The world is buzzing with talk about the Chinese space program, for on the 3rd of November 2011, the unmanned Shenzhou 8 craft, launched earlier this week, made contact with the 8.5-ton Tiangong-1 (Heavenly Palace) space lab at 1729 GMT. The union occurred 343 kilometers (213 miles) above Earth, over China itself.
What does it all mean? Are we in for another space race? Or endless rounds of paranoia and xenophobia? Who will control the high ground? Who will open the first space hotel? Who will set up the first base on the Moon? Who will plant the first flag on Mars? Who will first mine the asteroid fields and make a fortune? Who will be the first to hit the interstellar brick road?
All the rhetoric revolves, in varying degrees of fearfulness and excitement, around the biggest question of all - will we ever seriously get off this rock?
Anyway, with this particular dah bien-hwa, it might be time to brush up on my Mandarin. In the meantime, I have an overwhelming urge to sing the theme from 'Firefly'.
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