NYC and Washington D.C.
Dear All,
I just got back from NYC and Washington D.C. on Jan 31 and would like to share with you an update on my space travels. Sorry for not having posted for a while, I have been quite busy (including all the traveling required by being an astronaut).
Unveiling Ceremony for Virgin Galactic White Knight 2 & Space Ship 2: On Wed 23rd Jan in the morning at the Power House of The American Museum of Natural History in Central Park West at 79th Street. Sir Richard and Burt Rutan, the inventor, showcased for the very first time, the detailed scale models of WhiteKnightTwo & SpaceShipTwo, demonstrating the technology and revealing the new design and livery.
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The Year Of The Spaceship Party: On Wed 23rd Jan in the night we attended this event at the Rose Center, which is part of the compound of the American Museum of Natural History. Sir Richard made a genuine and touching speech during the cocktail reception, thanking his parents and all of us involved, for our support and making our future dream come true, not only for ourselves, but our future generations. The party ended with almost everyone dancing bare-footed on the dance floor, till the early hours of dawn, I was told. Actually, my sister and I left a bit earlier thanthe bare-footed crowd viz. right after the Branson family.
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HK Press: Soon after hitting the hotel pillow at around 3:50 a.m., I received long distance calls from HK Apple Daily, TVB, ATV & Cable TV. The TV stations wanted to interview me live for the evening news in Hong Kong and apologised, knowing that it was around 3:50 a.m. in NYC and that I was in the sack already. I took all the interviews in the toilet of my hotel room, so that I wouldn't disturb my sleeping sister. I had to refrain from using the tap or flushing the toilet because I was being taped live!!
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University of Columbia: On Thursday Jan 24th, I was invited to be one of the guest speakers at their Business School in the University Of Columbia. I was invited to share my life as an Asian woman VG Founder to a class of students who were studying about businesses relating to luxury goods, branding, space tourism and Virgin Galactic. With 30 pairs of eyes staring down at me, wondering what they were really thinking, quite honestly, made me nervous. After sharing my autobiography with them and throwing some humour into it, I was able to make most of them laugh. I had previously been invited to be a guest speaker for the 10th Anniversary of the Hedge Fund that was held last September 12 in Hong Kong, but, no matter how many times I speak in front of an audience, I still get butterflies.
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All the best in The Year Of The Rat!!
Cheese...I mean, cheers!
Perveen Crawford
Virgin Galactic - Hong Kong Founder Astronaut