Milton D. Heifetz <Southern Sky>

 

When I'd lived in the northern hemisphere, I'd thought simply southern sky would be completely different from there. Why did I have such an absurd idea at that time?

About 9 o'clock on last Thursday night, roughly 30 minutes later after sunset, I was walking around home. As usual, I'd been raising my head toward the zenith of the Earth seeing stars in the night sky. (Like me, people who are used to urban life will raise their head toward the zenith when they try to see stars.) 'There are not any stars I know as expected.' And right at that moment, I turned my head to the right, to the east, without thinking. Then a very familiar constellation appeared. It was Orion. I was shocked for a moment. After a while, I could understand why I could see Orion. It was natural that I can see the stars moving through the equator, that is to say the stars except for the circumpolar.

I could realize another one thing after a while; Orion was upside down. It was really marvelous scene. (People in northern hemisphere can simply see the shapes of constellations when standing on their head and watch Orion.) I found other stars near Orion in a hurry. There was Sirius to the upper right of the Orion. This brightest star in the night sky didn't be shown well in Seoul of South Korea because of its low latitude and Seoul's light pollution. Sirius is more than twice as bright as the next brightest star, but it was just shown as an ordinary star in Seoul. But here, Sirius is the most prominent in the summer.

 

There were many stars in the night sky of Sydney. I didn't expect many stars at first because of the light pollution from many buildings and air pollution, but my expectation was wrong. Of course I can't still compare them with those of the deep mountains, but they were more than my expectation. I might be able to see more beautiful scene at the beach.