Travel Travails on Indian Trails: Chapter 07

In late 1981, instead of the boys persuading me to take them on a trek to the Himalayas, it was I who persuaded them and three other teachers to go with me on a trek to the Everest Base Camp in the summer of 1982.

Why I did that can be understood in the light of another flashback into my life.

I have already mentioned that I had done an adventure course from Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, Darjeeling when I was seventeen.
It was not a personal choice. I was a member of the National Cadet Corps and every year, a few “promising” NCC cadets from all over the country were selected to attend various specialized training courses anywhere in India.
I was selected for the adventure course because the NCC officer was my uncle.

At HMI, Darjeeling, we were lucky to be trained by some of the most famous mountaineers in the world. Late Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, who had married twice and climbed Everest once, was our Field Director. Nawang Gombu, who had married once and climbed Everest twice, was our Deputy Field Director.
After completing the course, I had fallen in love with many Himalayan legends like Everest, Kanchenjunga, Annapurna, Dhaulagiri, Nanga Parbat and Nanda Devi.

~

In the years until I joined Mayo College in 1977, I had read every book written on major Himalayan mountain climbing expeditions. I had lived the experiences of those legendary mountaineers through imaginative participation, sharing their moments of grief and elation with deep intensity.
Place a copy of the the Kama Sutra and a copy of Sir Ed Hillary’s biography in front of me; I would make a grab for the latter.

I had read so many expedition accounts on Mount Everest I knew each step from Kathmandu to the summit of Everest like the back of my hand. Jiri, Namche Bazaar, Tengpoche, Pheriche, Lobuje, Gorakshep, Khumbu Glacier, Base Camp, Khumbu Icefall, Western CWM, South Col and Hillary’s Step sounded like home.

Alongside deep infatuation for Everest grew the passionate urge to see it with my own eyes, if not climb it. At that time, however, it felt like falling in love with Meena Kumari – the tragedy queen of Hindi cinema – distant and unapproachable.
The dream had remained dormant until I joined Mayo College and started doing small treks with Mayo boys. I came to know that Mayo boys had actually made a bid to reach Everest Base Camp a few years ago but had given up at 16000 feet after tiring themselves out by walking 150 miles from Jiri to Lobuje.

So in late 1981, I started persuading my colleagues Mr. Ramesh Shah, Mr. Arun Sharma and Mr. G.S. Bajwa to join me in taking the boys to the Everest Base Camp in the summer of 1982.
I had reasons to pick those three men.
Mr. Shah, a senior member of Math faculty and a mountain enthusiast like most Gujaratis would not be able to resist the temptation to see Everest for free.
Mr. Sharma, my colleague in English department, was desperately looking for the position of a Headmaster just as Mr. Dick Everhard had done back in 1978. A trek to the EBC would certainly open the gates for him.
Mr. Bajwa, an ex-sailor from the Indian Navy, had smuggling electronic goods from Nepal to India on his wish-list. He would not miss the opportunity for the life of him.

Still, they were reluctant to join me.
Their reluctance was based on their awareness of our Headmaster Mr. C.R.Gupta’s aversion to spending money.
Their reluctance evaporated when I suggested that a trek to Everest Base Camp could be made to appear like a big event for which funds could be raised through donations.

When we mooted the subject to Mr.Gupta, he was elated at the proposal. So long as money came in and did not go out, he was always elated. He happily signed the circular letter for parents which I had drafted cunningly to elicit maximum response from them. Even before we had started planning for the trek, more than sixty thousand rupees had already been donated by the parents.

The Chief Guest on the Annual Prize Giving function in November 1981 turned out to be a rich Sheikh from a Sultanate in the Middle East. He had studied at Mayo in the late forties and held an important office in his country.
Seeing the opportunity to raise more donations for our trek, we sought an interview with His Highness. He dismissed us promptly with a cheque for forty thousand rupees; there were other beggars waiting to have an interview with him, though he did not say that in those very words.

By the end of the year 1981, we had more than 100,000 rupees by way of donations for the trek. By then, I had already invented a name for our venture: “MAYO COLLEGE EVEREST BASE EXPEDITION 1982”. Wish I could delete the word ‘BASE’ from it!
The donations in kind too had piled up – kilos of sugar, rice, cooking oil, biscuits and chocolate from parents dealing in those commodities. Through the aegis of the NCC, we had been issued high altitude parkas and sleeping bags by the Indian Army which we had already started using for practice. After all, it does get quite cold in Rajasthan in winters.

~

Then began the next phase of our “Expedition” – planning. With the kind of funds we had already amassed plus the mandatory contribution of two thousand rupees by each Mayo boy wanting to join the expedition, planning a trek had never been such a delight!
Brain-storming sessions ensued from which Mr.Bajwa had to be excluded for obvious reasons. He was hulk of a man, but just that. Our Maker exercises immense discretion in the allotment of gray matter just as our Headmaster Mr. Gupta does in the allotment of money.
The first agenda item to be discussed and planned was the itinerary of the Expedition. Fully aware of the reasons for the failure of the earlier Mayo trek to Everest Base, we, first of all, decided to make the journey as comfortable as possible.

Thanks to the shoe-string budget at their disposal, the planners of the 1977 trek had almost killed the boys by making them walk from Jiri to Lobuje and then back to Jiri to save pennies. Since we had no need to save pennies, the Expedition would fly from Kathmandu to Lukla. The boys would be fresh and energetic and would reach EBC within ten days. We would hire porters to carry our gear and rations. We would make the boys stay in lodges and not in the tents to save money. We would give them bindaas food cooked by a team of Sherpa cooks. Finally, we would fly them back from Lukla to Kathmandu. Perfect.

~

On May 3, 1982, our Expedition comprising sixteen boys and four teachers reaches Kathmandu Airport at 6 in the morning to catch a plane to Lukla.

While we wait for baggage and security check in the domestic lounge milling with travelers both native and foreign, I notice a group of native men squatting on the floor and doing curious things. They have their baggage open in front of them from which they pick up brand-new shirts and T-shirts and start wearing them one on top of the other until all the shirts and T-shirts are worn.
At the end of the operation, they have so many shirts and T-shirts on them they look like Sumo wrestlers from neck to pelvis.
It is rather hot in Kathmandu in the month of May, so I am not convinced they are so cold they need to wear all those shirts and T-shirts at Kathmandu airport.
But wait a moment. Couldn’t they be getting ready for the cold weather at the destination – Lukla, Jumla or Jomsom?

I have almost lost interest in them when Shamendra Singh – a boy from a royal family in India and related to a royal family in Nepal – whispers in my ear.
‘You know why these people have trussed themselves up in those shirts and T-shirts, Sir? They are business people. They bought those shirts and T-shirts here in Kathmandu to sell them in their shops at Lukla, Jumla or Jomsom. Wear them all. No extra baggage, no extra payment. Only extra profit.’
By the time Shamendra has finished speaking, the group of ‘over-dressed’ businessmen is lined up in front of the check-in counter for Jomsom.

~

Until May 3, 1982, my colleagues Mr. Shah, Mr. Sharma, Mr. Bajwa and I had seen airplanes either in the movies or flying high up in the sky.
On the other hand, all the sixteen Mayo boys had travelled in them to the US, Europe, Canada or Australia on numerous holiday trips.
So when we walk to the small propeller-driven STOL Canadian airplane parked in a corner of the airport, all of us teachers have butterflies fluttering nervously inside our tummies.

Madhav: Hey, Shamu, are we flying to Lukla inside that kite?
Shamu: You guessed it right, man. Drones like a mosquito flying at 10000 feet. Been on it quite a few times.
Kong: Hope it doesn’t get stuck in a tree, ha, ha, ha!

I’m so nervous I don’t enjoy boys’ humour. Wish we had planned to walk from Jiri to Everest Base like our predecessors! Place terra firma under my feet and see how confident I can be.
Seventeen of us clamber into the small plane through its three-step ladder-cum-door. That is all this plane takes. Mr. Arun Sharma and two boys would be in the second flight to Lukla that morning.
The two uniformed Nepali pilots are already seated in the cockpit up front. Though I am scared, I choose a seat right behind them to the left of the narrow aisle. Would like to see how they fly the plane and be ready to lend a hand if need be.
The flight attendant bangs the door-cum-ladder shut when all seventeen of us are seated.
Then he moves up the aisle, distributing candies.
Then he checks if all of us have our seat belts on.

Mr. Bajwa: I don’t have a belt. I’m wearing track suit pants.
Flight Attendant: No. no, Sir! You fasten the seat belt.
Mr. Bajwa: What seat belt? You didn’t give us any. You gave us only one toffee.
Flight Attendant: Sorry, Sir, but would you mind getting up for a second, please? Let me show you how to do it.

Mr. Shah and I watch the demo eagerly so that the flight attendant doesn’t have to help two more ignormuses on his flight.

By that time, the pilots have switched the engines on. In a moment, the plane starts juddering as the propellers whirl at full speed. Boys are talking, laughing and joking loudly when the plane starts moving forward. Within seconds, it is air-borne. With my heart in my mouth, I see Kathmandu tilting to one side and then to the other. Oh dear Lord Shiva, let this plane land me safely at Lukla. I promise I would never ever step into one, especially when visiting your holy abodes in the high Himalayas!

As if answering my prayers, one of the pilots' voices rings out on the PA system.
‘Gentlemen, we are now flying at an altitude of 10000 feet. You can see the Great Himalayas to your left. Right at the centre of the range is the famed Gauri-Shankar group of mountains.’
I silently bow my head towards the venerated peaks shimmering white against a deep blue sky. All devout Hindus overcome their blues just by uttering the name of Shankar and when they can see Him side by side with his wife in the shape of another lofty mountain, they become as cocky as the Australian cricket team playing India at Melbourne Cricket Ground.
All the guys sitting to the right of the aisle (including Mr. Bajwa who weighs 104 kilos in his underpants) unbuckle their seat belts and rush to the left side to look at the mountains through the small windows. The plane starts tilting to the left so precariously one of the pilots has to order them back to their seats on the PA system.

I congratulate myself for choosing the best seat in the plane. I can enjoy watching the pilots fiddling with knobs and dials in front of them and occasionally tweaking those joy-sticks built like bull’s horns. They have earphones clamped to their ears and I keep wondering if they are listening to Nepali music on radio or just protecting their ears from the noise of the plane.
I also have the advantage of the ring-side view of lofty Himalayan peaks lined up on the horizon to my left. It is a bright and sunny morning and I can easily identify each massif or mountain. When I start recognizing the shapes of mountains around Khumbu in the far eastern corner of the view framed by the window, I know we are about to reach our destination.

One of the pilots comes alive on the PA system and asks us to fasten our seat belts for landing. Sooner than he has finished speaking, I find myself staring at the most frightening view through the windscreen of the cockpit.
The plane has slowed down and is lined up with a dusty airstrip below that starts from the edge of a cliff and ends up at the farthest end of a narrow shelf from where a steeply inclined mountain begins to rise up into the sky. The strip looks so short I am convinced the little plane would over-shoot it and then . . .
As I start praying fervently before my impending and premature meeting with my Maker, the plane is just about ready to touch the cliff-side edge of the runway. In a moment, I feel the wheels of the plane come in contact with something hard. The plane bounces into the air a few times as the harsh grinding noise of the brakes announces our return to terra firma.
Suddenly all the noise drops down to zero, the plane glides forward like a swan, takes a slow right turn and comes to a gentle halt on a wide and dusty clearing.
Thank you, Lord Shiva! Thanks for cancelling your unscheduled meeting with us!
Everest Base Camp, here I come!

~

We had paid a fortune to get our equipment and rations air-lifted from Kathmandu to Lukla.
When people saw it unloaded on the airstrip, they thought we were on our way to the summit of Mt. Everest.

Just as sugar attracts a horde of flies, our mound of stuff (which actually had a lot of sugar in it) attracted the Sherpa porters, guides and cooks from Lukla and neighborhood villages. We immediately fell for a young and handsome Sherpa guide and began negotiating with him. After considerable haggling, it was decided that the young Sherpa would engage a team of porters, cooks and yaks to carry our stuff from Lukla to EBC and then back to Lukla for a sum which we thought was quite reasonable.
Since our guide had an unpronounceable name, we decided to call him Tom.
After sealing the deal, Tom led us to a big lodge just above the airstrip.

Lukla in 1982 was still an archaic Sherpa village with a few simple lodges that catered to the continuous flow of backpackers from all over the world, especially during summer months.
Our lodge owners were a middle aged couple who readily agreed to accommodate the twenty of us in a large dormitory and also allowed us to use their big courtyard to sort out our mound of stuff. In a jiffy, Tom got all the stuff ferried from the airstrip to the courtyard where it was stacked neatly to be split into loads for porters and yaks the next morning at 6.

~

After dumping our rucksacks in the dormitory, we set out to explore Lukla. It was a cluster of houses and lodges on either side of the high-street which was also the trail to Namche Bazaar. It was a busy street with people and yaks moving constantly up and down.

Most tea-shops were filled with western trekkers who sat at the tables reading trekking guides to Himalayas and sipping tea. There were both men and women, young and old. It was reminiscent of Pushkar -- a holy town near Ajmer – where western tourists flocked throughout the year and sat in tea-shops reading Lonely Planet Travel Guides and smoking joints.

Lukla sits at 9000 feet and as we tried to soak in its ambience, we were content with the thought that we had begun the acclimatization process by staying a day at Lukla.

We had read and heard so much about the local beer called chhang Mr. Sharma and I decided to try it immediately after returning to the lodge. Mr. Shah being a Gujarati never touched alcohol; Mr. Bajwa drank anything provided it was free.

Though we hid the fact from each other until our return to Ajmer twenty days later, Mr. Sharma and I almost puked after the first sip of chhang at Mr. Ang Dawa’s lodge. It looked and tasted like the piss of a horse suffering from urinary tract infection. Still we drank it with the same kind of patience and perseverance as was required to drink potions made by our Mayo Hospital compounder.

I was so familiar with Nepal through my intensive reading of books on Everest and other expeditions I diplomatically changed the next drink from chhang to rakshi. When Mr. Ang Dawa poured it into our empty glasses from a huge kettle and Mr. Sharma took the first sip, I could see an expression of intense delight on his face despite a dense growth of salt-n-pepper on it.

Without the slightest hesitation, he called Mr. Ang Dawa back and bade him to refill the kettle with rakshi up to the brim and leave it on our table.

It took us the rest of the day to finish the kettle, but we never complained.

In the summer of 2007 a quarter century later before Mr. Sharma passed away, he and I met after many years and once again tried to recall unsuccessfully how we had managed to reach our beds in Mr. Ang Dawa’s lodge after finishing that kettle.

This is how Lukla looks now.