Comfort food before satellite launch

A satellite launch would make even an accomplished scientist feel butterflies in his stomach. Eighteen-year-old Rifath Shaarook, who built a satellite as part of a contest organised by NASA, started getting the jitters when his 64 gram satellite was being packed to be sent to the US space agency. He immediately reached out for his comfort food — rasam rice and potato curry. It was only after his nerves were calmed by the food that KalamSat — the satellite is named after rocket scientist and former President A P J Abdul Kalam — was despatched to NASA, which hurled it to space last week.