Nepal: The Mount Everest Buzz
It’s a mountaineering season. Nepal, being the country with Mount Everest the highest peak in the world, is abuzz with news about it. A few records have been set at always. More than 500 climbers have already set their foot on the Mt Everest peak, and five have died in the attempt, and the climbing frenzy is not decreasing.
Nepali blogosphere has a few things to say about the Everest climbing. A few bloggers are surprised on how Sherpas so easily climb and help other to reach the top yet do not get the due credit.
Nepal Sites is amazed how Sherpas make it so easy, “… there are people like Appa Sherpa, who climbs the Everest for 17th time and makes climbing the top of the world look like a piece of cake.”. And, The Radiant Star writes “Apa Sherpa had summated 17 times, Pemba Sherpa reached the top thrice within nine days this season, and there are many Sherpas who had climbed to the top more than five times.”
Yet both blogs believe the Nepalis are lagging behind when it comes to taking credit. The Radiant Star believes its unfair:
Yet, Sherpas do not get credit they deserve.
In almost every films made, Sherpas are almost absent once they mountaineers leaves the base-camp. In every documentary, the role of Sherpa is to cook food and carry loads.
Nepal Sites wonders why there are not films and books from Nepali summiteers:
I was also wondering at the same time that stories and heroic of climbing Everest are portrayed so beautifully by the foreign climbers. While Nepalese have climbed the peak more than anyone else, they don't seem to tell their stories. And even the journalists don't seem to bother telling their stories.
Look & Gaze talks about an expedition to be led by the Snow Leopard – 60-year-old Ang Rita Sherpa which aims to hoist the flags of eight political parties of Nepal atop Mt Everest. It says the Democratic Everest Expedition is important event of Nepal:
The snowmen's humble expedition, though it appears like a postmodernist game of littering the highest mountain with festoons, is at heart a symbolic journey of a ‘New’ democratic Nepal. The snowmen's excitement is a very meaningful historical phenomenon. To rush up to the summit with flags by these snowmen is to deconstruct the grand Everest narration, the grande récit used by both the British Empire and the Nepali feudal history. This “Democratic Everest Expedition” will give a new meaning to the history.
And, Real News Stories from Nepal has an entry about an expedition to clean up Mt Everest.
2 comments
Everest should be submitted by more people on the planet. Don’t know why many of us can not afford do this even we are physically fit for it! Sure it’s going to cost to shoot up above the sky, hope the cost of submitting everest goes down so more people go up there!
What is amazing to me is that one of the largest, most successful female everest expeditions, where all 10 members have summited Everest has not received much media coverage. This team is made-up of all Nepali females – setting records for many Nepali female firsts as well – first Brahmin, Chhetri, Gurung and Danuwar female summiters. Not only did they have to fight extra hard to raise the funds and get their permit to to even attempt the Everest bid, it now looks like they will have to fight to get the recognition that they deserve for this historic feat.