NASA Comes to Gdansk

Last Monday was a Polish holiday so the British School was closed. The Monday before that we were in Germany so the kids did not go to school. And today we ditched school yet again! Actually, we just switched days this week, they will go tomorrow instead. A fantastic opportunity popped up that we could not say no to.

An American astronaut, Steve Robinson, was visiting Gdansk today. He was speaking in a large auditorium at Gdansk Politechnika. In fact, Myles got to introduce him!

The auditorium was jam packed. There were people sitting and standing in the aisles. I was thinking to myself that this would never fly in the US (to heck with fire codes)! We were considered VIPs (wowza!) and we got to sit right up front.

Dr. Robinson went on a space station mission this past February and was there for almost two weeks. He did not do a space walk on this past mission, but he has twice before. His presentation was fascinating with spectacular photos. He talked about what it was like in the international space station.

On this most recent mission, six American astronauts went on the Space Shuttle Endeavor and met up with five others who were already at the space station. Two are American, one is Japanese and two are Russian. He talked about lots of different things about space travel, and we enjoyed his presentation very much. Here is more information on Steve Robinson.

When he was finished with his presentation there was a question and answer session. Imagine my fear when Trey's hand shot up. I needn't have worried. When Dr. Robinson called on Trey, sitting cutely in the front row, Trey asked, "What language do you speak at the Space Station?" What a smart question! Turns out that everyone at the Space Station is fluent in English and Russian. Who knew? Someone asked him if he thought there was a possibility of intelligent life out there somewhere. I liked his answer. He said that the vastness of the universe is incomprehensible. So, it is certainly possible, maybe even likely, that there is something else out there. But because the universe is so vast, if other life does exist, it is highly unlikely that we will ever know about it.

There were many questions from the audience that were answered by Dr. Robinson. There would have been more but they ran out of time. There were television cameras and newspaper reporters there, and many cameras flashing throughout the presentation. I think no one expected the large amount of interest that our American astronaut generated.

We were able to meet him and shake his hand. I was only somewhat offended when he said, "Nice to meet you, mom," to me. I'll just say it's a good thing he was nice looking! I was able to snap this picture at the very end.

It's not as clear as I would have hoped but I was lucky to get a picture of him with my kids at all. Awesome!