Today, i and a few friends arrived in Los Angeles where we will wait for our flight to Tahiti tomorrow. On the flight from Calgary, an Asian flight attendant writes down the words for eclipse: "ri shi" (日食) in Mandarin, "yut sick" in Cantonese, and "ni shokku" (日食)in Japanese. The excitement grows.
Steve Barnes, who was with me on the last two eclipse trips, and Alan Dyer who planned the 2008 eclipse trip with me out of Cambridge Bay, and i had lunch together in our 1960-era Travelodge near LAX. The jets roar off from the nearby airfield. I wonder where all those people are destined. How many eclipse chasers are on those flights. Murray and Joanne Paulson left this afternoon for Tahiti -- we connected briefly by cell just before their flight. Others are coming in... a fellow from Whitehorse, a guy from Montreal, a couple passing through from Chile, and many unseen and unknown faces, all heading to the South Pacific to stand in the shadow of the Moon. A friend from China texts me... i Skype with another... They know there is something in the air. They feel my excitement. They know many people are traveling great distances to see the eclipse. They wish they could be there; i wish they could be there, too!...
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