A Celebration Bigger than Diwali for me!

Congratulations to ISRO for launching India's dream to the Moon. When you are a young kid in India, several people promise you the Moon, we address the Moon as 'Chanda Mama' - as our maternal uncle. The Moon is hence a part of every kid's family. Today, India finally got me and everyone Indian a taste of the excitement of what it is like to be exploring new worlds. The Moon is a start I hope and I would like to see ISRO, Indian industry and universities explore further and reach Mars and beyond.

Thank you to the dedicated team at ISRO that has been working non-stop on what was initially only envisioned in early 2004 as a 'program'. Paper studies had been done, but the budget line only appeared after that year. So, well done in accomplishing this mission.

Pradeep Mohandas has been blogging and tweetering as @Chandrayaan on twitter - you can follow his microblog there!

A few other noteworthy places to get information on the mission are:

ASI Student Chapter's website: http://www.indianspace.in
ISRO Press release: http://www.isro.gov.in/pressrelease/Oct22_2008.htm
www.chandrayaan-i.com
www.isro.org/chandrayaan/htmls/home.htm
www.isro.org/chandrayaan-1/
www.planetary.org/explore/topics/chandrayaan_1/
www.planetary.org/blog/ - Emily did a great job of following the webcast till the link broke through!

More to come.
This is bigger than diwali this year for me!