The Longest Solar Eclipse of the 21st century

On 22nd of June, 2009, three days ago, we people here in India residing in cities like Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara, Varanasi, Lucknow, Kolkata, Delhi and others had the oppurtunity of viewing the longest solar eclipse of the 21st century, for the next such eclipse would appear only after the year 2132!

My friends and I were all really excited but we are a bunch of lazy fellows who need to be egged on to initiate doing some work. On the 21st June, 10 o'clock night, we called up each other and asked whether to go to the Community Science Centre to view the eclipse or not(they had invited all the students of our school). After an hour and after making over 20 - 25 phone calls, we decided that we would wake up early and go and watch the eclipse- we were ready to dispose off our laziness for a day that comes only once in our lifetime!

Alas! That was not to be! You see, Ahmedabad was busy getting moderate to heavy rains and hence all I saw when I woke up at 5 oçlock was the grey clouds in the night sky. I SMSed to my counterparts - Dark clouds hovering. Plan cancelled.

But at 6: 30, the sun had not shown up, even not behind the clouds and I knew that something was going on behind there, something that I could not miss but we were cloaked by the clouds. We humans are not all-powerful and we cannot change nature!!!
Look at this photo of the people at Varanasi to watch the eclipse - we Indians are so very religious!