Gozo, 2 April, 2019

5,000 years ago, the mysterious builders of the oldest still freestanding buildings in the world downed tools and looked up into the night sky. They were standing on Gozo at the centre of the Middle Sea, and the stars they were exploring were, to a large extent, the same stars we experience today. These old-world ancestors were looking at the heavens through clear pure air, into space at the wondrous radiance of the Universe. Lucky them.

Spacelab brought a strong present-day connection to those engineering ancestors on Gozo this weekend, with a series of events that celebrated the unrivalled purity of children’s imagination and creativity; marked the international WWF Earth Hour 2019; and highlighted a local Malta initiative to grow and plant out 10 trees from seeds. All the events happened in a wonderfully relaxed atmosphere on the ancient bastions of the Cittadella in Gozo.

Friendly Space Invasion of Gozo

The weekend started with a colourful ‘Friendly Space Invasion of Gozo’ that saw 23 alien Spaceships landing at the Cittadella in Rabat, all on a mission to get Earthlings talking about the Universe and about unbridled children’s creativity! The pop-up Spacelab Base Space Station was hosted at Gozo Cittadella by the Ministry for Gozo and took the form of a static exhibition of temporarily grounded interstellar spacecraft on display to the public. Excited visitors were able to get up close and personal with fantastic Spaceships made from LEGO, Duplo Blocks, and to see awesome Spaceships made from Upcycled Waste Materials. 

WINNER! Age 5 to 10 Category ‘GALAX’ by David Attard – Photo Credit: © Spacelab 2019

Young Spacelab Engineers & Explorers

The Spaceships were designed and built by young engineers and space explorers aged from 5 to 15 years. The contest was a truly international happening with entries and exhibits representing an array of 6 Nations including Malta, Gozo, Great Britain, Slovenia, Spain, and Denmark! The creativity and imagination of the children totally astounded the 5 judges of the competition, 3 adults and two peer-group children. They were all super-challenged to come to decisions in the face of the high standards of quality creativity, imagination, engineering and the evident hard work of all the children in constructing their Spaceships.

It was a pleasure to see the delight and pride in their work of each and every child at the Build-a-Spaceship Awards, held in front of an enthusiastic audience at the Spacelab Exhibition on Saturday evening. The results were announced, and they revealed 3 Category Award Winners plus a Special Recognition Award for Creativity. The 3 Winners will visit the Esplora Science & Interactive Centre with their families, courtesy of Esplora, while the Special Award and 3 Runner Up Spaceship builders each received hard bound kids’ science books.

And the Winners are…

Spacelab Build-A-Spaceship Contest Winners & Runners Up 2019

5 to 10 Category #LEGO
Winner:                      GALAX by David Attard (9)
Second Place:          H.A.H. Star Rainbow by Isla Bremner (6)

11 to 16 Category #LEGO

Winner:                      Galactic Wolf by Travis H. Jarrett (11)
Second Place:          Search & Destroy Racer by Glenn Attard (15)

#UPCYCLED Category:
Winner:                      Zeto by Mireille Cini (10)
Second Place:          Sam the Lunar Rover by Kayley Cini (7)

Special Prize for #CREATIVITY:
Space Magic by Miriana Falzon (10)

A Spacelab spokesperson said: “This weekend of events has been a wonderful catalyst for building super connections between people and their ideas in Malta, Gozo and internationally. For the children’s Spaceship contest, we have spoken with parents and teachers and they have been amazed at the way the children have acted by themselves to think, design and then build these stunning Spaceships. Equally fascinating have been the imaginative stories behind the builds, with one young child saying he and his father would like to send the first cardboard spaceship to the moon!”

Earth Hour, #cosmicsounds & #grow10trees

“It was also a privilege to bring Earth Hour 2019 participants to the Cittadella and to be with so many people reflecting and connecting to Earth as we listened in the darkness to music specially commissioned and composed for Spacelab. The sounds of Peter Jerman’s symphony came from remixing NASA earth recordings to his own gifted music, making for a highly relaxed and meditative atmosphere for everyone as we stargazed through telescopes with The Astronomical Society of Malta.”

“The generations of people on Earth today are the last that can save the planet, beyond us it will be too late. For all of us that means act now, change now. With this in mind we were pleased to have with us Why Not? Malta and the ‘Grow 10 Trees” project and to offer packs of indigenous Tree Seeds and to invite participants of our Earth Hour event to #grow10trees.”

We invite people everywhere to join the Spacelab crew to stimulate the space between your ears. www.gozospacelab.com

 “Take Me to Your Leader” SAM the Lunar Rover by Kayley Cini (aged 7) – Photo Credit: © Spacelab 2019

Ends

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For more information please email hello@gozospacelab.com or on Messenger: @GozoSpacelab

About Spacelab

Spacelab is a resource for the explorer inside all of us. We are here to guide you towards cool happenings, ideas, content and events on and off our planet earth. Our mission is to think about and to link the universe of uncovered mysteries that surrounds humanity, and all the beings and nature with which we share that universe.

We want to invite you to do the same and to participate in the fast-growing Spacelab Explorer Team to better understand each other and the ways we are connected to everything that surrounds us. Spacelab: Stimulating the Space Between Your Ears.

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