GLOOMY SKIES. There is a disappointment condensing out of the air as the stargazers stare at the blank clouds. Months of anticipation, marking the calendar, asking others to mark the calendar (and after no small amount of driving for Penangites, a whole 40 minutes, to get to a dark spot), has brought about a December night that promises a spectacular deluge of meteors – The Geminids Meteor Shower. But the clouds had rolled in, obscuring the last star from the night sky. What a killjoy.
“Ping!”
The speaker connected to an array of jumbled wires and a satellite dish goes off. As each meteor burns up behind the unyielding clouds, the contraption pinged once. A crowd starts to gather around the operator of the speaker, “What of the pings?” The device, a radio telescope, looks a wildly different beast from images of the tubular, tripod-mounted optical telescopes that often blaze news reports on solar eclipses.
Of the assemblage of spectacular wonders Penang plays host to, an obliging weather is not among them. Our temperate tropical climate is typified by loyal clouds and a dusty atmosphere, and much stargazing ends up being a night of frustrating cloud-gazing.
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