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A Walk for Friendship!

A Walk for Friendship!

Last Sunday, the 5^th of January 2014, was a day when we took the first steps to fulfil the pledge we had made some months earlier. We are a motley bunch of classmates who had joined school in the year 1964. When we realised that we had known and had been friends with each other for 50 years, we decided to mark this milestone by walking a distance of 50 kilometres.

This idea of a walk for friendship came to us at an earlier get-together and was welcomed enthusiastically. But when it came to be known that some of us were seriously thinking of actually doing it, the enthusiasm waned a bit. We committee members started getting anonymous calls threatening us and also came to know that there was a move to black-list us from the group. Not wanting to be chucked out, we watered down the proposal a bit by suggesting that the 50 km could be done collectively. We also announced that there was no minimum distance to be covered and a classmate could even contribute as little as half-a-kilometre to the class kitty. The enthusiasm increased tenfold with this announcement. We promised to meet at the Stuart Battle Tank end of Ulsoor Lake at 7:45 a.m. on Sunday to do the walk and thereafter treat ourselves to a hearty breakfast.

Some of our mates were travelling and some were otherwise engaged, but we decided we would start this off if we had just 5 participants. The others would pitch in on other Sundays.

One of our mates is a bit of a Tangential Thinker (probably on account of a coconut being dropped on his head by the maid when he was two years old). He suggested that he would come an hour early and do a couple of rounds 6 km before the rest of us reached. We did not want any violence from him, so all of us agreed without a murmur. Let him come early if he wants, let him walk all he wants, he will still get the same breakfast as the rest of us, we decided.

I prepared myself for the tough-a-thon by having an early dinner and going to bed an hour earlier than usual. I set the alarm on my mobile for 6:10 a.m. and a second alarm for 6:30 a.m. I also told my wife to wake me up by 6:45 a.m. I missed the two alarms but my wife did not miss when she splashed water on my face.

Hastily completing the download formalities, I donned my track pant and an orange t-shirt and then called a classmate who lived down the road. Apparently he too was roused by his wife a while ago and had completed his roll call, so he was also ready to roll.

We reached the Stuart Battle Tank corner well in time. I was not surprised to find that Tan Thin had already completed 2 rounds and was looking none the worse for it. Before he could suggest 2 more rounds, I prudently changed the subject by pointing to the flocks of geese doing their morning flypast exercises over our heads. We were saved.

Soon 2 more classmates sauntered in and we were ready to go. It took a couple of minutes to get into our stride but once we did, we simply ate up the kilometres. We made a few halts along the way to savour the morning air. We also managed to break the rhythm of a couple of passing walkers by stopping them and having our pictures clicked by them. Each of us completed 3 km while Tan Thin did 9 km, for a grand total of 21 km, rounded off to 20 as a mark of our generosity.

All puffed up with pride and satisfaction after having achieved this stupendous task, we came to the concluding and most important part of the agenda – breakfast! We adjourned to a nearby darshini and feasted on idlis and vadais washed down with good, strong filter coffee.

Seeing the darshini owner nervously fidgeting, we went up to him and reassured him that we would leave soon and he need not worry about payment or depleting stocks. He thanked each one of us with folded hands and told us that our good deed would certainly be rewarded, though not by him, but by The One Above.

I reached home around twelve o’ clock, had a quiet moment of introspection, reliving the morning in fast playback. With a smile on my lips and a song in my heart, I told my wife I was about to take a well deserved nap and she should call me without any water-splashing when lunch was ready.

Wow, what a Sunday!

© Shiva Kumar 2014

Pluto, here we come!

The Pluto Orbiter Project

The Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) appears to have taken off on the right foot and the mission controllers appear to have got the manoeuvres right in putting the MOM into the second leg of the Mangal yaan yatra.

The progress of the mission so far has boosted the confidence of our space scientists. From the journey to Earth’s nearest planet they are now planning an even more audacious trip, this time to the farthest planet (albeit a dwarf planet) in our Solar System. Pluto, no less.

Pluto was discovered in 1930 and since then was considered the 9^th planet in the Solar System. However, in 2006, it was “demoted” from a planet to a “dwarf” planet since astronomers have discovered other bodies in the Solar System which may be as big as or even bigger than Pluto.

In 2006, NASA sent out a spacecraft named New Horizons to Pluto without even informing India. The craft is expected to reach Pluto in 2015 and will be able to take pictures of the dwarf planet’s surface. This NASA adventure caught the Indian space scientists unawares and left them fuming. They did not take very kindly to NASA stealing their thunder and immediately set about planning their own counter offensive.  

After tasting success with the launch of the MOM, the space mission programmers are believed to have recommended in an internal meeting that we should launch our own Pluto mission. On a parallel path, a 5-member private team consisting of a travel booking agent, a retired cricketer, a wandering musician, a water diviner and a gym instructor, has drawn up a programme to send a space craft to the Pluto. This project has been named Pluto Orbiter Project or POP.

POP will be our second major planetary mission after MOM.

The new POP mission will be launched soon after MOM reaches its Mars orbit. A spacecraft is being built at a secret underwater base for this purpose. According to an anonymous but reliable source, this spacecraft will be called Nayi Disha.

Our source further revealed that the project team has discovered a short-cut route from Earth to Pluto not known to anyone else. This short-cut will enable our own Nayi Disha to overtake New Horizons in the last lap and will also save us some 2347 litres of unadulterated subsidised aviation fuel.

Right now, no one is talking about this hush-hush mission. All our source would say is “Wait till MOM reaches the home stretch to Mars. POP will then take off.”

Watch this space. Do not blink.