Informational message

In connection with the situation in Nepal, expedition 'Everest-2015' is completed because of the impossibility of its continuation. The information with details will be posted soon.

Day 20. April, 29. BC (5200 m)

Yesterday in the evening Victor Bobok came to our camp to play and sing guitar songs. He used to work as a guide for Abramov, but several years ago somehow not nice left '7 summits' to work as a guide with his own clients. So Abramov and he didn't communicate with each other for quite a long time, because both were offended at each other. Now Sasha and Vitya reconciled and this is good. All our camp residents came to listen to the original songs and some people from other camps came as well. I love to listen such songs and love to sing to the guitar. But Bobok as a performer is so-so, so I decided not to waste my time and just left and went to read books before going to bed.

Today the film crew got up very early in the morning to film the necessary 'takes' with V. Pelsh. After the takes shooting the cameraman Sasha went around the camp with kitchenboys and filmed how they bring coffee to the clients.

Today early in the morning the famous showman Valdis Pelsh left us; it's a pity, now I can't write in my blog 'yesterday Valdis conducted the evening'. His first plan 'to ascend at least the North Col' wasn't realized unfortunately: Valdis wasn't higher than in MC - he wasn't in ABC. Evil tongues could also remember, that his attempt in autumn to ascend Elbrus was unsuccessful as well. In short, mountains are not easy for the Moscow celebrity.

Actually, it is not Valdis' fault that he leaves ahead of schedule - he got seriously sick, he almost completely lost his voice. It is not easy to be at such altitude in mountains without a preliminary preparation and strong desire. some fellows say, that Valdish got sick because he smoked and went without a hat in the frost and in the wind - these fellows just slander. Yeah, he smoked, yes, he went without a hat - but still he is a nice and positive person in general...

Well, to the regret of those who stay, showman by bus of the neighboring expedition started his trip back to Russia - through Lhasa, Chengdu and Beijing. The film crew will stay as members of the expedition to film the further actions.

After breakfast Tolya Menskiy and I decided to walk around and ascended almost the half of the neighbouring slope - 300 meters up. It is a wonderful view to the Rongbuk valley from there, the camps of all expeditions - including ours - are clearly seen.

There are many wild birds in surrounding mountains, they are about the size of pheasants, and a form of a partridge: they are not afraid of people, you can come closer - a few meters from them - to take a picture. When I came to the camp I found - to my regret - that all the workspaces in the Internet tent are occupied, and the club is fully occupied by the Sherpas, kitchen boys and their friends who listen to their sherpa-music. So I had to take a temporary workspace in the dining room. Now the lunch begins, so the today's post is done.

Day 19. April, 28. BC (5200 m). The day of rest

Today, tomorrow and the day after tomorrow are the planned days of rest in BC after the trekking to ABC. We spend the time in Internet tent, reading news about the awful events in Nepal and the Himalayas. The situation with the expedition continuation is not clear - there are a lot of discrepant rumours. The leaders of other expeditions come to our camp to talk to Abramov, share gossips, bring and drink up alcoholic drinks. The mood in general is rather depressed.

Except for rumors and gossip - there is no information at all. There were no official Chinese statements of authorized persons until now. The leaders of the expeditions wait for a big sports boss from Lhasa to arrive. Maybe after his arrival something will be clarified. Maybe not. When exactly will he come - is not known too.

Abramov gives a lot of interviews to the Russian mass media by skype right from the BC, Pelsh - by phone, Bogomolov - by e-mail. Except for these sources, there are tons of distorted and just fabricated informational messages. What is important - no one from the Russian trekkers, travellers and mountaineers, who were in Nepal at the time of the catastrophe, was hurt... This is important - there were a lot of friends in different places, and thanks God that everybody is alive!

For the past days we received a lot of letters from comrades and friends from different countries, who worry about the expedition, about my and Sergey's lives and well-being; it is very nice. I've tried to reply to everybody, but Internet doesn't work stable here, so many of my answers are short or standartized.

At the present time all we are left for is to sit, enjoy the nature and await developments.

Day 18. April, 27. ABC (6400 m) - BC (5200 m)

Early in the morning the sun has shined into the tent and the temperature inside of it has risen. We took photos with the flags against the background of snow-covered Everest, being in immediate proximity to the North Col - from ABC to the beginning of the ascent of the Col is about an hour of walk. After breakfast we began the descent to the path of an ascent - it is much easier to go down, than to go up: the way to MC took 3 hours 10 minutes - we ate a bowl of chicken soup there and then went to the BC - the way took 3,5 hours.

I have to say, that after what happened the day before yesterday I started to look quite differently on mountains - I mean, I now watch at every rock, couloir and slope as on a source of a potential danger in case of a rockfall, at the same time trying to find an appropriate boulder to use as a shelter. But, unfortunately, there can be a lot of stones falling from different sides, but very often there is just no shelter, where you could hide. 

When we came to the BC we discovered new unpleasant circumstances, which we didn't know at the time of acclimatization trekking: a massive earthquake happened in Nepal, Katmandu is partially destroyed, hotels are closed, airport works in the mode of force majeure, Russian travellers live on the territory of Embassy (sleep in tents at the lawn), a lot of people are dead (thousands of people). Moreover, a huge avalanche in the area of Solo Khumbu descended on the base camp of Everest (on the southern side), not less than 80 people were killed.

Khumbu Glacier moved because of the earthquake, breaking off the ropes were railing, as a result - about 100 alpinists are now isolated from the outside world in the camps 1 and 2. They will be evacuated by helicopters, probably. The government of China prohibited to go by the roads from Lhasa and through Zhongma/Kodari to Nepal because of the earthquake. And in the end  - those yakmen, who work for the expeditions, descended from the Rongbuk monastery down to their villages with all yaks for 'a few days', and sherpas, who fix the ropes on Everest, stopped their work for an indefinite period of time as well.

Thus, at the present time BC is like an island of calmness and comfort, isolated from the outside world; it is not clear yet, if we will be allowed to continue the ascent or not, but in spite of everything we do not lose a good spirits. Especially when there are no problems with food... 

Day 17. April,26. MC (5800 m) - ABC (6400 m)

Sound sleep was disturbed only by tinkling of yak's bells, which walked between the tents. The yak's bell tinkles through the 'wall' of the tent very loudly, if the distance to him is 5-10 meters... By the morning yaks, on the contrary, fell asleep, and yakmen had to kick them to wake them up and load the baggage on them. While we had breakfast, sherpas loaded the baggage and left for the ABC.

After the breakfast the group moved forward to the ABC. You must understand that the high-altitude trekking is different from the usual. In particular, MC is on the height of Kilimanjaro, and ABC is on the level of Mera Peak... Our group with its full complement moved up along the East Rongbuk glacier. The path from MC to ABC is safe from avalanches and rockfalls, since it is trodden on the crest of the moraine, and potentially avalanches and rockfalls can't reach it.

There are penitentes on both sides of the moraine - the tall thin blades of hardened snow or ice of 3-5 meters and up to 20-25 meters. The colour of the ice is sky-blue, the size of these ice fields amazes.

It took us 7 hours to get to the ABC. The tents are set right at the edge of the cliff, the view on the North Col, Everest is amazing here. The place is well equipped with necessary facilities, the food is good - what else do we need for happiness? But the altitude of 6400 meters lets know about itself - but the magic pill of doctor Larin + Nimesil does the part. It is quite cold inside the tent at night, my watch froze at the temperature of -17 C and stopped displaying the temperature and the degrees. It is good, when you have an emergency watch!

Day 16. April, 25. BC (5200 m) - MC (5800 m)

It all started from Friday - April, 24 - Roman Reutov's birthday. Kitchenboys cooked a big pan of buckwheat on his special order.

There was a lot more, than only buckwheat, so the team of the '7 summits' club had a big party. They, probably, forgot, that on Saturday morning they have to go to MC for the overnight acclimatization stay. They sang and danced up to the midnight, and as a result, nor everybody was able to wake up in time - until the moment of the load of baggage on yaks. Bogomolov and I decided not to wait for yaks and the rest of the group: we put our stuff to the heap, from where yakmen took stuff to load it on yaks to bring it to ABC, and we went on foot to the middle camp. 

The climate is such, here is not a plain -
Comes avalanches' an infinite chain.
And after stone-falls another will roar, -
 Vladimir Vysotsky

No one knew or even presumed, that when Sergey and I will pass the place named Yak Point, where I took a photo in a pose of a thinker for the post of the day 14, April, 23d, the earthquake will happen, which will destroy a half of Katmandu and which will cause the avalanche, which will descend on the base camp of Everest from the south side.

If not to be lazy and go check that post - it is easy to be seen, what beautiful stone pillars the nature made. That is the southern slope, and it is always more ruined, than the northern slope, because the sun heats it. This is a work of the wind, the sun and the frost and it looks really great.

Exactly at 12:00 on Nepal time from the couloirs, which were right above us, we heard the roar of the rockfall. The sound was like a big amount of stones falls down and it was soon clear, that this amount of stones falls right towards us. We immediately ran to the huge boulder to hide behind it - it was our luck that this boulder was close to the path.

30 seconds later the rockfall reached us, but its main part slowed down higher on the slope. I counted about 5-7 huge stones with the size of a good travelling suitcase. They flew by, but it was not the scariest: when the huge stone with great power fall on the ground - the smallest stones fly in different directions like a grape-shot - and that is what really scary. 

The distance from the path to the end of the slope - 400-500 meters  in vertical direction. this photo is not clear, because it was taken at the time of video recording. You can watch the video here:  http://youtu.be/8NnqGw6q5PU  (if some Russian bad words won't confuse you). Since I saw the rockfall from the very center of events for the first time in my life - it impressed me a lot. It is very terrifying. Except for rockfalls there were several small avalanches on our way, for example this one:

 
So, maneuvering between the rockfalls and avalanches we got to the middle camp, where we stayed for the night. 

Day 15. April, 24. Base camp (BC). The day off

Session 2: Everest as a way, process, creativity, joy of life

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 live. That is what life means and what life is for.

George Mallory

Well said 90 years ago. The way of joy of life, which is maximally full of pleasure from everything, what happens to the person - Everest is perfectly fits this conception! I'm lucky: I was able to organize the expedition and found financing for it at this difficult time - how many people stumbled over the lack of money! Sergey Bogomolov agreed to be a leader - this is valuable! Colleagues and family let me go for a long period of time without any excesses and scandals - it's wonderful! We arrived in time, our baggage wasn't lost, we are in the BC, we acclimatize! Things are going great!

I wrote a little about the process approach in the post of March, 21st. For the past month there is almost nothing to add. Erich Fromm wrote at his time: 'The individual aware of himself as an active and creative individual and recognizes that there is only one meaning of life: the act of living itself'. In general, on the mountain you aware of yourself as an active member of the process, filled with meaning, you aware of yourself as subject of the process, not as object (you make the process, not the process makes you), you feel like you are a creator of this process in some measure.  

Expedition to Everest - it is a classic example of a way, which starts far from its actual beginning, which takes about 1,5 month and doesn't end in a day - because the understanding will come later. It is not an easy way (read the previous posts: a headache - a mountain high altitude sickness - a lack of oxygen - ...), but still attractive and alluring. What it attracts with? What is valuable in it?

I won't write in general, I'll write about myself. Since I go there for the first time, so this way is new, unknown, mysterious and difficult for me. In this way I appreciate the possibility to be alone - on my own - for a long time, I appreciate an intercourse with people, who go the same way; there are not many random people here. I appreciate the physical work - a great physical activity and harassing labour. I appreciate an opportunity to understand the value of my family and friends, my work - in everyday life sometimes the very important and truly valuable things become boring and bother you, sometimes you just need to have a rest from them. I appreciate uncertainty and vagueness - I don't know, will I be able to get to the summit and then go back down alive and safe. Mikhail Degtyarev says: 'The understanding of the possibility to do an action often becomes a serious restraining reason for its realisation'. There are no such restraining reasons here. And the main thing, which is hard to express, is that the possibility just TO BE ALIVE PERSON is really valuable. Not just to add Everest to your assets, but to LIVE EVEREST. 

The modern occidental (and Russian) society doesn't allow TO LIVE a normal human life. We are all turned into (semi-) automatic machines, we depend on formal (prescribed - consequently, not live) schedules, regulations, procedures, we are assigned the numbers to register us, we are alienated from ourselves. When should we just LIVE? It's hardly possible to call it life - sitting in traffic jams, a rat race for a new model of mobile phone, a new car, a bigger flat. In such 'life' of a modern human there is almost no more space for such value as LOVE. More precisely, it is converted into money too, in its different forms, and  it ceases to be LOVE, but becomes a product, which has an exchange value. 

Probably, it is because of the age, but I think, that during last years a change in me is happening: the transition from TO HAVE to TO BE. Many years ago, before a consuming society, in which we live, appeared, Schiller wrote: ' We love what we have; we desire what we don't have. Because who is rich in spirit - loves, and who is poor - desires.' I wish I could be rich in spirit, of course... Maybe someday our childish ability TO LOVE will be back to us - the ability we've lost in fights for TO HAVE.

Session 3: Integral 
Who and when said, that the process contradicts the result, that the joy of life contradicts the challenge, that TO HAVE contradicts TO BE? Oh, yeah, I forgot - a lot of people said that - tens of classics and thousands of their followers, who write comments to their works. Must be, they are somewhat right - for neurotics, for which the contradiction between these two positions generates a deep intractable internal conflicts. This contradiction is is peculiar to the occidental culture. If we'll cross the boundaries of restrictions, which are placed on our thoughts by occidental culture plus by Christianity in all its forms (which during last 1,5 thousand years had been proclaiming by 10 commandments one behaviour, but in fact encouraged another behaviour, which is diametrically opposite to the proclaimed one) - so the conflict will disappear. Probably, there will be no problems, which are impossible to solve mentally; except for, may be, the sexual problems (for those who are married).

Modern society and husbands/wives have negative attitude towards adultery and promiscuity of their wives/husbands. That sometimes leads to the sexual tension and conflicts. And the animal primal self is still here, human genes require breeding... Since this topic is beyond the scope of this blog, I will finish on this. 

Yesterday the whole film crew led by Valdis came back from MC to BC. Today in the morning  the baggage of the expedition was sent by yaks from BC to ABC. Sherpas set tents, kitchens and stuff there. The connection between MC and ABC - via radio. Someone said that there is a lot of snow in ABC - up to 30 cm. The weather have suddenly changed today: the sky is heavily clouded, the snow pellets fall from time to time. In daytime the temperature inside of the tent is +12,5 C - which is cold. To compare: a normal temperature inside of the tent in BC in daytime, when the sun is shining, is about +45 C if the tent is closed; if to open the doors for ventilation - the temperature can be regulated to the comfortable +25 C. 

Tomorrow morning - April,25 - the first group will load their stuff on yaks to ABC, and will leave for MC, where will stay for the night; the day after tomorrow - April, 26 - we move from MC to ABC and will have our first acclimatization overnight stay at the altitude of 6400 m. Yaks will go in parallel. The descend from ABC to BC is planned for the following day - April, 27. Since there is no Internet in MC and ABC - the next post will be after we'll come back. Three working days on high altitude are wait for us! Let us hope, that we'll cope with it.

 

Day 14. April, 23. Base Camp (BC). The day off

Since today we have a day off, and there is a possibility that tomorrow will be the day off and day of recreation too, so there is a great opportunity to philosophize. I plan to philosophize methodologically: the first part I'll devote to Everest as a challenge, achievement, result; the second part - Everest as a way, process, the pleasure of life; the third part I'll try to make integrative, which combines the way and the result, to HAVE and to BE.

But since I have no experience of philosophic reasonings, which would be meant to be published, and I don't write an american textbook on management, but the blog - the life narrative thread, so it is not clear where will this methodological action lead me.

For those, who are more interested in what happening here - I inform: yesterday in the evening our club was officially opened. There is a tennis table, billiards and a TV in the club. Yesterday there was the Russian movie 'The Caucasian prisoner' ('Kavkazskaya plennitsa' - 'Кавказская пленница' in Russian), which in general only sherpas watched. In general, everything is quite good.

Session 1: Everest as a challenge, achievement, result

Our views on what is good and what is bad were formed in the occidental system of values, and it is easy to see, how the converting of the human person value into cash happens. Money as a system of measurement are very convenient: even fool can see that the owner of Rover or Porsche is better, more successful and (must be) happier than unhappy owner of a car of the Russian car industry or than those 25-30 year old odd fellows, who were not able to pile up some money to buy a car at this age.

From this point of view Everest is easy to be measured as the highest aim of strivings and desires of any mountaineer: there is just nothing higher than the highest top. It's even possible to measure the attractiveness of 8000+ mountains  with the help of the table of the ascents of eightthousanders (the are 14 of them) by counting how many people ascended each mountain. The result will be the following: Cho Oyu - 3000+ ascents (Cho Oyu is the easiest eightthousander, a lot of mountaineers often ascend it before Everest - just to try ones powers at the high altitude), Everest - 5000+ ascents, other eightthousanders - from 200+ to 400+ ascents. Consequently, Everest - as the highest point of the world - is MUCH MORE demanded, than other mountains higher than 8000 meters. Summarizing, we can say this: from the point of view of the (close to mountaineering) society, a person who were on the top of Everest is happier than those, who weren't.

Quite often on first acquaintance all conversations between mountaineers start from listing all highest points, on which they have been. Since such conversations are usually in English - the verb 'to have' is usually used. That means, that the summits, which  had been conquered, are considered as an asset, a property. Thus, it is subconsciously assumed that the greater asset (number of conquered summits, their height, complexity) a person has, the happier he is.

There is no need to say, that in the hypertrophied human development as a mountaineer, other aspects of his life (family, personal life, work, relationship with friends) cannot but suffer. There are not so many people, who can  evaluate the achievements of that remarkable conqueror of mountains, and the farther he moves, the less people can evaluate that. What difference is there for you, which peak of Annapurna he climbed on and on which route, if you don't know what Annapurna is? For the professionals this is the matter of high importance though, like for some successful businessmen it is important what car to drive -  Lexus or Cruiser.

But remember, ascending your Everest: 

you would never do that alone. 

Yuriy Kukin

Now let's look on Everest as a on a result, first of all as a personal result. Or in other words: how better it is - to ascend Everest rather than not to ascend. Here is an example: in 1990 the team of four people stormed the mount of Everest. They fixed ropes, hammered the hooks in, set the tents up, cooked food. Only one of them got to the summit, because the whole team had worked for him. But the whole team considered themselves as conquerors, winners. These people grew up and learned to be mountaineers in 1980-s in conditions of the collective culture of Alpine camps of Soviet Union.

Now, everything is the same - the team of 4 people, one of them is on the summit - in 2012 - and a completely different estimated result: one is a fine fellow, the other three - not, for them the ascent is considered unsuccessful. The Soviet Union collapsed in these years, the culture changed, the serious transformation of views on what to consider success happened. From the point of view of the modern (close to mountaineering) society, only a person, who stood on the summit, can call himself a a conqueror. No more team spirit - now only the crystal-clear individualism is encouraged.

An approach to the organisation of ascents have changed: the trained mountain sherpas are hired -  they build infrastructure, fix ropes, put up tents, cook food, after that they throw away all trash and bring the hardware down. Sherpas get money for that, mountaineers are engaged only in 'lifting' themselves by the prepared routes.

And here the question of comparability of the results comes up; we started this discussion with Bogovolov in 2007 in Nepal and we continue it now. If to compare: to go on route by oneself, setting camps, cooking food, carrying the equipment up to the higher camps or to go on the fixed ropes, to eat a hot soup, prepared by the time of your arrival there (which was served to us yesterday in the preset kitchen tent), to sleep in the pre-mounted tent in a sleeping-bag, which had been brought there just for you - it all is like to swim across the river on your own or in a boat -  the uncomparable things, with the labor expenditures of the completely different levels. But today the society evaluates the success from the achieved result point of view, and from that point of view any person who got to the top on the ropes, fixed by someone else, 'has' a mountain; and those three men from the expedition of 1990 - 'have' not. 

The question of Everest challenge is different for everybody. There are people in our expedition, who have been on Everest multiple times: Mingma Sherpa - 7 times, Lakpa Sherpa (his sister) - 6 times, Aleksandr Abramov - 8 times, Noel Hanna - 6 times, Sergey Larin - 6 times, Ivan Dusharin - 3 times, Sergey Bogomolov - twice. Apparently, for them the question of challenge is not so relevant as for me. For me personally - Everest is a great challenge, even though I understand the absurdity of the external challenges for a (kind of) successful person.

The question of Everest challenge is different for everybody. There are people in our expedition, who have been on Everest multiple times: Mingma Sherpa - 7 times, Lakpa Sherpa (his sister) - 6 times, Aleksandr Abramov - 8 times, Noel Hanna - 6 times, Sergey Larin - 6 times, Ivan Dusharin - 3 times, Sergey Bogomolov - twice. Apparently, for them the question of challenge is not so relevant as for me. For me personally - Everest is a great challenge, even though I understand the absurdity of the external challenges for a (kind of) successful person. For me Everest is an internal challenge. Reinhold Messner wrote good words about it:

How can only a man, who appreciate well-being and the feeling of safety, understand that I only feel complete, when I am able through sacrifices and extreme exertion to approach to the boundaries of the human possible stress? And that I am trying to move this boundary?

A boundedness of my high-altitude capabilities I understood in 2007. At the time of an overnight stay in Lobuche village (4950 m) I became strongly sick from mountain altitude disease. To the usual weakness and headache the violation of peripheral blood circulation was added: when you press on your finger tip - the white spot appears and doesn't disappear - the heart doesn't drive blood up to the tips of the fingers. For the same reason at night my feet froze: I put worsted socks and warm pants inside of my sleeping bag, but it didn't helped. In the morning they measured with pulseoximeter the oxygen content in my blood and said: 'Go down immediately!'

It was a pity to go down, almost reaching the aim. And I decided that if to go with a good pulse, blood should be driven to the tips of the fingers. Thus, we had one same day to climb to Kalapattar (5 550 m), then to reach Everest Base camp the same day, and descend for 1 km down to Feriche village, because I was afraid to stay for the night at such altitude. So I came to Feriche at 1 a.m., and clearly understood that it's impossible for me to become a mountaineer and it is better not to ascend higher than 4200 m. The only thing that I understood not very clearly - is that excess weight, smoking and alcohol greatly reduces the limit of the possible. So now I'm very curious to try – will I be able to push this boundary more?