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Tania's Martian EncounterBy Kanika GEdited by Pell GCopyright 2015 by Kanika GDedicated to papa for inspiring some of the ebooks/2

Tania's Martian EncounterTania was waiting for her uncle Karan toarrive. Uncle Karan was a prankster. He hadhelped Tania play a few practical jokes on herfriends, and Tania thought he was super cool.Also, there were some important things shewanted to discuss with him.-----------------------------It all began on 29th September 2015, when theplanet Mars had quite literally made a splashin the media. NASA had just announced that,there was evidence of water on Mars. Mama said"You know Tania, your uncle Karan works forNASA. I am sure he will have some interestingthings to tell us when he visits in a fewmonths."3

Tania had heard snippets of the news ontelevision and asked "Mama, what is Mars?"Mama said "Okay this is going to take someexplaining. Do you remember how I told you welive on planet Earth which is shaped like aball?""Yes, I still find that hard to believe. TheEarth looks so flat. But you said that, theEarth is a very big ball, and we are tiny incomparison. We only see a very, very smallpart of the Earth at any time, so it looks4

flat.""Very good Tania! And what do you know aboutthe Sun?""The Sun is a ball of fire much, much biggerthan the Earth. It only looks small because itis so very far away.""That is correct. You can line up a 109 Earthsto fit across the Sun. Also the Sun is so faraway, that you can line up about 10,000 Earthsfrom side to side between the Earth and the5

Sun. Can you imagine that?"Image shows the relative sizes of the Earth and the Sun"No. When I try, I feel like my brain is goingto collapse. The Earth itself is so big. Ijust can't imagine these enormous sizes. "6

Mama smiled. "Yeah, I find it hard to imaginetoo. Anyway, do you know why day and nightfollow each other?""I think so. You once told me, that the Earthspins like a top. So different parts of itface the Sun at different times. The half ofthe Earth facing the Sun, gets sunlight andhas day. But as the Earth spins, that halfslowly turns away from the Sun and has night.That is why we have day and night and then dayagain as the Earth happily spins on and on.One day is the amount of time it takes theearth to spin once.""Very well explained, Tania. The Earth notonly spins like a top, but also goes incircles around the Sun. This motion of theEarth is called orbiting. It takes the Earthone year, which is 365 days, to complete one7

circle around the Sun. ""Oh I see. But what has all this got to dowith Mars?""Ah, I am coming to that. Earth is not theonly planet that orbits the Sun. There are atotal of 8 such planets."The one closest to the Sun is Mercury. Next isVenus, then Earth, then Mars, Jupiter, Saturn,Uranus and finally Neptune. The Sun and theseplanets together form 'The Solar System' "Mama showed Tania some lovely pictures of theSolar system.8

Tania asked, "Is Mars another planet likeEarth? Are all these planets just like Earth?"Mama replied "No they are all quite different.The 4 planets closest to the Sun have an outercrust of solid rock. Jupiter and Saturn arehuge balls of gas. Uranus and Neptune are madeof ice and other frozen material.""I see. So only the first 4 planets are likeEarth.""No. Mercury, for example, is a lot smallerthan Earth. Mercury spins very slowly andorbits the Sun very fast. So for a person onMercury in the time between sunrise and sunsetand then sunrise again, Mercury would havegone twice around the Sun.""So if we call the amount of time a planettakes to go around the Sun a year on thatplanet, then on Mercury a day is 2 years long.9

That sounds crazy! But there are no people onMercury, right?"asked Tania."As far as we know, Earth is the only planetthat has life of any kind."Do you mean these other planets don't haveany plants or even insects or germs?""It seems unlikely because they are either toohot or too cold or they do not have air andwater which are essential to life as weunderstand it.""Is that why people are so excited about wateron Mars? Does this mean there might be aliensthere?" Tania pictured all the aliens she hadseen in books, movies and cartoons runningwild on Mars.10

"It is too early to tell. To find life onother planets scientists look for water. Wateris necessary for life as we understand it.""Since they found flowing water on Mars, thescientists are very excited, because thismeans they can look for simple life forms likebacteria or algae in the water."11

The news continued to give updates on the Marssituation for a while, but Tania was lookingforward to hearing the inside story from heruncle.Unfortunately, because of the amazingdiscoveries on Mars, uncle Karan was very busyand had to delay his visit to Mumbai severaltimes. Now, almost a year after NASA'sexciting announcement, uncle Karan was finallyon his way.-----------------------------The doorbell rang and Tania shot off to answerit. Uncle Karan gave Tania a big bear hug.Baby Sonia had never met him before and wasfrightened by his odd hair style and beard. Soshe stuck to mama and tried to hide behind herlegs whenever possible.12

Tania, on the other hand, had spent a wholemonth with uncle Karan before he took the jobwith NASA a couple of years ago, and was veryfond of him. He had shown her some very messy13

and fun science experiments and she was hopingfor more messy fun.During lunch mama asked uncle Karan aboutMars. He told a few amusing anecdotes and gavethem some interesting details but he could notreveal much because most of his work wasclassified. Tania was disappointed.In his efforts to cheer up his beloved niece,uncle Karan said "Okay I think it is presenttime." and predictably, Tania perked up.Uncle Karan had brought mama and papa a box oftheir favourite liquor chocolates. For babySonia he got a Lego set. Tania was gettingimpatient. "What about me? What about me?" sheasked, bouncing up and down."Ah, for you little munchkin, I have gotsomething quite awesome. Here it is."Tania opened her gift with mounting14

excitement. Inside was a compound microscope.Oooh how exciting. "Can we set it up rightnow?" asked Tania hopefully."Sure." said mama. "Why don't Karan and youset it up while Sonia and I take an afternoonnap?"Uncle Karan helped Tania set up themicroscope. Tania opened a package wrapped in15

thin paper and bubble wrap. "What is this?"she asked."Those are glass slides. You put the sampleyou want to inspect on the slide and thenplace the slide under the lens. So what do youwant to see under the microscope?""I don't know. I have never used one before.What should I look at?""How about some of your hair?""Why? I can see that without a microscope."Yes but it looks quite different when you lookat it under the microscope. Why don't you giveit a try?"Tania did and she was amazed at what she saw.16

Fascinated by how different things could lookunder the microscope Tania examined a piece ofplastic.Tania noticed that uncle Karan was not sharingin her excitement. He looked quite abstracted.So she said, "Uncle what are you thinkingabout?"17

"Well you know how I said a lot of my work atNASA is hush hush.""Yes. What about it?""It really annoys me. We found something superexciting. That is why I got you the microscopein the first place. But then they told me Ican't tell anyone about it. It is reallyfrustrating. I have never worked on classifiedstuff before. I hate secrets." said uncleKaran, now looking quite glum."Uncle you can tell me. I can keep a secret. Iwont tell anyone. Oh please do tell me.Please.""Okay. I really do need to tell someone.Otherwise I'll explode. But promise me you'llkeep it a secret or I'll get in big trouble.""I promise. Now tell me quick, before mamawakes up."Uncle Karan took out a couple of glass slidescarefully stored in plastic cases. He mountedone on the microscope and asked Tania to takea look.18

Tania peered at it curiously and asked, "Whatis this uncle?"Karan replied, "This is just algae found onEarth." "But now take a look at this." he saidmounting another slide. "Do you see anydifference."It looks very similar to the algae but it isreddish and has some curved lines of jellylike stuff. So what is this?"19

"This is algae they have found on Mars. Wethink the red colour comes from a nutrient, itpicks up from the red Martian soil.""No way!. You are telling me this is Martianlife. That would have made big news. I wouldhave heard something about it.NASA heard about it a while back. But thesamples just arrived a couple of weeks ago. Wehave been studying them and it is reallyexciting. But we are not allowed to talk aboutit to anyone."Tania was exploding with excitement. "So thisis an alien. I am actually seeing an alien. Socool. I am the youngest Earthling to see a20

Martian. Woohoo!"In her excitement Tania forgot to speaksoftly. Mama and Sonia woke up. They heardTania's last statements and came to find outwhat was going on.Mama asked "Karan, what is Tania talkingabout?"Karan blushed. "Okay, okay. I am sorry. I wasjust playing a prank on Tania. I fooled herabout finding life on Mars.""But you showed me the slide with Martianalgae on it." wailed Tania annoyed abouthaving been tricked."Well that was just regular Earth algae withred dye." said uncle Karan laughing hard. "Gotyou didn't I?""Very funny" said Tania and stomped off in ahuff. She was annoyed that she had been soeasily tricked and upset that Karan unclecould be so heartless. Mama too glared atuncle Karan and told him he was mean to upsetTania when she was looking forward to hisvisit so much.21

Uncle Karan apologised to mama and said hewould fix things with Tania.Tania was furious with uncle Karan. "I hateyou." she said. "How could you fool me? Youare supposed to help me fool other people."Uncle Karan smiled. "Now Tania. I did not foolyou. I really did need someone to talk to. Butyour mother heard the tail end of ourconversation. Do you remember how I said thatif the secret got out I would be in very bigtrouble?""Yes. Oh wait so you pretended to fool me somama would not ask more questions.""Yes. I was telling you the truth. That wasMartian algae you saw. I know it is a hardsecret to keep. But I can trust you, right?""Of course, uncle. I promise I wont tell asoul."That evening Tania felt thrilled to belong tothe group of the elite few, who had seenMartian life. But suddenly doubt crept in. Washer uncle fooling her again? He was aprankster after all. Hmm. May be she wouldnever know. Wait she thought, there is one way22

to find out. When I grow up, I'll work forNASA and they'll tell me.23

The earth algae image posted by Micah Sittig /I have modified the algae image posted by Micah Sittig /and presented it as Martian algaeThe liquor chocolates image was posted by Naotake 341812476/The Lego Duplo box image was posted by James Honeyball 2451/The hair under the microscope image was posted byGrahamPics1 43852/All above images were made available under the /Many public domain images were obtained fromopenclipart.org. Thanks openclipart for making them freelyavailable.Approximate relative sizes of Earth, Sun and the distancebetween them were obtained athttp://sunearthday.nasa.gov/2007/materials/solar pizza.pdfPlease note that this story is a work of fiction. There aresome interesting facts about the solar system and the storywas inspired by the recent discovery of liquid water onMars, but the plot of the story and the characters arepurely fictitious.24

llyTota,Y!!AYThis edition of this free ebook wasbrought to you by -https://www.freekidsbooks.orgPreschool, early grades, picture books, learning to read,early chapter books, middle grade, young adultAlways Free – Always will be!Copyright – Legal NoticeThis book has a standard copyright. The permission to publish thisFKB version has been provided by the author or publisher tohttps://www.FreeKidsBooks.org. The book may not be re-postedonline without the author's express permission.

Tania's Martian Encounter Tania was waiting for her uncle Karan to arrive. Uncle Karan was a prankster. He had helped Tania play a few practical jokes on her friends, and Tania thought he was super cool. Also, there were some important things she wanted to discuss wi