First Space Tourist Readies For Flight
星际旅游者准备起航
　

For years, people have talked of traveling to space as tourists, but it has only been talk—until now.

　　Dennis Tito, who started dreaming of space flight when he watched Sputnik’s launch as a teenager, who worked as a rocket scientist charting paths to planets, then switched to investing and became a multimillionaire, has a ticket to ride.

Sputnik： 苏联人造地球卫星；1957年10月4日苏联将第一颗人造卫星发射入地球轨道，开创了人类的太空时代。
multimillionaire：亿万富翁；我们的主人公Tito原来是一位火箭科学家，后来投资成功成了亿万富翁。

The fit, 60-year-old Californian has left his 30,000-square-foot Pacific Palisades mansion for two rooms in the Star City cosmonaut training center in Russia to prepare for the launch, which could come early next year.

　　He has deposited millions of dollars—each one worth 28 rubles - in an escrow account, to be released to the cash-strapped Russian space authorities the moment he is launched as the first space tourist, but not a millisecond before.

cosmonaut：宇航员；Tito在俄罗斯的宇航员训练中心受训。
deposit：存放，储蓄。
escrow account：第三方账户；Tito将数百万美元存在银行里，飞船一起飞这笔钱就自动转移到俄罗斯航空机构帐下。
cash-strapped：被金钱捆绑住的。
millisecond：毫秒。

That’s all in his contract, his ticket.

　　“The key is launch,” Tito said recently during an interview in Star City. “All they have to do is light the rockets and the escrow opens up and they get all the money. And it’s a lot of money. ... There’s a real strong incentive, I think, for the Russians to fly me.”

contract：合同，合约；Tito所得到的就是一张飞船的“船票”。
incentive：动机；Tito认为金钱是俄罗斯允许他乘坐飞船做太空旅行的动机之一。

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