Japan -- Oct/Nov 2007

This photo is the statue of a bull (or cow) near the train station in the Hyogo district (near the first Kobe hotel). Kobe is famous for its steaks (which we were able to have on one night on this trip). {I later heard that a few years ago NASA was looking to purchase a used Boeing 747 cargo plane to be used (after modifications) as a "flying platform" for some type of telescope (for ultraviolet observations, I suppose). At that time (and perhaps still), it was economical to fly live cattle from the US to Japan. The NASA request for proposals explicitly stated they would not accept a plane that had ever been used for such a "beef run" (I suspect they were concerned about getting the cargo space sufficiently clean to prevent volatiles from interfering with the astronomical observations).}

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