Astronaut-politician Astronaut-politician Astronaut-politicians are those individuals who have entered politics after traveling to space as an astronaut. Even with the increasing number of individuals who have flown in space, astronauts still maintain a wide degree of public recognition, and those interested in pursuing a career in politics have been able to take advantage of their renown to enter politics at higher levels of elected office. American John Glenn, one of the Mercury Seven selected in 1959 by NASA became the first American astronaut to orbit the earth when he flew the Mercury-Atlas 6 named "Friendship 7" for three earth orbits on
Chinese as a foreign language late 16th century. Among the first were the Italian Jesuits, Michele Ruggieri and Matteo Ricci. They mastered the language without the aid of any grammar books or dictionaries, and are often viewed as the first Western sinologists. Ruggeiri set up a school in Macau, which was the first for teaching foreigners Chinese and translated part of the "Great Learning" into Latin. This was the first translation of a Confucian classic into any European language. He also wrote a religious tract in Chinese, the first Chinese book written by a Westerner. Matteo Ricci brought Western sciences to China, and became a