Bedazzled

Tonight we watched the first Lord of the Rings at the Brothers’ house with Br. Bill and Fr. Richard, the two American Marianists here at Chaminade. Fr. Richard even made buttered popcorn, and Dugan shared some of his delicious chocolates that came in his package the other day. It was wonderful.

But even more wonderful was stepping outside after the movie finished and looking up at the sky. Thus far, the moon has been quite full, so it has been hard to see the sky clearly, especially since much of the country has been filled with haze from the farmers burning their fields for the planting in the rainy season. However, tonight, as we walked back the 25 meters to our house, the moon was not out, and the sky was filled with the brilliant dazzling sparkle of thousands of stars, contrasting the deep, dark black of a night absent of light pollution.

Another fascinating aspect of the sky here is that the stars are different than the stars I’ve been looking at for my whole life in the northern hemisphere. For example, there are some stars here that simply can’t be seen in the northern hemisphere. And even cooler, the stars that I have seen before, are flipped from how I’m used to. The Big Dipper for example, is inverted. So every time I’ve looked up at the night sky, it has been as if I’m looking at a sky I’ve never seen before.

And I know I’ve never seen the stars dazzle the way they dazzled tonight. There was so much sparkling that they seemed to be moving. There was so much activity up there that the sky seemed alive; it was awe-inspiring.