The Goddess of the Moon

A while back, I spotted a mural in Oakland's Chinatown: Chang'e, the Chinese goddess of the moon.

I have read many versions of her story. For me, the most poignant is that she exiled herself to the moon using an elixir of immortality out of love for her husband, although it meant they could never be reunited. Other versions are darker, less favorable to her, and used more as warnings.

In any case, space fans may be familiar with her for two reasons. First would be the recent Chang'e 1-5 (and counting) lunar orbiter, lander, rover, and sample return spacecraft. The Chinese have made remarkable steps forward in uncrewed exploration of the moon, especially the previously-unexplored far side.

The other reason is this goofy (and very of-its-time) exchange between CapCom (and fellow astronaut) Ron Evans and astronaut Mike Collins during the Apollo 11 mission - the kind of "reading news to the crew" moment that often irritated the astronauts in space, who were trying to get work done, but nevertheless supplied some color to journalists covering the space program.

095:17:28 Evans: Roger. Among the large headlines concerning Apollo this morning, is one asking that you watch for a lovely girl with a big rabbit. An ancient legend says a beautiful Chinese girl called Chang-O has been living there for 4,000 years. It seems she was banished to the Moon because she stole the pill of immortality from her husband. You might also look for her companion, a large Chinese rabbit, who is easy to spot since he is always standing on his hind feet in the shade of a cinnamon tree. The name of the rabbit is not reported.

095:18:15 Collins: Okay. We'll keep a close eye out for the bunny girl.

(from NASA’s Apollo Flight Journal)

And the rabbit does have a name... Yutu.