Well, I think it’s newsworthy, Part I
typed for your pleasure on 27 October 2005, at 7.57 pmSdtrk: ‘Very friendly’ by Throbbing gristle
First otaku in space? Yes. But it’s okay, cos he’s cosplaying as someone cool.
Space geek to orbit in cartoon outfit
AFP, October 13, 2005
TOKYO: A Japanese Internet whiz is tipped to become the world’s fourth space tourist — and he wants to orbit the earth dressed as an ace pilot from a hit Japanese animation series.
The candidate for the $US20 million trip is Japanese investor Daisuke Enomoto, a 34-year-old former board director of the Livedoor Internet firm headed by flamboyant entrepreneur Takafumi Horie, local media said.
Enomoto has already passed medical checks and started flight training for a trip in late 2006, Jiji Press news agency reported.
Enomoto said in January that he was likely to be the first Japanese to make a paid space trip.
“I’m planning to do something amusing,” he wrote then on his website.
If he gets Russian approval, Enomoto said he wanted to dress up on the trip as “Char Aznable”, a character in the popular “Gundam” hero robot series of animation whose name is inspired by French singer Charles Aznavour.
Enomoto describes himself as a “Gundam otaku” (geek).
The third civilian to pay for a space flight, US millionaire businessman Greg Olsen, returned to Earth this week in a Soyuz capsule.
The 60-year-old American paid Space Adventures US$20 million for a seat aboard the capsule and eight days of gazing down at the Earth from the International Space Station, 370km up.
He was preceded into space by two other millionaire tourists, American Dennis Tito in 2001 and South African Mark Shuttleworth the following year.
DON’T LET HIM DO IT!! HE’LL HIJACK THE SHUTTLE AND DROP A COLONY ON AUSTRALIA!! Heh heh, little Gundam joke there.
Actually, Enomoto-san, during the inevitable filming of you tumbling round the shuttle in your Char outfit, I’ll give you $50 if at any point you shout ‘Sieg Zeon!’
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October 27th, 2005 at 9.58 pm
That is frigging hilarious. As long as he has a good costume though.
October 30th, 2005 at 9.15 am
I wanna be a SPACE MAN!
I wanna hock a loogie on humanity!