Anousheh Ansari - First Female Private Space Explorer & Space Ambassador

http://www.anoushehansari.com/

Dear Anuosheh,

We are all proud of you. You have created History.

As a child, Anousheh Ansari begged her mother to let her sleep on the balcony of their home near Tehran, Iran. She would gaze into the velvety darkness, drift off to sleep and visit the stars. Most childhood dreams disappear when the sun rises on adulthood and people are blinded by responsibilities, time and money. But it didn't happen that way for Mrs. Ansari, a 39-year-old Plano businesswoman, who could not speak English when she immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager. In 2000, she sold her family's telecommunications business for $750 million.

As early as today, she is the world's first female space tourist.

Mrs. Ansari has been training at Houston's Johnson Space Center and in Russia as a backup civilian astronaut to Japanese businessman Daisuke Enomoto, who paid $20 million for a 10-day round trip to the International Space Station on Sept. 14. ."

In 2000, after three U.S. patents, they turned a $50,000 initial investment into the stratospheric sale of their company. The money allowed the Ansaris to finance their dream.
The Plano family contributed more than $2 million toward the Ansari X Prize Competition, which financed the first civilian rocket plane to puncture the world's atmosphere, in 2004.
That contest awarded $10 million to the developers of the first privately developed reusable spaceship. Legendary aerospace designer Burt Rutan, who was backed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, won the prize in October 2004 after two successful suborbital launches from the floor of the Mojave Desert.

"This was our dream; it's always been our dream," Mrs. Ansari said in an October 2004 Dallas Morning News story. "If you can live your dream, why not?"

http://www.anoushehansari.com/


First Female Private Space Explorer & Space Ambassador

Anousheh Ansari, has been officially named to the Soyuz TMA-9 primary crew. The first female spaceflight participant will launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on September 18, 2006 en route to the International Space Station (ISS) along with the Expedition 14 crew members: NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin.“By reaching this dream I’ve had since childhood, I hope to tangibly demonstrate to young people all over the world that there is no limit to what they can accomplish,” said Anousheh Ansari, chairman and co-founder of Prodea Systems, Inc.

To visit her blog link is

http://spaceblog.xprize.org/