Last week, I hobnobbed with all the “who’s who” of Seattle’s Japanese community. My conversation partner invited me to be his guest at a formal reception at the Japanese Consulate for the most recent addition to the list of Japanese astronauts—Akihiko Hoshide.
When we arrived at the Consulate, it was a little different than we had imagined. Nearly everyone else there was dressed in a full suit and jacket. The Consulate itself was not a large office building, but rather a very charming Tudor-style mansion, with a garden in the back overlooking the Sound. The room where the reception was being held contained about a hundred fancy chairs, a grand piano, a large buffet table featuring a gourmet mix of traditional Japanese cuisine, and a handful of caterers, wandering around offering people drinks. We had arrived fairly early, so we grabbed a couple of drinks and went outside to the garden, to enjoy the view and avoid some of the suffocating atmosphere.
Finally we gathered up our courage and found seats right in the front row—right behind Mr. Hoshide himself, in fact. The Japanese Consulate-General introduced Mr. Hoshide, in a long and carefully-prepared English introduction. He told of Mr. Hoshide’s birth in Tokyo, his early few years in New Jersey, his visit to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida when he was four years old that first hooked him on the idea of space flight, his return to Japan and education in Singapore, and joked about his name (a pun for “to the stars”) being fate.
Mr. Hoshide himself had a video presentation showing—from take-off to touch-down—his trip to the International Space Station. He narrated it himself, describing the purpose of his mission—to add a new Japanese-designed module (room) to the space station—and sharing amusing anecdotes about the flight and the experience. I had previously thought that the primary reason people went into space nowadays was just to walk around and stuff, so it was fascinating to me how his two weeks on the space station were packed solid with important things to do (from repair work to adding the new module to the station to all sorts of things) nearly every hour of the day.
Afterwards, the chairs were cleared away and a toast was announced. Shouts of “kanpai” filled the air as glasses were lifted, and the astronaut was given a cheer of celebratory congratulations. At that point a line started for the food, but N. and I sought out Mr. Hoshide’s wife. N. had earlier mentioned that he had glanced at Mr. Hoshide’s face during the video of the rocket launching into the air, and he had a look of sublime rememberance in his face. I mentioned that his wife must have similarly been remembering the experience, and it was probably a less sublime experience for her!
So N. and I managed to chat with her for quite a while about her thoughts on the flight—all in Japanese, of course! I understood the general topics of conversation, which was encouraging, but I must confess I didn’t add much myself. We got a chance to talk at length on a number of different subjects, until finally she was called away for pictures. N. and I waited patiently and we too had our pictures taken! I had never imagined that I would someday have my picture taken with somebody who had been to outer space. It was actually quite thrilling!
One last highlight of the evening—my old Japanese teacher (あかさか先生) was there! I spoke with her, half in Japanese, half in English, talking about the presentation and catching up in general.
All in all, it was a thoroughly unique, enjoyable, exciting experience and opportunity. ありがとうございました。
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Whoa. So cool!