Here's a brief report of last night sidewalk session (6 March 2012).
We saw Mars, Moon, Venus, Jupiter, M42, Sirius, Saturn with the Mak 127 on the porta mount. The queue was not extremely long but long enough not to have more time to see other stuff. Partly because almost everyone in the queue requested and had a good look at Moon and the planets at various magnification and did not mind queuing and re-queueing again. LOL.
Big thanks to Ken and Avarielle for coming down and helping out to man the scope, explaining astro stuff to the public and being a human ipad/iphone holder. LOL. Hope you guys have fun observing and making new friends!
Big thanks to Richard and Siti for dropping by despite your busy schedules. Richard, you literally disappeared in a flash (camera flash!). Wanted to thank you personally for coming but by the time I finished answering a question from the public, you were gone! Hope to see you guys again there this weekend. Big thanks also to Tsukiyoruutari and family for their loyal support. I think you guys have already seen more planets and star clusters through the telescope than your science teacher. LOL.
Seeing was generally good for the night and the best was during 10:30pm - 12:30 am (maybe 7/10). Moon was crystal clear and contrasty. Mars was too bright and I forgot to use the basic colour filters I brought along. The ice cap definitely shrank since we saw it a month ago. Not sure if this increase in brightness/glare is the reason for seeing less albedo on Mars compared to the MN56 which gave a better but slightly dimmer view a month ago. Hope to have a side-by-side comparison together with the 6" newt.
THE highlight is definitely seeing the bright ISS flyby at Toa Payoh Central as a public group! I think those guys and gals made Toa Payoh history being the first group of 10-15 people seeing it there! Let's break this record someday! This is definitely more fun than flash mob.
Will try to bring more ISS material to let the public better appreciate what they saw. But I was glad to mention to them it was a multi-national effort among 15 nations and that itself says a lot.
Brought a NatGeo Mars book co-author by the chief scientist of Mars Pathfinder. Some nice 3D imagery in the book that looked quite cool with my old pair of world cup 3D paper glasses.
Lastly, just to want emphasis again the public is not visually as demanding as most of us imagined them to be. One of them even requested to see the Moon when there is some thin clouds passing infront of it for that special movie effect! Another case in point was Saturn last night. One group of youth took a look at Saturn when it was still relatively low and dim through some thin haze. But still I hear wows from them because they saw the classic ring-planet appearance live for the first time. When Saturn rose higher and clearer, they can appreciate it even more.
So do not let the fear of showing what you think is too inferior views to the public in a small scope and have fun sharing your hobby with them. There is always the Moon to bail you out most of the time anyway.
I am sure some of the public last night remembered the contrasty view of the Moon, the rings of Saturn and the bands of Jupiter much better than the small orangey/red disc. But as long as they enjoyed seeing something which sparks their curiosity about the universe we all live in, then it is already mission accomplished for the sidewalk session - one more human being's perception of the universe has been fundamentally and irreversibly changed.
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