How did you fall in love with space?

I think that the stars are a shared vision. There's this aspect in, especially science fiction, right? People really gravitate towards the stars because it allows us to imagine what a fair future might look like.

Ever since she was a young girl, Amanda Nguyen imagined her future among the stars as an astronaut.

I really have a connection with the stars because it's what led my family to freedom. My mom, her siblings are boat refugees from Vietnam, and they use celestial navigation in order to find their way to freedom. Hi.

How are you? I wore my flight suit for you. I met up with one of Times' Women of the Year of 2022 at the Liberty Science Center in New Jersey. The activist now on the cusp of making history as the first woman of Vietnamese descent to go into space, overcoming personal pain and generational trauma to reach for the stars.

The weight of breaking that glass ceiling, being the first Vietnamese woman to space, is to let every young Vietnamese girl know that we belong, that they can see themselves in the stars, and that their dreams, no matter how big, are absolutely real, and they matter.

A lifelong dream come true, but it almost didn't happen.

I, during my My last semester at Harvard was raped. I went to do things that people tell survivors to do. Go get help, go to the police, go to the hospital. But Juju, the worst thing that happened to me wasn't being raped. It was being betrayed by America's criminal justice system. I found out that my rape kit, untested, would be destroyed in six months by Massachusetts, and that when I spoke up about my story, other survivors all America had faced these issues, too.

And in that moment, you felt as though you had to decide between justice and your life's dream.

I had to make a choice, and I couldn't live with myself if I chose not to pursue justice. When I spoke up, there were so many people who reached out to tell me their stories. In that moment, I realized that my story wasn't mine alone.

Fueled by the way she says her case was mishandled, she turned her trauma into action and a call for change.

My name is Amanda Wyn, and I am a rape survivor.

In 2016, the 32-year-old was a major force behind Congress, passing a bipartisan sexual assault survivor's Bill of Rights.

When President Obama signed my law, we heard from over a million people around the world who shared their stories and wanted to join into the fight, wanted to bring this fight on a global level. And so we did. When I spoke at the United Nations last Last November, I wore the same clothes that I wore on the day I was raped. It was not only to save my own rape kit from destruction, but also for the 25 million other rape survivors in the United States. The right to be notified about your rights, the right to not have your evidence be destroyed, the right to not have to pay for your rape kit, the right to request a police report.

Adding to all that she's accomplished just a few months ago, the call of a lifetime. A few philanthropies decided to sponsor her ticket to the Cosmos.

With this flight, I'm so grateful to Blue Origin, to Space for Humanity, to the supporters, because it symbolizes this idea that many astronauts go through when they see Earth for the first time. When they look back, they are overwhelmed with the fact that that everyone is on this Pale Blue dot. This one is very special to me. So this is the note I wrote to myself after I left the hospital, after my rape kids. As a survivor to myself, I will definitely be flying with me to space.

You said that this launch into space feels like a form of justice.

Being able to answer those promises to myself, to the person who wrote this. Never, never, never give up for me was, of course, about of surviving rape in the immediate aftermath. But also it's evolved over time to passing and penning my own soul rights into existence.

Though no date has been announced, the new Shepard rocket will launch later this year.

This one is a picture of my mother, my grandma, and my grandpa was taken by my uncle, who was the captain of the boat.

With Amanda on board, carrying her family story with her.

. Can you translate that now for me in English? Yes. It means you swam so I can fly. You crossed the ocean so I can touch the sky.

I get misty-eyed every time you say that. What does that phrase mean for you as you sit preparing for a launch into space?

It means that I am the dreams of my ancestors. We came on boats, and now we're on spaceships. In one generation, that really speaks to the power that we have, that Asian women have. I wouldn't be where I am if it weren't for her crossing the ocean.

Do you feel like launching yourself into space is yet another form of representation? Not only you are the first Vietnamese-American woman in space, but you're also the first Southeast Asian woman in space. There's a lot of firsts there.

What's important to me is bringing my community with me. I know the pain of trying so hard to dream for something but not seeing myself in it. And just as I fought for my civil rights as a survivor so that no one would have to go through that again, when I fly, I want to show show all the young Asian-American, Asian women out there, and especially the Vietnamese community, that they belong in the stars.