TRAVEL DIARY: Friday, November 3, 2006

11:36 AM
Posted by jodi rose

checked out the wooden tardis in potent exhibition on now at first draft, then motorbike ride to gail’s cd launch at lanfranchis for excellent night of sonic textures and julian’s wild rock-star sound art set. talking about the irania woman space tourist – just need a spare 20 million for that trip – leon tells me of a picture showing the recently landed cosmonauts on their post-space couch in Kazakhstan, grinning hugely and smoking cigars while waiting to re-aclimatise after being in zero gravity. looked for it on google but instead found this selection of art inspired by Sergei Krikalyov’s sojourn in space on Mir after the collapse of the USSR left him stranded. Definitely need some gravity rehabilitation myself.

After landing:

Crew should not get up quickly from their seats to leave the Descent Module. They are advised to stay in the couch for several minutes and only then stand up. In doing that, they should limit head and eyes movement and avoid excessive motions, proceeding slowly. They and their body should not take up earth gravity in the upright position too quickly.

Sergei Krikalyov on the space station Mir

In 1992, Cosmonaut 3rd Class Sergei Krikalyov was stranded on the Mir space station when the Soviet Union collapsed. The home he had blasted off from no longer existed and his new country, Kazakhstan, did not have the money, authority, or expertise to land him. While he waited to be landed he circled the planet 5000 times, spinning uselessly and trying to repair his leaky space station, all for a country that no longer existed.

Transit Lounge interweaves the stories of an eclectic group of characters orbiting the Lost and Found desk at a Douglas Adams-style Airport-at-the-End-of-the-Universe. The creation process was launched with each of the highly individual artists creating original works inspired by the plight of Sergei Krikalyov. A year later, the play’s dramaturge and director Rachel Ditor has arranged this material into a constellation of stories about the quest for home.

And finally, a gorgeous poem by Jay Ruzesky also inspired by Sergei:

From: Painting The Yellow House Blue. Concord, Ontario: House of Anansi Press, 1994.

this is for those people
that hover and hover
and die in the ether peripheries
– Michael Ondaatje, “White Dwarfs”

My name is Sergei and
my body is a balloon.
I want to come down. I
tie myself to things.
My eyes try to describe your
face, they have forgotten.
My ears echo your voice.
I am a star, you can
see me skating on
the dome of night. My blades
catch sun from
the other side of earth.
Days last an hour and a half.
No one else lives here.
My country has disappeared,
I do not know where home is.
I am a painter standing back.
I watch clouds heave like cream
spilled in tea, I see
the burning parrot feathers
of the Amazon forests,
ranges of mountains are
scales along the hide
of the planet, the oceans
are my only sky.
This is my refuge. There is
no one else near me.
Do you understand what that means?
Elena, I am
cold up here.
I hang over Moscow and
imagine you in our flat
feeding little Olga
in a messy chair.
When I drift out of signal range
I do things you
don’t want to hear about.
These feet do not know
my weight. A slow
balloon bounces off the walls.
I do not feel like I am flying.
I want to come back and
swim in your hair.
I want to smell you.
I want to arrive in the world
and know my place.
Think of me. I am yours adrift.
Let me describe
my universe: I can see for years.
– Jay Ruzesky

Linked from 30/11/2006 Journal