"When you’re flying in space, some of the things down on Earth seem trivial. Things like politics leave your mind. I didn’t feel like I was a person from the United States" ❤️

Sunita Williams to participate in Kerala Literature Festival

Today’s The Hindu, Chennai Edition

#newspaperinlearning

31 December 2025

So happy to know that, Sunita Williams is participating in the upcoming Kerala Literature Festival 2026, as reported in today’s The Hindu.

Ms. Williams, 60, is expected to reflect on her journeys beyond earth and speak about science, exploration, leadership, resilience, and the enduring power of human curiosity,

says the news report.

This post is for all ye ardent fans of Sunita, and for those of you planning to participate in KLF 2026 - 

Well, Sunita Williams is a pioneering NASA astronaut who holds the record for the most total spacewalk time by a woman, with 62 hours and 6 minutes across nine spacewalks.

In the year 2007, she became the first person to run a marathon in space, completing the famous Boston Marathon on a treadmill aboard the ISS.

In 2012, she also completed the first triathlon in orbit, using a treadmill, stationary bike, and resistance machine to simulate the swimming portion.

Umberto Cavellaro’s book titled, To the Stars: Women Spacefarers’ Legacy, published in the year 2023, gives very interesting vignettes from the life of Sunita Williams, especially on her time in space.

Here goes interesting vignettes gleaned from the book for us all –

Sunita Williams: From the Depths of the Sea to the Heights of Space

During her two long-term stays on the ISS, Sunita Williams broke several records, including the longest continuous spaceflight by a woman (192 days), total female spacewalks (seven), and the longest total spacewalk time for a woman (50 hours, 40 minutes). She was the second woman ever to command the ISS and the second astronaut of Indian descent to fly into space –

Records are for breaking. They are just little beacons out there that somebody else will want to do and they are measures of the accomplishments that we’ve made so far. I don’t think too much about them because I was also just in the right place at the right time.

From May 13 to 20, 2002, Williams lived underwater in the Aquarius habitat for nine days as a crewmember of the NEEMO-2 expedition, the NASA program aimed at investigating survival in a hostile, alien place for humans to live. During the expedition, she performed EVAs to simulate underwater spacewalks.

Williams participated in two long-duration expeditions on board the ISS.  Her first trip into space was Expedition-14/15.

Launched aboard the Shuttle Discovery STS-116, together with Joan Higginbotham, she participated in the 20th Space Shuttle mission to the station.

“My first mission was six-and-a-half months. We weren’t exactly sure how long it was going to be because I went up and back on the Space Shuttle which was dependent on weather for launch and landing. So you might have to say goodbye a couple of times and you might get excited to come home and then have to wait. It was an emotional rollercoaster, particularly because it was my first space flight”.

As all the astronauts who have been in space for some time have said, from up there you look at Earth and its problems with different eyes. Williams was no different -

When you’re flying in space, some of the things down on Earth seem trivial. Things like politics leave your mind. I didn’t feel like I was a person from the United States, I felt like I was lucky enough to be a person from Earth.

For me, most news wasn’t important but people are important, so when you hear about natural disasters like hurricanes and fires, that makes you miss home and wonder how everybody’s coping.

But I would also look back at the planet and think ‘gosh it’s a pretty little place, everybody’s going for a walk on the beach or something like that, they must be enjoying life down there’. If you are having a bad day, you can go to the Cupola window and see a part of the Earth. It makes you smile.

The Cupola was her preferred place, “the crowning jewel of the space station,” as she named it.

She said: “It’s like being on a spacewalk. but it’s a little bit more comfortable; you’re in just a T-shirt and shorts and you can turn 360°. It’s just spectacular, a great place to have a pretty much heads-on view and to manipulate the robotic arm”.

Like many astronauts after their extraterrestrial experience, Williams suggests that we should broaden our vision: “It is hard to believe that we have borders on our planet. In space, all we see are oceans. I believe that we are all citizens of this universe.”

Williams made headlines while she was on the ISS, on April 16, 2007, when she ran the famed Boston Marathon, which happened to be in her home town.

She had qualified by running a 3:29:57 in the Houston Marathon in 2006, finishing among the top 100 women. With her race number, 14,000, posted on the space station’s treadmill, she successfully crossed the metaphorical finish line in an unofficial completion time of 4:24:00, while circling Earth at least twice, running as fast as 8 mph but flying at more than 5 miles per second.

She ran in tandem with fellow astronaut Karen Nyberg, who was running on Earth among the 24,000 other runners participating in the marathon.

Despite having to contend with the monotony of running 42.2 km (26.2 miles) on a treadmill without crowds to cheer her on, Williams ran under better weather conditions than her counterparts in Boston, where it was 9°C with some rain, mist, and wind that day.

Williams said: “I did it to encourage kids to start making physical fitness part of their daily lives. I thought a big goal like a marathon would help get this message out there.”

The media sang the praises of the marathoner “pioneering new frontiers in the running world,” says Cavallaro.

Well, I’m happy the media is all set to sing her praises yet again, at the KLF!

PS: You may want to read our past blogpost on Carl Sagan’s awe-inspiring book titled, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space, that’s got us all fascinated for close to three decades now, for “that one last look of its home!” from the invincible Voyager spacecraft before departing our planet and veering towards the other pockets of our solar system, HERE on our blog.

Credits: The Cupola Image from ISS is taken from FriendsofNasadotOrg