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I counted with Neil Armstrong as the lunar module approached the surface of the moon for the historic moon landing 40 years ago.
It was past midnight Indian Standard Time. I was in bed wide awake and hugging on to my transistor radio and listening to the live transmission of the landing broadcast by the Voice of America.
I had no TV set. Even if I had, it would not have been useful. There was no live telecast.
And then came the most exciting (for us on earth) words.
“Eagle has landed.”
One would have expected total excitement on board the lunar module. Nothing. Not even one Hooray.
Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin started reading out from the instruments on board so that the ground controllers could satisfy themselves that everything on board was all right.
The ground controllers then asked the two astronauts to go to sleep.
They obediently did.
Imagine! They had landed on the moon.
The first human beings to do so.
Had I been there, I would have immediately opened the door and rushed out of the module to explore the moon.
But not Neil and Buzz.
They just went to sleep as ordered by the ground control, which, from the ground, monitored the various instruments on board as the two were sleeping--as if they were sleeping on their bed at home and not inside a module on the lunar surface.
The live broadcast from the module stopped. The VOA started broadcasting interviews with ground controllers, members of the families of the astronauts and others.
I also went to sleep after switching off the radio.
But after every hour or so, I would wake up and switch it on to see whether live transmissions from the lunar surface had resumed.
They had not. Neil and Buzz were still sleeping.