The Space Shuttle and I

There aren't a lot of things from my class IX curriculum that I can relate to today, but there is this one poem, "Child or Adult" by Margaret Lawrence and in particular, there is one line in it, "My dream world has rippled away". The poet puts herself in an adolescent's perspective and uses this line to convey why she may not be a child anymore. Her world of dreams and fantasies has slowly but steadily drifted away from her, like a ripple moving over water and she lives in the real world of adults now.
My english teacher thought that this was a beautiful metaphor.

Now, eleven years and half a world away from that classroom, I can't help but think that the metaphor is backwards. The ripple made by a raindrop gets bigger and bigger, but a dream, it shrinks with time. Go fifteen years behind and where did I think I would be living finally? My own city on an asteroid or may be a palace on a remote island that I discovered. It came down to a thousand acre Austalian ranch when I just got into college. And what about now? I want a house, and the adjectives are spacious, nice and safe. See what I mean? Let me give you another one, I intended to be the pioneering hero who will build India's manned space program. I then came down to being an astronaut at NASA. Now I am an IT contractor, very very happy to see that my masters' thesis work finds a brief mention on the NASA website.

In this context of NASA and dreams rippling inward, let me give you another anecdote. The pushes and pulls of my contracting position have put me in a position where I need to commute about fifty miles up and fifty miles down by bus. This commute from Thousand Oaks to Los Angeles takes about two hours each way and I have to wake up at five, every morning. The alarm clock, of course, wakes me up but not my bowels. They invariably wake up at seven, about an hour into my journey. To completely wake up and avoid any disastrous situations on the bus, I started taking a ten minute walk as soon as I got up, and it did help. The catch is Los Angeles and its suburbs are not as safe as the quaint university towns that people like me start off with. I keep hearing stories of shootings and crimes and the five'o clock walk does not seem like the safest idea.

So another fine day and after another irritating alarm, I was getting ready for my walk and then suddenly I heard this very loud sound outside. Whatever it was it scared me and I did not go out to walk. I was also a little frustrated, for the need to go to so much of trouble merely for the sake of getting to work. Later that day, I was back home and I was telling my roommate about this incident and he quickly interrupted me to say it was the space shuttle; it was the sonic boom of the shuttle re-entering and landing near Los Angeles. My fear and frustration immediately turned into elation. How many other people have their early morning toilet routine directly affected by the space shuttle? The astronauts and may be a few other important people at NASA. I was smug, just couldn't stop smiling.

The Tricolor

To think of it, it is quite a challenge to come up with the insignia that represent a nation. There are requirements of symbolism, then are aesthetic requirements and you need to get it right the first time. If a nation's insignia is subject to change after its genesis, it stands to lose its aura as the natural representation of that nation. That change may well set the precedent for each meteorically influential demagogue to toy around with the national symbols.

In this regard, I believe that our then national leaders did a remarkable job in giving India her national flag. The symbolism is as profound as it is unique and it is achieved with such elegant simplicity.

From the aesthetic perspective, I find the flag's symmetry most appealing. While this may seem trivial, it is to be recognized that most of the world's national flags don't look the same when seen from either side. For arguemnt's sake we can look at the flags of India's neighbours, Pakistan, China, Nepal, Bhutan, Myannmar (Burma), Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Maldives.



None of these flags have that kind of symmetry. Even the Bangladeshi flag has its red sun slighty closer to the mast. I must mention here that the symmetry in the Indian flag is not accidental. It was one of the reasons for the Ashoka Chakra replacing the Congress's spindle.

Yea... but then who can't find a reason to think something is beautiful, let alone his or her own national flag. I can make a much more forceful arguement for symbolism. The Ashoka Chakra effectively tells India's story from Emperor Ashoka's "conquest by dhamma" to Mahatma Gandhi's sathyagraha. It is unique, the wheel stands for something uniquely Indian and the wheel appears only on the Indian flag. Once again, I would like to make a comparison, the Stars and Stripes is almost instantly and universally recognized as an American emblem. But, does a star or a stripe uniquely represent the American polity and ethos? I guess not. There are other flags that do say something about their nations' distinctive culture. The Mexican flag, with its eagle, rattle snake and cactus is one example, the sword wielding lion of Sri Lanka is another. But I believe (and it is just my belief..) that they end up trying too hard and compromise on the elegance that comes with simplicity.


So, to conclude, Kudos Mr. Pingali Venkaiya. MERAA BHAARAT MAHAAN...