This is the Happy Pod from the BBC World Service.

I'm Jan Nacheleil and in this edition,

Dream big, dream audaciously and go for it.

We hear from a woman who's defied the odds to fulfill her childhood dream of becoming an astronaut.

I used to love lying on the beach looking up at the stars above me.

That childlike curiosity gave me such a drive to explore

then.

Also how a car accident prompted a photographer to share his skills with children in Belize.

Life is too short to be so selfish and I like to say in trying to figure out a way you

going to heal myself, I figure out a way to change the world.

We visit a school for older people in an Indian village and a wobbling online

sensation that has won hearts in Thailand and beyond.

We start with a woman who's made her childhood dreams come true with a giant leap in the world of space exploration. After 13 months of rigorous training,

Catherine Bernal Peg qualified with the European Space Agency earlier this year as the first astronaut to officially represent Australia.

In the past Australians who went into space had to do so under another country's flag.

Catherine, who's 39 and has two daughters, had worked as a space engineer in six different countries,

before eagerly moving back home when Australia established its own space agency six years ago,

and she hopes her achievement will inspire others to pursue careers in what are known as

STEM subjects, science, technology, engineering and maths. She's been speaking to the happy pods

Isabella Joel.

It's an incredible honor to be the first to represent Australia as a qualified astronaut.

When I was a young kid growing up with the childhood astronaut dream. I never thought I'd have the chance to do so

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