Iam sitting by my window in my hotel room far away from Nigeria. The long glass window pane is crying with droplets of rain. Wide awake at 6:30 in the morning, I watch, mesmerised, as crystal droplets drizzle down with such amazing choreography.
One fat clear crystal droplet falls on the window from the top and makes its way down in frizzy tiny drizzles in a straight uninterrupted line all the way to the end of the window. I marvel at nature and sit glued to the window which in the dodgy light of dawn has become an artistic masterpiece.
I am momentarily distracted by a woman in the building opposite who has arrived pretty early in her curtain-less office of similar high windows. She checks her computer and settles into a chair rather exasperatedly. Her top is a brighter orange. I return to my window pane which is still in tears and my phone beeps. It’s a text from my colleague, NTA’s economic correspondent and newscaster with NTA News 24, Cliff Ayozie. His text had come into my phone at 5:36 am and I had clearly missed it. The window, the rain, the tears. I cannot see Cliff but his text was heart-rending.
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Sad, teary, painful. Cliff had just lost his beloved wife of 14 years, Joy Ngozi Ayozie. My heart goes out to Cliff. I share the grief, our common humanity. Our mortality. May Joy’s soul rest in peace and may the Lord grant Cliff the fortitude to bear the loss.
Before then, I had read at about 5:00 am an excerpt from astronaut Chris Hadfield’s new book, You are here: Around the world in 92 minutes, which is so profound that I dare to share.
“Those wonders are endless. My final space mission lasted five months, from December 2012 to May 2013, yet I never tired of looking out the window. I don’t think any astronaut ever has, or will. Every chance we have, we float over to see what’s changed since we last went around the Earth. There’s always something new to see because the planet itself is rotating, so each orbit takes us over different parts of it. Every crossing of the Pacific, every landfall, brings different weather and vegetation and lighting. And as the seasons change, sunlight, snow and new plant life create new patterns, the world over.
“During 2597 orbits of our planet, I took about 45,000 photographs. At first my approach was scattershot: just take as many as possible. But soon, I began to think of myself as a hunter, silently stalking certain shots. Some eluded me: Brasilia, the capital of Brazil; Uluru in Australia. Travelling at 28,000km/h, the margin for error is very slim. Miss your opportunity and it may not arise again for another six weeks.
“Over time, my ability to understand what I was seeing improved. I started to look forward to certain places and lighting conditions, in the way you love to hear a favourite piece of music. I began to get nature’s sly jokes: rivers that looked like letters of the alphabet, pieces of land that resembled animals. I became more adept at noticing and interpreting the secrets Earth was discreetly revealing. My ability to photograph what I was seeing also improved. I started to -figure out how to compose a shot in a way that draws attention to particular features and textures. I didn’t think of myself as the next Ansel Adams, but I didn’t want my pictures to look like satellite images, either. I wanted them to have a human element, to express a point of view.
“Like many astronauts, I felt compelled to try to communicate what I was learning, so from orbit I began posting photos on Twitter and other social media sites. The immediacy of the reactions and interactions, the collective sense of wonder, made me feel as connected to our planet and to other people as I ever have, even though I was floating 400km above Earth in the company of just five other human beings.”
When Chris Hadfield asked people on earth what they wanted to see, what photos he should take, the resounding response was people wanted pictures of their hometown. How human can that be, really? That we all yearn for the same thing. Our common humanity.
With -192 photographs and his decision to donate the proceeds of the book to the Red Cross, Chris Hadfield is not only the most famous astronaut in the world but now in retirement he has to be one of the most admired men in the world going to space, taking pictures of our hometowns, sharing them with us. Gosh, that’s awesome!
I can add nothing more to all of this. He says it all for all of us. An astronaut can see the whole world in orbit and he shares his testimony. Last word from him: we are all the same in spite of our colour, our heights and weight. Same eyes, same ears, same mouth, same voice. We are, if we just stop to think, just the same people with the same pain, the same fears, the same joy. A common humanity!
Eugenia Abu
