Time magazine has released its annual list of the world’s most influential people. Under the category of leaders – next to people like Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and Benjamin Netanyahu – Swedish student and environment activist Greta Thunberg is found.
Small, shy, survivor of crippling depression, Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish girl skipping school to shame the world into addressing climate change, drew a parade of fans one Friday in February on a frozen square in Stockholm.
She has spoken for the UN Climate Panel, at the UN Climate meeting and she has had bilaterals with Angela Merkel, Marcron, UN Secretary General Guterres and even The Pope.
In its motivation, the TIME magazine compares, among other things, Greta’s involvement with the civil rights movement in the US during the 60s and 70s.
“Climate change is part of our reality, and young activists like Greta do everything in their power to prevent this by demanding a change,” the newspaper writes.
TIME:
“Greta Thunberg saw her power in us, and we in turn see our power in her. Fighting in her home country, Sweden, for a future free from pollution, environmental degradation and climate change, Greta is inspiring steadfast students and shaming apathetic adults”.
Astronaut Jessica Meir is now set to fly to the International Space Station for the first time in September, and Christina Koch, who is currently in space, has her stay onboard extended to an expected record-setting flight of 328 days.
Meir’s September launch to the station will mark her first spaceflight. The Caribou, Maine, native was selected as an astronaut in 2013, while serving as an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School/Massachusetts General Hospital. She holds a bachelor’s in biology from Brown University, a master’s in space studies from International Space University, and a doctorate in marine biology from Scripps Institution of Oceanography. And she is half Swedish! ??.
Time for another Swede in space. Astronaut Christer Fuglesang is a Swedish physicist and an ESA astronaut. He was first launched aboard the STS-116 Space Shuttle mission on December 10, 2006, at 01:47 GMT, making him the first Swedish citizen in space.
With Koch now scheduled to remain in orbit until February 2020, she will set a record for the longest single spaceflight by a woman, eclipsing the previous mark set by Peggy Whitson of 288 days in 2016-17.
“Astronauts demonstrate amazing resilience and adaptability in response to long duration spaceflight exposure,” said Jennifer Fogarty, chief scientist of the Human Research Program at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. “This will enable successful exploration missions with healthy, performance-ready astronauts. NASA is looking to build on what we have learned with additional astronauts in space for more than 250 days. Christina’s extended mission will provide additional data for NASA’s Human Research Program and continue to support future missions to the Moon and Mars.”
Source: Nasa
I am spending a few days this week in our Paradise, Boulouris-sur-mer by Saint Raphael in Provence, South of France.
Reloading the batteries and writing a few chapters on my new book.
I also take some time, especially mornings and evenings, to read a few novels that I have saved up over the last months, including books by favourite authors like Don Winslow and Simon Kernick.
We love this place, it is our favorite place on Earth.
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