NATIONAL8 (Spotlight Weekly]

Spring Of Records

Mount Everest summiteers have returned to the base camp with a bagful of firsts

By A CORRESPONDENT

Although the current mountaineering season kicked off with depressing news, it has witnessed some positive developments. At the outset of the season, on April 29, Babu Chhiri, the 35-year-old Sherpa from Solukhumbu district, died after he fell 200m down a crevasse at the Base Camp II, situated at an altitude of 6,500m, while taking photographs, his second passion after climbing mountains.

This year’s mountaineering season sprung many records, including the first climb by a blind person, the youngest and oldest mountaineer, the first father-son conquer and the first Nepali woman to climb the mountain twice.

Mountaineer Temba : Perseverance pays

Temba Chhiri, the 16-year-old boy who lost four fingers of two hands last year during his failed attempt, succeeded in setting foot on the summit this year, becoming the youngest person to do so.

Sherman Bull, a physician from Connecticut, became the oldest person to climb Everest. The 64-year-old American also shared another record by conquering the mountain along with his son, Bradford, 37.

Another American citizen, Arrik Wainmair, became the first blind person to reach the Everest summit.

Lakpa Sherpa, the first Nepali woman to return alive from the Everest summit, made another record by climbing it for the second time this year. She has climbed the peak from both the Nepali and Tibetan sides.

After the first successful bid to the Everest summit by Tenzing Sherpa and Edmund Hillary, more than 2,000 climbers have scaled the world’s tallest mountain.

If an individual has the determination to do something, nothing can hinder his way to achieve success. Temba Chhiri is the latest case in point.

Despite his physical weakness, the young Sherpa from Rolwaling Village Development Committee of Dolkha district broke the record set by Sambhu Tamang 28 years ago when he reached the Everest summit at the age of 18.

Temba Chhiri decided to climb Everest after another Nepali teenager, Arbinda Timilsina, abandoned his attempt at the age of 14 just 28 meters below the summit because of bad weather.

Rolawaling Village Development Committee has produced many mountaineers who have set diverse records in climbing. Temba Chhiri grew up inspired by these stories and records set by the people from his neighborhood.

The determination of Temba Chhiri never died even when he lay on a bed at B&B hospital when an operation was performed to remove four of his fingers. A few hours after the surgery, when this scribe met him at his post-surgery room, Temba had expressed only one wish: to climb the Everest.