Maya Sherpa

Second attempt. This spring, Maya Sherpa, one of Nepal’s most famous and best female climbers, will tackle Kangchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world. “I am happy to go there again,“ the 40-year-old told me as we met in Kathmandu last week. “I have found sponsors who support me. However, my goal is not only to climb Kangchenjunga, I like to climb more 8,000-meter-peaks as the first Nepali woman.” In May 2017, Maya and her Nepalese friends and teammates Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita and Dawa Yangzum Sherpa had had to turn around on the 8,586-meter-high Kangchenjunga, about 300 meters below the highest point. The entire group of summit candidates had run out of ropes. “One of our Climbing Sherpas told us then that they had made the same mistake in spring 2013,” said Maya. “At that time, they went up to the summit. On descent, two Sherpas and three foreign climbers died because there was no rope, they were tired and it was extremely slippery in the upper part of the mountain, especially on the rock.”

More ropes, more manpower

Maya Sherpa, Dawa Yangzum Sherpa and Pasang Lhamu Sherpa (from the right) on Kangchenjunga in 2017

It is not an option to move the last high camp on Kangchenjunga at 7,400 meters further up, says Maya: “I saw no safe place for tents there. We need enough ropes and manpower, that’s the solution.” The three Sherpani, who became the first Nepalese women to climb K2 in Pakistan, the second highest mountain in the world, in 2014, will not be complete up this time. Pasang Lhamu gave birth to a son last November and is missing this time. It’s still open whether Dawa Yangzum will come along. “There are still two weeks to go. Let’s see what happens,” says Maya. “Otherwise, I go alone, with other people.”

Three times on Everest

Maya on Everest

Maya Sherpa has stood her ground as a woman in the men’s world of mountain climbing. She is a professional climber since 2003. With her husband, the expedition operator Arnold Coster, she leads expeditions and works as a mountain guide. The mother of a seven-year-old daughter has scaled Mount Everest from both sides, to date a total of three times. She was also the first female Nepali woman on Cho Oyu (8,188 m) in Tibet, Pumori (7,161 m), Baruntse (7,129 m) and Ama Dablam (6,814 m) in Nepal and on Khan Tengri (7,010 meters) in Kyrgyzstan.

Mental strength counts

In addition, Maya is president of the “Everest Summiteers Association” – and, since last August, also Vice President of the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA).”I feel very proud. I never thought that I was going to be elected.” She says, she wants to take care of all climbers, not just for women. “Ever since I’ve been climbing, I’ve been giving other women an example of what’s possible. I love to share my experiences and give advice to them. I think that helps.” In the meantime, she is not only accepted by her male Sherpa colleagues, but also by the clients. “Physically, women may be a bit weaker,“ says Maya. „But if you‘re mentally strong, this doesn‘t matter.”

Arnold Coster

The Everest spring season is on. This Saturday, eight “Icefall Doctors“ will be celebrating a puja in the base camp on the Nepalese south side of the highest mountain in the world, a Buddhist ceremony, during which the gods are asked for their blessing. Next week, the Sherpas, who are specialized in this task, will prepare this year’s route through the Khumbu Icefall. At the beginning of April the first commercial teams are expected in the base camp. “I’m wondering how busy it will be on the south side with every year we see the numbers increasing significantly,“ says Arnold Coster, when I meet him today in Kathmandu. “And I wonder how many actually switch to the Tibetan side.“

Only one new operator in Tibet

Tibetan North side of Mount Everest

In truth, only the expedition operator Altitude Junkies of the British Phil Crampton has been added, says Arnold: “It sounds in the media as if a lot of people are switching but I think most of the regular companies will be there, but with bigger groups – including myself.“ The 41-year-old Dutchman will lead an internationally mixed team of twelve clients. Already last year, Arnold was en route on the Tibetan north side. “The main reason why I climb in Tibet is that it’s too busy in the Icefall on the South side. There are too many people who are too slow and it’s easy to get stuck in a traffic jam.“ Moreover, the objective dangers on the north side are much lower, says Coster, adding that after heavy snow fall, there is only, if at all, a low avalanche danger on the way up to the 7,000-meter-high North Col. “On the south side, however, you are constantly in danger in the Icefall, but also in in the Western Cwm by avalanches if there is a lot of snow. And even in the Lhotse Face.“

Three times on the summit

Arnold on expedition

Coster has been living in Nepal since 2004. He is married to Maya Sherpa, one of the country’s most famous female climbers (my interview with her will follow later). They have a daughter aged seven. This spring, Arnold will lead his 15th Everest expedition. He has been on the summit at 8,850 meters three times – more than any other mountaineer from the Netherlands. “My job is taking care of the people and not going to the summit myself,“ says Arnold, pointing out that he has been already eight times on the 8,748-meter high South Summit of Everest. “Very often I climb with my group but I turn around with somebody who needs help.“ In spring 2016, however, any help came too late for two of his clients. Within 24 hours, a Dutchman with whom Coster was a friend and an Australian woman died – even though both had reached the South Col after their summit attempt. In social networks, Arnold was subsequently accused of not informing the families of the deceased in time.

Liaison officer passed on sensitive information

In the Khumbu Icefall

“That is not the truth. The truth is that I got an emergency contact for all of my members. So as soon as I called this emergency contact, and I did that, I felt that my part of the job was done. And they should spread the news between friends and family. That part didn’t happen, but I got accused of that,“ says Coster. “At this point I was busy on the mountain with the rescue of other team members and with the recovering of the victims.“ According to Arnold, the liaison officer in the base camp was responsible for the fact that the families learned about the death of their relatives from the internet. The officer had nothing better to do than to reveal internal information from the radio in an interview, says Arnold.

“Quite silly“

Coster does not favour the new rules for expeditions in Nepal. As reported, the government had decided not to grant permits to double amputees and blind climbers and to prohibit solo climbs. Meanwhile Nepal’s Supreme Court overruled the permit ban for disabled climbers. “The rules are quite silly because those people don’t cause the problems on Everest,“ says Arnold. “The big problem on the south side are unexperienced people.“ It would make much more sense, finds Coster, to demand for example from Everest aspirants to have climbed previously at least a seven-thousander in Nepal: “Then you can check it because the records are in the (Tourism) Ministry. And you also don’t lose the income, because tourism is one of the biggest sources of income in Nepal.“

The main reason that proposals like this come to nothing is that the Nepalese government has changed every six to eight months since the end of the monarchy in 2008, says Coster: “There is a new government now and people hope for – and I also hope – that this government is gonna stay the full term. It doesn’t even matter who is there. As long as people stay, we’re gonna make a plan. But if people are always changing, how can we make a plan?“

Newly car-free zone in the tourist quarter of Thames

P.S. You may be wondering why I am currently visiting Nepal. Tomorrow, in Thulosirubari, 70 kilometers east of Kathmandu, the first two buildings of the new school will be inaugurated, which could be built with your donations for our aid project “School up!“. In addition, German climber Ralf Dujmovits and I will lay the foundation for the second construction phase. Then I will report on the celebration in the small mountain village. In addition, I use the opportunity to conduct some interviews on the upcoming climbing season in the Nepalese capital. I will publish these interviews by and by in the blog.

Eric Arnold’s body was transferred to Kathmandu

More than 400 summit successes, five deaths. This is so far the balance of this spring’s climbing season on Mount Everest, which is slowly but surely coming to an end. The two Indian climbers who had been missing for nearly a week with a probability bordering on certainty are dead. A Sherpa rescue team discovered the body of Paresh Chandra Nath above South Col. Rising wind prevented the search for the second missing, Gautam Ghosh. The chance of finding him still alive is virtually nil. The dead bodies of Dutchman Eric Arnold and Australian Maria Strydom have been meanwhile transferred by helicopter to Kathmandu. The corpse of Indian Subhash Pal, who had also passed away during summit attempt, should be brought today to Camp 2, to be flown out from there subsequently.

“Very slowly”

Recovering the body at an altitude of about 8,000 meters is complex and not without risk for the rescue team, said expedition leader Arnold Coster, who belonged to the team that brought Eric Arnold’s body down from South Col. According to Coster, six climbers were needed, two in front, two in the middle, two at the back: “We were moving very slowly. It took us almost 24 hours to bring down his body to a height of about 6,200 meters.” 36-year-old Eric Arnold had become increasingly weaker on his way back from summit and finally had died in Camp 4 at South Col.

20 hours without oxygen

Robert Gropel in Kathmandu

Coster informed that 34-year-old Maria Strydom had abandoned her summit attempt near Everest South Summit at 8,750 meters, about a hundred meters below the main summit, because she had felt bad. Her husband Robert Gropel and some Sherpas had managed to bring Maria down to South Col. The next morning, on descent, the Australian had collapsed and died in Robert’s arms. “It was a superhuman effort, she was without oxygen for 20 hours”, said Gropel in Kathmandu in an interview with television channel ABC. The reporter digs deeper: Why was she without oxygen for that long? “Because of the length of time it took her, and took us to get her down, and it ran out.”

Maya Sherpa (in the background Mount Everest)

Nepal needs strong women like Maya Sherpa. “With our women expedition project we want to inspire women doing what we really are capable of even after being married and having children”, the 36-year-old climber writes to me. In July 2014, she scaled the 8611-meter-high K 2 with Dawa Yangzum Sherpa and Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita. They were the first female climbers from Nepal on top of the second highest mountain in the world. A week and a half ago, I introduced the trio’s new project in my blog: the planned ascent of Kangchenjunga next spring. I got Maya’s answers to my questions concerning their plans a few days after the article had gone online.

Still on debt

Climber, wife and mother

As Dawa Yangzum did previously, Maya confirmed that they are still sitting on debt with a volume of about 13,800 US $ (converted) after their expedition to K2. “People think, we have just earned a lot and lost nothing. Reality is just behind the wall”, says Maya adding that they want to do things differently now. “This time we have just tried to raise fund from many of those reputed mountaineering organizations like NMA [Nepal Mountaineering Association] or TAAN [Trekking Agencies’ Association of Nepal] who understand what we are doing and why.” She is alluding to the Government of Nepal that has still not paid the promised money for the K 2 expedition (equivalent to 4,950 $) till this day.

Twice on Everest

Maya (l.) on top of K 2

Maya grew up in a small village in Okhaldhunga district, not far from Mount Everest. She fought hard to find a place in the still male-dominated world of mountaineering in Nepal. “Being a professional climber since 2003, I have always tried my best to launch myself in the eyes of all those guys who think women are pathetic in this field”, says Maya who was a successful weightlifter (featherweight) before she started climbing. The Sherpani scaled Mount Everest from both sides, from Nepal in 2006, from Tibet in 2007. In addition, she was the first woman from Nepal on top of Cho Oyu (8,188 m) in Tibet, Pumori (7,161 m), Baruntse (7,129 m) and Ama Dablam (,6814 m) in Nepal and Khan Tengri (7,010 m) in Kyrgyzstan. She is married to the Dutch mountaineer Arnold Coster. They live with their four-year-old daughter Roos Dawa in the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu.

Fight against gender discrimination in Nepal

In 2010, Maya was elected as an executive member of the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA): “I learned a lot there, the need of women expedition guide and climber in reality. Female climbers and guides could be counted on two hands.” It was a “huge challenge” for her, Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita and Dawa Sherpa Yangzum “to fight against gender discrimination in Nepal”, Maya Sherpa says. “We would also like to give a shot awareness message to every single man who thinks girls are born with a curse: This is not the truth if we just avoid gender discrimination in the society.”