China is celebrating its 76th National Day (国庆节) and the Mid-Autumn Festival (中秋节) between October 1st and 8th. The National Day celebrates the formal proclamation of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China on October 1st 1949, while the Mid-Autumn Festival celebrates the end of the autumn harvest.
For the celebrations, Chen Dong (陈冬), Chen Zhongrui (陈中瑞), and Wang Jie (王杰) of the Shenzhou-20 mission onboard the Tiangong Space Station shared a message from the orbiting lab, with a translation as follows:
Chen Dong: This is my second time celebrating our motherland’s birthday in space. From witnessing the assembly of China’s Space Station’s three-module T-shaped configuration to its completion, and now seeing the space station’s applications yielding fruitful results. I deeply feel that these achievements are inseparable from the overall planning of the entire engineering system, and even more inseparable from the attention and support of the people of the whole country. From China’s Space Station, we wish our great motherland prosperity and strength, and wish the people of all ethnic groups happiness and health!
Chen Zhongrui: We have already spent five months in space and successfully completed four extravehicular activities. Every time I wear the extravehicular spacesuit and gaze at our motherland’s land from space, my heart is filled with pride and glory. Now, space travel has also become routine, witnessing the miraculous power of space exploration. Thank you to our great motherland for giving us the stage to pursue our dreams of flying. We will certainly live up to expectations and safeguard our people’s home in space.
Wang Jie: As the National Day holiday approaches, we who are in China’s Space Station have our hearts toward the sun. As a young aerospace worker, this space mission has brought me tremendous fulfillment. Please rest assured, motherland and people, we are feeling well in China’s Space Station. Next, we will continue to complete various scientific experiments and make all preparations to welcome the Shenzhou-21 crew. We will perfectly complete our part of the Shenzhou family’s space relay handover. From China’s Space Station, we wish our great motherland peace, prosperity and flourishing.
All three: The motherland is the light that illuminates everything. Our youth is dedicated to our great motherland. May our motherland’s tomorrow be even better! I love you, China!
All three (alternating sentences): Although we are in our space home 400 kilometers from Earth, our hearts always miss and care about our homeland. We always like to look out from the cupola, watching one home while paying attention to another home. Although Earth is always within our field of vision, with this longing and missing, in the eyes and hearts of the crew, it transforms from flat to three-dimensional, from silent to vivid and alive. Motherland, I am proud of you.
If there are any problems with this translation please reach out and correct me, the full recorded message can be found here.
During the celebrations, the various space companies in China shared posters online in celebration. Like with the Mid-Autumn Festival (中秋节), the New Year, the Spring Festival (春节), May Day, the Dragon Boat Festival (端午节), and the commemoration of victory in World War Two, almost all of these posters were solely shared on Chinese social media platforms, such as Weibo and WeChat. Due to this, I’ve compiled them all here with links back to the original posts, or where they were found. (If you have found one that I didn’t include please do reach out).
China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation
Deep Space Exploration Laboratory
China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology
Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology
LandSpace
Jiuzhou Yunjian
China Siwei
Galactic Energy
Cosmoleap
ExPace
CAS Space
Minospace
iSpace
Orienspace
Arktech
Space Epoch
Space Circling
Astronstone
Genesat
