Web-based Messages From The Sea to Shanghai will Connect Two Ocean Expeditions -- 600 Years Apart
July 8 - 14, 2005
Two ocean expeditions, one in 1405 and another in 2005, are 600 years and oceans apart, but are now connected by the voice of a Chinese scientist on the Worldwide Web.
Beginning July 10, a series of four daily messages will be recorded in Chinese by Dr. Cai Minghong at sea in the Artic Ocean, and posted below, with English texts. Dr. Cai's messages will be played daily for visitors at NOAA's exhibit space in Shanghai at the Zheng He Ocean Voyages Exhibition & International Marine Expo.
In late June, scientist Cai traveled from his work as a Chemical Oceanographer at the Polar Research Institute of China in Shanghai, to sail with an international team of 46 scientists on " The Hidden Ocean, Arctic 2005," a month-long NOAA-sponsored expedition to the Arctic Ocean in an area that has been hidden by sea ice for most of each year.
A week later, NOAA employees headed to the Shanghai exhibition to participate in a series of ocean policy meetings and to exhibit materials around the theme of "Building a Global Observing System." The exhibition in Shanghai is named for famed Chinese navigator Zheng He, and comes on the 600th anniversary of the first of his seven epic ocean voyages from China to the South Pacific, Indian Ocean, Taiwan, Persian Gulf and Africa.
NOAA’s exhibit will reach an audience of senior Chinese political leaders, representatives from all national government marine resource organizations and ocean science institutions, and large numbers of the general public with estimates of up to 30,000 visitors a day.
Dr. Cai joined the “Hidden Ocean” team to help measure the diversity of life so as to build a baseline of data against which change may be measured in an area of warming and ice melt over the last four decades.
Audio Messages from Dr. Cai Minghong
Click on the links below for daily messages recorded in Chinese, along with an English text translation.
1. 
Introduction
4. Cooperation
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