The Man in the Moon looked at his wife as she stopped gazing at Earth and stared at him, “What?” he asked, because women whether they were from Earth or Moon, or even from Venus, always had a question on their minds when they gave their men that look, and it was very important that men, whether from Earth or the Moon or even from Mars gave them their full undivided attention, “What?” he asked again.
“The Indians are over the moon with joy!” she said simply.
“What’s odd about that?” asked the Man in the Moon, “Do you know they landed here on a shoestring budget and their country is winning recognition throughout the world for doing something only three developed countries have done before?”
“Husband,” said the Woman in the Moon sharply as the Man in the Moon flinched, “I know all that! I heard the speech the man with the white beard gave while waving the flag so daintily!”
“Then why that look on your face?” asked her husband, puzzled.
“Why did they wait so long?” asked his wife, shaking her head.
“Now why would you say that?” asked the Man in the Moon testily as sometimes his wife’s theories, though later proven right, still kept him away from his daily chores of creating romantic lighting for earthly couples, and even making others loony on full moon days.
The Woman in the Moon tugged her husband away from his moon work and made him look at the country of India below, “Look,” she said, “What do you see?”
“My God they replicated our moon in their country!” he said, “I can see crater, Albategnius, and there’s Langrenus, and there’s crater Pitatus How did they replicate our Moon?”
“Husband, ‘that’s not our moon, those are their roads during their monsoons, and what you see are not craters but potholes. Just look at the men and women, the buses and cars and all that traffic going in and out of all those potholes! Now do you see how much moon experience they have?”
“Then our craters are a cakewalk for them!” said the Man on the Moon, “They could have easily come here earlier, with all that experience!”
“That’s exactly what I said,” said the Woman in the Moon. “Just look at their rover!”
They both looked at Pragyan the rover from Chandrayaan 3, easily making its way in and out of moon craters as if it had been doing this in all its manufactured life. The Moon couple then stared at the cities of Mumbai, Panjim, Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi and others all over India as the Man in the Moon sighed, “As usual you are right dear, why ever did they take so long?”
Robert Clements is a newspaper columnist and author. He blogs at www.bobsbanter.com and can be reached at bobsbanter@gmail.com
