it is impossible to realize, because I have lost time, I should have been doing this sport from a very little age, but in future, I think I can have my own Formula 1 team, who knows…

Olzhas – My friend had a dream, he wanted to make his own time machine.  He saw it from a film and he really wanted to build it.  He very like this film with such machine.

Valerie – When I was small, I wanted to shoot from a gun, and this was an unattainable dream, because I couldn’t find these kind of sports by myself.  Parents didn’t allow me to do this because I am girl.  I wanted to be a master.  I didn’t attain this goal.

Aigerim O. – I had a dream to have my own flat at 18 or living in another city.  Now, when I’m living in another city with my aunt and sister, I don’t think that my dream was so clever, I really miss my home in Astana.  Independent life, adult life seems not so perfect as in childhood.

Our hero, Carl Sagan made the news today when he drunkenly crashed his ship of the imagination into the International Space Station today, injuring two astronauts.  NASA estimates the total cost to be “billions and billions”. Charles Bolden, the head of NASA was asked to put an exact figure on that and responded, “Fuck you!  We just lost the International Space Station, that thing is fuckin’ priceless!”  Sagan and his team of physicist-lawyers had no comment.  What Sagan was drinking isn’t for sure but some suspect that it might have been some kind of Romulan ale not yet banned until the future circa 2200 common era.  One thing is for sure, Bolden, head of NASA is absolutely pissed, “Man, this pisses me off!  Wait a second, I thought he was dead!” said Bolden.

Sagan hasn’t been in the news for over a decade. Some of you might be wondering who this man is. Carl Sagan is one of the most famous scientists in history, mostly due to his having invented astronomy.  Before Sagan, people just ignored the stuff in the sky because they couldn’t comprehend it.  There were special hats that people wore at night that kept them from having to see the stars or moon. Sagan set ‘em straight.  But he wasn’t just a scientist.

A Demigod Among Men

Carl Sagan also skeptically analyzed things such as UFO reports. He believed by Ockham’s razor that if there were flying saucers, then they were more likely man-made.

He demonstrated this fact by building his own flying saucer, which he called “the ship of the imagination.”  It was on this ship that he was able to film his series Cosmos in the 1970s.

The famed astronomer was an enthusiastic proponent of nuclear de-proliferation and environmental awareness.  To illustrate the dangers of these, he set off a chain reaction of nuclear explosions on a nearby inhabited world and created an artificial greenhouse effect baking a planet full of sentient (and delicious) invertebrates.

An inquisitive child once asked Sagan, “How do you know so Mr. Sagan?” The astronomers eyes got wide, and he said with gravity, “The Gods!” He stood there perplexed at the scientist who then explained that he had learned all about the cosmos from some gold tablets unearthed in his backyard.

Sagan once showed his disdain for astrologers. He dissected the pseudo-science point by point, ripping it logically to shreds.  Then he stabbed an astrologer to death on live TV.

One of his arguments that endeared him to the skeptical community was “the invisible dragon in my garage” which, as opposed to most thought experiments, was an actual dragon that lived in his garage, was incorporeal and gave off heatless fire.  It did eventually ravage Yorkshire in 1987 and had to be put down.

Sagan once described how vast the universe in an interview on 60 Minutes and midway through just trailed off and began licking a long, sharp knife.

Carl Sagan also kept his personal interests very distinct from his scientific pursuits so as not to cloud the interpretations of his science.  This was most masterfully done when he published (under the pseudonym Mr. X) a 300 page treatise about how hot his wife Ann Druyan is and with detailed photos to back up his assertions. “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence!” he said in regards to this.

After this latest debacle, the scientist got into his ship and floated away like a mote of dust, with a suspended license.

Last Time Carl Sagan Was Seen Before He Went Crazy And Disappeared In His Ship Of The Imagination

5 Centimeters per Second | Makoto Shinkai, 2007

I’ve little knowledge of anime filmmaker Makoto Shinkai, but after a little research it can be found that he owns quite a cult status in Asia. This could be the reason for the feverish hype that descended upon Japanese movie theaters in the Easter of 2007, when queues were formed around the block for just a glimpse of his latest project, 5 Centimeters Per Second. The film follows a young man named Takaki Tōno, whom we trail from youth to adolescence; witnessing everything inbetween. It is split up into three overlapping stories that trace the route of time – Ōukashō, Cosmonaut and Byōsoku 5 Centimeter – beginning in the early nineties and leading up to the year 2008. At little over an hour in total length, the film could in fact be confused with a three part miniseries, yet it is essential that each segment is watched subsequentially and so is perhaps best viewed as a whole. We open upon a conversation between Tōno and his young friend Akari Shinohara – at which point we learn the reason for the title. Five centimeters per second is the speed that cherry blossom petals fall. The two enjoy each others’ company, and it takes Akari’s parents to move away and take her too for the pair to realise the nature of their bond. After years apart and constant letters, Tōno takes a delayed train to meet Akari in rural, snow-bound Japan.

From introducing us to a spliced view of things in the first segment, Shinkai jumps forward in time with Cosmonaut. Tōno is now well into his teens and completing school at a serene, wind-swept town on the coast. He is the object of desire for young Kanae Sumita, whose perspective we watch this middle story from. No matter how obsessively she is in love wish Tōno, it his clear that his mind rests elsewhere. Eyes to the horizon, he fails to notice this and in the end Kanae settles for the heartbreaking decision of keeping her feelings to herself. This segment is permeated with some quite beautiful wide animation reminiscent of the great Hayao Miyazaki and his flawless landscapes. Indeed it could be said that Shinkai is the rising star to Miyazaki’s grand master. The final part of our triptych of tales is named Byōsoku 5 Centimeter (5 Centimeters Per Second), the title of the film itself. Here we find ourselves in Tokyo, 2008. Tōno has tried with much effort to let go of his memories of Akari by now yet is still finding it hard to shake her face from his thoughts. The movie ends as Tōno quits his job and returns home – stirring up these old memories with a glimmer of hope that he may see his first love once again. With an artform usually reserved for attacking the senses, Makoto Shinkai scupts a tender tale of young love with 5 Centimeters Per Second. Bathing every still in a shimmering, rose-tinted hue that does well to symbolise the intoxication of youthful romance.

Our Rating:

On the medical side of Tetrasomy 8p (Genetic Disorder)

Josephine took a trip to the neurologist on July 26.  The neurologist wanted to monitor her brain activity for a 48 hour period.  The process of attaching the 26 electrodes was less than wonderful, both for Josephine and Mom and Dad.

But after the procedure, Josephine became our little cosmonaut (see pictures above)!

No results yet from that test.  Next up is the brain MRI, which is scheduled for August 6.  This is another big test to give us some big answers – does Josephine have a corpus callosum (arched bridge of nervous tissue that connects the two cerebral hemispheres, allowing communication between the right and left sides of the brain) and does she have hydrocephalus  (water on the brain)?

Josephine has been experiencing, what I think to be petit mal seizures – vacant stares for a few seconds and head twitching in repetition of 2-4 movements.

This MRI will give us a better idea of her prognosis.  Every test leads to a new piece of the puzzle.  We may not always get the answers we want to hear, but it’s better to deal with what’s coming head on.  Denial is not our friend at this point.

Are electronic books just another example of making something more complicated just for the sake of it? Yes I know that’s sort of stating the obvious, and it’s not the sort of the thing the entertainment industy juggernaut wants to hear, but then they don’t care do they; it’s going to happen.

It’s like DVD. DVDs are OK, the picture’s pretty sharp compared to VHS, and the sound is a hell of a lot better. The only problem with them is that they’re not selling quite as much as they used to, we’ve replaced our knackered old video collection, and apart from the occasional boxset of The Wire and Gavin and Stacey, we’ve finished with our movies collection. So now they have convinced everyone that they need HD or Blu-Ray or whatever, so everyone needs to go out and buy everything all over again. Well they can fuck off, I’m not buying into any different formats – am I made of money?

Anyway, they reckon the same thing is going to happen to books and newspapers. It’s all very impressive in a techno way, if you’re a robot. But not if you’re human, and paper is a human sort of thing, where a TFT screen isn’t.

Why do we have replace everything with plastic and metal, and then pretend it’s progress? I’m reminded of the story of the NASA space programme, when they realised that pens weren’t going to work in low-gravity. They spent tens of millions of dollars on research to come up with a pen that would work for astronauts. What did the Russian comsonauts do? They used pencils.

Don’t get me started on our radio being switched over to digital whether we want to or not, else i shall get quite irate.

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I introduce a new character on Casual Gossip. His name is Shirtless Angry Russian Man Across the Street. I know, it’s a long name, but bare with me (misspelled pun intended). His apartment and balcony are directly across from my living room. He’s a smoker and frequently steps outside, which creates a series of awkward moments as he hangs over the railing, seemingly staring directly into my apartment. I’m not too weirded out by this, but my wife certainly is. To top it all off, he NEVER wears a shirt. It could be 50 degrees outside (freezing for Angelinos) and he’d still be flashing his man tits for all the world (or probably just us) to see. Oh yeah, and he weighs about 350 pounds.

So far, this is the intel we’ve been able to gather on Shirtless Angry Russian Man Across the Street.

1) He’s Russian.
2) He constantly agrues on the phone with his mother. (I know this because my wife speaks Russian and picks up angry tidbits here and there.)
3) He smokes.
4) He’s obese.
5) He hates gay people.

Now, the last of this list became apparent most recently. Living in a VERY gay friendly neighborhood, I’m used to the late night antics of the testosterone challenged. Last night was no exception as a group of gay hispanic men decided to settle a domestic dispute on the street between SARMAS’ (the abbreviation of our comrade) building and mine…at 4 a.m. I woke up and listened, wondering how long I should wait before screaming profanities out my window, when suddenly, SARMAS beat me to it. And with the eloquent tact that only a Soviet ex-pat could muster. “Shut the f*ck up or I call the cops!” he cried. Soon followed by, “F@GS!”

To my surprise, this was immediately succeeded by silence. I was expecting a flurry of high-pitched rebuttals but received nothing more than the quiet drone of the sprinklers outside our building.

All I have to say is watch your big fat hairy back, SARMAS. When the gays fall quiet, it only means one thing: revenge. It’s being plotted, and you’re surrounded. And The Casual Mafia ain’t the only wise guy operation in town. Oh no, there’s a far scarier one. It’s called The Gay Mafia, and they’re EVERYWHERE. One morning you’ll wake up with a feather boa wrapped tight around your neck, but it won’t be your typical costume attire. It’ll be an actual boa constrictor…with feathers. ‘Cause that’s how they roll.

Enjoy your last days on Earth, Shirtless Angry Russian Man Across the Street. I’ll be watching…

July 18, 1984: Svetlana Savitskaya became the first woman to perform an Extravehicular Activity, or spacewalk, during the Russian Soyuz T-12 mission.

Cosmonaut Mimobot USB

Billionaire Boys Club Astronaut T-shirt

Medicom Toy: Astronaut Snoopy

5 Centymetrów Na Sekundę
(秒速5センチメートル)

Gdyby przyjrzeć z bliska wszystkim dziełom Makoto Shinkai można by stwierdzić, że wszystkie jego filmy są takie same. Wszystkie obejrzałem w przeciągu dwóch dni dla poznania stylu animacji oraz formy opowiadania historii. W rezultacie można stwierdzić, że Shinkai ma wręcz boski dar do tworzenia animacji oraz lekkie, choć maksymalnie melancholijne reżyserowanie. Wszystkiemu można nadać formę pamiętnika, który łapie za serce i oczy. Może się wydawać, że wszystko jest tak idealnie, iż nie ma się czego czepić.

Najprościej określić twórczość Shinkai jako animowaną poezję. Wszystkie jego historie są opowiadane z perspektywy narracji bohaterów a same dialogi między nimi są już tylko oczywistym dopełnieniem. Historia zawarta w 5 Centymetrach… została podzielona na trzy akty. W pierwszym poznajemy Takakiego i Akari, którzy mają się ku sobie, choć los jest wobec nich dość niesprawiedliwy, bowiem zawsze są rozdzieleni; chodzą do różnych szkół, zmieniają miejsca zamieszkania etc. W związku z tym piszą do siebie listy, by utrzymać emocjonalną więź. Oczywistym jest jednak fakt, że na dłuższą metę nawet taka metoda nie oddala uczucia tęsknoty. Takaki postanawia więc pojechać pociągiem do miejsca zamieszkania Akari, by w końcu móc poczuć jej bliską obecność. W kolejnej części Takaki jest już uczniem ostatniej klasy liceum, kiedy to nadchodzi pora na wybór uczelni. Pojawia się Kanae – jest koleżanką z klasy Takakiego i jej problem polega na tym, że jest zakochana w Takakim… Trzecia część zamyka historię i trudno o niej napisać, by nie zdradzić za dużo istotnych szczegółów.

Gdyby chcieć opowiedzieć sobie na pytanie, o czym traktuje to anime, na usta ciśnie się słowo “miłość”. Shinkai na szczęście nie popada w schemat telenowel; wykorzystuje subtelnie poezję słowa i obrazu tworząc z tego dzieło, które urzeka pięknem życia, miłości i otaczającej nas natury. Można się przyczepić, że dzieła Shikai’ego nie są tradycyjną fabułą, gdzie następuje przyczynowo-skutkowy bieg wydarzeń. Być może dlatego, że to historia o uczuciach, które trudno okiełznać i które sprawiają, że bohaterowie trzymają się swoich przyrzeczeń na przekór losu. Idą wręcz na ślepo oddani uczuciu a reszta świata, pomimo całego swojego piękna, zdaje się być jedynie tłem.

Przyznam, że film musiałem obejrzeć dwa razy, bowiem przy pierwszym mój mózg skupił się wyłącznie na cudownej, szczegółowej do granic możliwości animacji. Sięgając po inne dzieła Makoto Shinkai’ego da się zauważyć, że również one mogą pochwalić się piękną warstwą wizualną a zaskakuje fakt, iż swoje pierwsze anime reżyser stworzył w domowych warunkach, za co się należą owacje na stojąco. Animacja to po prostu arcydzieło. Pocieszającym jest fakt, iż w dobie wszechobecnej animacji 3D nadal powstają takie cuda. Można zadać sobie pytanie czy tak perfekcyjna w wykonaniu warstwa wizualna może mieć jakieś błędy? Jest idealna, piękna i chwilami porażająco realistyczna. Dlatego też można jej zarzucić… brak stylu. Zastanawiałem się jakiś czas nad tym zarzutem, jednak nie przyszło mi do głowy nic, co by mnie przekonało do tego stwierdzenia. Być może dlatego, że jest perfekcyjna animacja… 2D i okiem fana anime taki styl animacji (czyli tradycyjna, ręcznie malowana) to jednak rzecz najpiękniejsza.

Jeśli chodzi o warstwę muzyczną; w filmie zarówno w wersji instrumentalnej jak i wokalnej można usłyszeć piękny utwór Yamazaki Masayoshiego – One More Time, One More Chance. Umiejscowiony pod koniec filmu stanowi cudowne podsumowanie całej historii i jednocześnie szybko wpada w ucho. Za pierwszym razem ten utwór wprawił mnie w sentymentalny nastrój, dlatego trudno odmówić mu uroku.

Yamazaki Masayoshiego – One More Time, One More Chance

5 Centymentrów Na Sekundę to film poezja. Wzruszający, emocjonalny i sentymentalny. Przepiękna animacja podparta komputerami zapiera dech w piersiach i nie pozwala o sobie szybko zapomnieć. To pozycja, do której można wracać co jakiś czas, by rozkoszować każdym aspektem filmu. Czy można nazwać film arcydziełem? Rewolucją nie jest, ale należy go pochwalić za to, że traktując o miłości nie popada w mdłą dramaturgię i po prostu przyjemnie się ogląda. Scenariusz nie jest skomplikowany, bo wystarczająco skomplikowane jest samo pojęcie miłości, które Makoto Shinkai potraktował bardzo… ludzko.

Polecam wszystkim a tym, którzy nie znajdują się w anime to idealna pozycja na to, że animacja potrafi być mądra, wzruszająca i najzwyczajniej w świecie piękna.

5 Centymetrów Na Sekundę
FilmWeb | IMDb | Azumi.net | Makoto Shinkai Fan Web