Besides that England is a lovely country, I like spending time here because a lot of my friends live here. I’m mostly staying in Portsmouth with one of them – Edd, but every now and then we travel through the country, mostly to London, to see the others. This varied group of people met through Galaxy Zoo, which led to a lot of (more or less official) meet-ups.
Last Sunday we broke our record. With approximately 35 people from all over the world, we came to Greenwich to get a special tour around the Royal Observatory. And to have fun in the pub afterwards of course. Besides some of my best friends located in England, I met new faces (some of whom I had spoken to online though) from the USA for instance. It was also a good opportunity for a lot of members of ‘the Zoo’ to get to know the founders of this project (i.e. the ‘Zookeepers’). This first picture, of almost the whole group, was taken near the Meridian Line. Credit to Mr Jules.
Afterwards we found the pub which we knew had enough space for all of us, but still turned out to be very cosy, at the foot of the hill where the Sun was shining: Kings Arms. We sat in the garden, late after when the sky turned dark, enjoying each other’s company. The people working there are very friendly by the way, I can really recommend it. Here’s two pictures of that evening. The first was taken by the guy who goes by the nickname of BP and you can see Weez and Adam in the left corner (so glad you guys made it!). The three guys in the middle, from Illinois, are the technical geniuses backstage of the project. The picture with Edd and me was taken by Paddy.
The American guys didn’t all just come over to meet us ‘Zooites’ that Sunday. The team had a conference until Wednesday. With Edd officially being a zookeeper too, he was there on Monday and Tuesday as well. Tuesday evening I went to pick him up and together with the team we took a boat trip over the Thames – which I absolutely loved – and where I took this picture, showing a different angle of Tower Bridge. Edd and I stayed in the Hilton hotel nearby that evening, as I was invited to the last day of the conference the day after.
The Wednesday part of the conference was about citizen science in general, which was very interesting and had a workshop part in it for educators (which explains my role in it). As an example of citizen scientists, Chris invited my friends Jules and Tommy as excellent speakers and their talks were broadcasted through the internet. A bit to my surprise, I was announced to say a few words too, as discoverer of Hanny’s Voorwerp, which is maybe only a small example of what a success ‘the Zooniverse’ is and will be. I took the following picture from the audience, during the panel discussion with Jules and Tommy to the right and (zookeepers) Jordan and Pamela from the USA on the left. In the background you can see the group picture from Greenwich.
After this exciting day, we ended up in the Kings Arms again, where the interesting conversations continued. It was nice to have a look backstage, to see what they’ve planned for the future and to share thoughts on it. For me personally it was also good to find out what is happening on the educational front and how teachers will use citizen scientists (projects) in their classrooms. But besides that, it was good to finally meet Jordan and Steven (who managed to stay out of a lot of pictures I’m afraid) and to see Kevin, Arfon and Pamela again. Here’s a picture of Pamela Gay and me in the pub, taken by my wonderful friend Tommy (who managed to find ice cream at London Waterloo). Thanks all for the amazingly good times already and see some of you tomorrow, for a less official meet-up!
7 Comments
Nice comments & photos Hanny.
I probably didn’t mentioned it, but we have a Dutch school here in Woking, mostly for Shell BP, who had offices here in Woking. Though, I think the offices are closed, the school is still going strong. (I had a Dutch swimming teacher friend, though I got her Dutch name spelt wrong, English spelling, on her Christmas card.) I’ve got quite a few photos of Amsterdam/Rotterdam on my website.
Thanks John, that’s cool.
Oh and we had another nice meeting didn’t we
Hi Hanny!
Lovely to see you all. Thank you for your write-up on your trip over here. Great pictures all. Nice one of you, Hanny, with Pamela. (Sorry, I missed you guys again! Even if only to say hello)
That group shot, over at the Observatory is excellent.
Best regards Hanny
mahesh
Thank you Mahesh.
You have too much fun Hanny! I too hope to meet Pamela soon as she is supposed to be in the San Francisco bay area this month. Cheers!
Hiya Ted! It was indeed a lot of fun! Wish you the same!
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