A perfect ten at the age of 14 and the first gymnast to do so at the Olympics — in this one line, Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci's biggest achievement can be summarised. But it would surely be a disservice to her and the eventful day of July 18, 1976, when this feat was accomplished, if we don’t tell you what exactly happened.
A ten was such an anomaly in gymnastics that a space of three digits would suffice on the scoreboard and the same was conveyed to Omega, the Swiss company incharge of keeping both time and score at the Olympics. What a grave misjudgment this would prove to be at the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games because when Comaneci actually scored the perfect ten, the scoreboard flashed '1.0'. Today, this nine-time Olympic gold medalist might have retired but she will always be the perfect ten for us.
Austen is awesome
If you think British author Jane Austen merely wrote about societal gossip and amorous affairs, then you are simply not reading her work right. Under all that wit and sarcasm is a dissection of society that educates anyone who reads it. That's why though her books allude to forgotten social codes and the simple village life, the stories themselves remain relevant, Austen still remains relevant long after she passed away on June 18, 1817. Shall we read one of her works today? We are going for the gothic novel Northanger Abbey.
