50
years after man stepped on the roof of the world, the impact it made to the
world undoubtedly reveals Everest’s enormous power and energy. BBC featured
their version of the 50th Anniversary, which I caught on BBC news last Sunday 1
June 2003 at 5 PM. True to a BBC production, it is well documented and thought
provoking. Weeks earlier, National Geographic and Discovery Channel aired their
own specials commemorating the first step on the roof of the world 50 years
after 29 May 1953. National Geographic’s Surviving Everest chronicles the
remarkable expedition back to Everest. Discovery Channels Civilization presents
tensions caused by the first climb:
- It was the Swiss who first nearly reached the top
with Tenzing as part of the expedition in 1952.
- Tenzing was more loyal to the Swiss than the
British. But as the British were scheduled to climb in 1953, the Swiss
permitted Tenzing to join.
- The Brits were driven to reach to the peak first
because the mountain was in their territory. The Swiss wanted to beat
them.
- 1953 was a British Expedition. But it was a New
Zealander and a Sherpa who reached the summit.
- Tenzing was pressured on his nationality. Was he
Nepali or Indian? He claimed he was born in Nepal, his heart in Nepal and
lived in India.
- Did Edmund reach the summit? He has no proof to
show he was there. Edmund photographed Tenzing at the top.
- Who stepped on the summit first? At first, it was
Tenzing. When they descended, they declared they arrived at the summit
together. In Tenzings autobiography, he confessed it was Edmund who
reached it first. On some accounts, Tenzing was said to be pulling Edmund
up with a rope.
- Tenzing claimed to be very happy to reach the
peak and said a prayer in what they regarded as the sacred mountain. Edmund
said they knocked the bastard off.
- Edmund was accorded knighthood by the Queen. Tenzing
was awarded an honor.
- Lord John Hunt, the British expedition leader of
the successful climb never made it to the top. It was he who decided to
choose Edmund and Tenzing to assault to the peak.
- 50 years after, we still have to find out the
truth about the first climb.
Chito R. 3 June 2003
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The more I hear of the line "it was Hillary who
planned it out as a mountaineer and Tenzing was just that, a guide, the more I
am convinced that Tenzing really was the first mortal to step on Everest. Tenzing
died lonely with sadness in his heart in India in 1986 as a result of poor
health and a drinking problem. It must have been the remorse on the burden of
truth. Sir Edmund had his share of misfortune. It was tragic to lose his wife
and daughter in 1975 on the same range that made him a knight in 1975.
When I repeatedly deliberate on were the thoughts,
"Edmund and Tenzing were different from each before Everest. They were
very different after Everest. What was common with them were the ten minutes
they were together at the roof of the world," the more I am intrigued,
"what did the worlds highest mountain do to them?"
There are about 120 corpses lying in Everest. With every
5 climbers, 1 dies. It is said no one conquers it. They just survive it. Those
who survived Everest have these to say.
Q: What words would you use to describe your feelings
about Mount Everest?
A: Alive, humbling, unpredictable, exhilarating, empowering.
Q: What words would you use to describe your feelings
about the Sherpa people?
A: Hardworking, joyous, loyal, thoughtful, my dearest
friends.
-Liesl Clark writer/ producer/director on the filming
of Dark Side of Everest
Lorraine: Explain to me a sherpa's approach to
mountain climbing compare to how we see it from the west?
Jamling: The mountains have been there the whole time.
Sherpa's see the mountain all the time but we never have interest to climb
these mountains. It was only when the British and the foreign expeditions started
to climb these mountains that the sherpa started to become involved in climbing
because it is a way of living for them. And for most of the sherpas, climbing
is the bread and butter, lots of them have lost their lives. We don't climb for
pleasure at all. We believe most of the mountain is sacred to us. For example,
Mount Everest, we called it ''Chomolungma'' which is mother god-ness of the
world. And ''Miyolangsangma'' is the deity that resides on Everest so we pray
to her all the time. We pray to many of the other mountains surrounding, you
know in the Himalayas.
Lorraine: Jamling, would you ever consider stopping
mountain climbing, getting a regular job somewhere?
Jamling: I don't think so; I mean I don't see myself
sitting in office 9 to 5 at all. And I just enjoy being in the outdoors,
climbing mountains. I have stopped climbing Everest but smaller mountains I
still continue to climb. Just like being in mountains... it makes me feel so
nice, it makes me feel really alive and it makes you feel how small we are in
this world, how fresh we humans are. It's great feeling just being up in the
mountains.
-CNN's Lorraine Hahn interviews Jamling Tenzing
Norgay, son of Tenzing
I think the expeditionary experience of climbing
Everest, of surviving it, has changed our lives. To push yourself to within a
wisp of life itself and return to the world in the valleys below is to see life
in its raw immediacy and in its essential components.
For me to receive hearty congratulations from Jamling
Tenzing Norgay was the true finale. Our two families have been transformed by
this mountain.
The mountain has given us a hard-won opportunity to
rise above ourselves and to play the lottery of surviving the experience. Just as
it has done for the Sherpa people who live around its lofty base. And veteran
climber. Ang Norbu of Pangboche Village says that despite his frostbitten fingers,
"the mountain is a jewel. It is a gift".
-Peter Hillary on climbing Everest for the National
Geographic Documentary Sons of Everest 50 years (actually 49) before his father
Edmund first reached the summit
The first question which you will ask and which I must
try to answer is this, 'What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?' and my
answer must at once be, 'It is no use'. There is not the slightest prospect of
any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behaviour of the human
body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to
some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of
it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any
coal or iron. We shall not find a single foot of earth that can be planted with
crops to raise food. It's no use. So, if you cannot understand that there is
something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out
to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever
upward, then you won't see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just
sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and
make money. We eat and make money to be able to enjoy life. That is what life
means and what life is for.
-George Leigh Mallory, 1922
Because it is there.
-George Mallory (1886-1924), answer to the question
'Why do you want to climb Mt. Everest?'
I have climbed my mountain, but I must still live my
life.
-Tenzing Norgay
Well, we knocked the bastard off!
-Edmund Hillary, on first climbing Mount Everest
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