The first homotopy group of SO_3 has an order 2 element (that's a classic).
The surface area of a quarter of the unit sphere is Pi via Gauss-Bonnet (My source is Ariel Shaqed - it should have been a classic, but no one I asked seems to knew it). The sphere is what you reach with a straight hand while standing still. Hold a Pencil in your hand, that's your tangent vector. Now parallel transport the pencil on a quarter sphere: it points in the opposite direction. QED
David Lehavi
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