You might think twice at the name Peter Hillary, but with Mt. Everest about to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first ascent of its peak, 8,848m above sea level, any confusion is quickly resolved. Peter is the son of Edmund Hillary -- "the bee keeper from New Zealand," as he was described in contemporary news releases -- the first man to reach the highest point on the Earth's surface and live to tell the tale.
Indeed, Edmund Hillary did very much more than that. He is currently chairman of the Himalayan Trust, a group doing great and good things in the Everest region of Nepal, and his son, on a promotional tour of Europe, Asia and the US, hopes to raise awareness of what has been achieved and also what remains to be achieved.
As a celebration of this event, the National Geographic Channel (NGC) has put together a series of 13 episodes on ascents of Everest, led by a brand new program entitled Surviving Everest, in which a second generation of climbers scales Everest's peak, lending continuity to the achievements of that first ascent back in 1952.
PHOTO COURTESY OF NGC
In Surviving Everest, Peter Hillary joins with Jamling Tenzing Norgay, son of Sherpa Tenzing -- Hillary senior's legendary guide -- in a modern ascent, reliving one of mountaineering's great achievements. The program itself, scheduled to premiere worldwide on April 27 (9pm Taiwan), is a celebration of the promise that Sir Edmund Hillary, a boy from the Dominions, made to an illiterate Sherpa. It is a story of friendship -- one not without difficulties, for there was more than a little agro over who actually set foot on the summit first -- and the power to face difficulties and dangers together.
"Ultimately, that's what it's all about," said Peter Hillary in an interview with the Taipei Times. "It is when life is stripped down like this -- a tent, a cup of hot tea, the company, really that's all you need."
Of course, this is the romance of mountain climbing, which combines the ingredients of teamwork, long-term commitment, and an acceptance of the harsh realities that nature imposes on the lives of climbers. Everest has claimed its share of lives, and this is why the Sherpa people, who seem to benefit so plentifully from the tourist trade it brings into the impoverished kingdom of Nepal, see it both as a gift as well as a fearsome god, a being not to be treated lightly.
The ascent of Everest is now achievable by anyone with the money and the time -- the practice of "short-roping" tourist climbers up the mountain means that anyone with time and US$60,000 to spare can get up there, regardless of experience; there are currently more inexperienced people on the mountain than ever before. Everest was the scene of a hecatomb back in 1996, when eight people lost their lives in a single day of bad weather. But at the same time, the desire to see the Himalayas has brought money and, more valuable still, education and opportunity, to the Sherpas of the Kumbu region.
The camaraderie that mountaineering engenders and what has been achieved in the Kumbu by the Himalayan Trust are two of the more poignant and memorable themes of the series. They should touch the hearts of regular NGC viewers, and with any luck, bring a new understanding of that very special kinship that binds those who will walk with nature and accept all the risks that that entails.
Peter Hillary, while celebrating the achievements of the Himalayan Foundation over 40 years, recognizes the terrible contradiction that remains between the hard-core trekker's pursuit of an idyllic life in nature, and the desire to improve life for the Nepalese, whose existence lacks much that we take for granted.
"Part of our success has been because we have focused on a small area, one that we know very well," Peter Hillary said. Ask why the Trust, given its success, has not extended its operations to other parts of Nepal, and one is quickly brought up against the intimate nature of its basic conception. In a sense it is almost a family relationship, one expressed in the friendship that has developed between Peter Hillary and Jamling Norgay, who carry on a dream first envisaged by their fathers.
Adding to the themes of fathers and sons, the expedition covered in Surviving Everest also includes Brent Bishop, the son of Barry Bishop, who was part of the first American expedition to the summit of Everest in 1963. Like Hillary and Jamling Norgay, he is also heavily involved in environmental work in the Kumbu region, having led a number of important cleanup expeditions both to Everest and to the Boltoro region of Pakistan, collecting rubbish that has been left by decades of mountaineers.
The new program, Surviving Everest raises -- without answering -- many questions, providing an opportunity to think about the many conflicting issues concerning Western assistance for developing countries.
What is heartening, and another element that has made Nepal such a haven for people seeking something other than the Western norm, is how something as mundane as geography can create faith -- the kind of faith that may even change the world.
It was a simple thing that created the Himalayan Foundation: a lyrical phrase by a captain of porters, speaking to Edmund Hillary: "Our children have eyes but they cannot see," spoken during one of the many long nights spent at the base of Everest.
Now the foundation supports 42 schools, providing the basics of education and medical facilities for one of the world's poorest regions.
Surviving Everest will premiere on April 27 at 8pm. It will be followed by a weekly series of programs on Everest. The new program will be repeated on May 29, the actual date of the 50th anniversary of Hillary and Tenzing Norgay's conquest of the Everest summit.
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