You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.

Shortwave reporter Emily Quang here reporting for duty.

With science correspondent Jeff Brumfiel.

And today we're coming at you with two tales of the moon.

The first is a folktale thousands of years old.

Of a young archer who has given a potion of immortality.

One day his wife drank the potion and floated up to the heavens,

accompanied by a Jade rabbit and landed on the moon,

forever separated from her love.

This is a traditional Chinese story of the moon goddess,

and she is honored every mid-autumn festival her name is Chang'a.

And it's with that name Chang'a that Chang'a is also writing a new story about itself.

It's a modern technically advanced superpower,

and a big part of that story also involves the moon.

With a successful launch, the Chang'a 5 rope will be the first space mission to bring back moon rocks in decades.

So late last month, China landed its first mission designed to return samples from the moon's surface.

The mission is called Chang'a 5 in honor of the moon goddess.

And scientists all over the world are really excited about this mission because assuming it goes well,

this will be the first time rocks have come back from the moon in more than 40 years.

Which is a huge deal.

So today on the show, we're going to talk about China's Chang'a 5 mission,

what it's doing, what it will tell us about the solar system,

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