Beyond the summit: An Everest adventure and Romance Read online

  Noticing their eager, gawking faces, one of the men smiled and pressed his palms together, bowing slightly. “Namaste.”

  Ready to bolt like scared rabbits if he took a step nearer, the children giggled and twitched nervously. He was too new, too unfamiliar, too frightening—but not for Dorje. At five, he already sensed he was different from other children and wanted Hillary and Tenzing to recognize it. To get their attention, he climbed onto the wall and then leapt off with his arms thrown over his head, yelling, “Namaste!”

  Preoccupied with getting settled, no one paid attention. Dorje fired an angry look at the children giggling and ridiculing him. More resolute than ever, he marched straight into camp. He could play one game better than anyone else in the village. After nervously rubbing his calf with the instep of his bare foot, Dorje began hopping on one leg. Arms gracefully out to the side lent him incredible balance enabling him to jump forever. Hop, hop, hop. Hop, hop, hop.

  His back turned to Dorje, Hillary started towards his tent. “No, don’t go. Not until you see,” Dorje yelled in Nepali. When Hillary glanced over his shoulder, Dorje’s insides scattered like corn popping but he kept his balance and hopped even faster. Then he flashed the smile his father called the most infectious in the village and it spread all the way across his face. Laughing, Hillary scooped Dorje into his long arms and placed him on his shoulders.

  “Sahib has the Tenzing of the future,” a porter yelled in Nepali and everyone laughed. Perched up there, Dorje was taller than anyone. He bounced up and down and touched Hillary’s hair and face. The most auspicious day of his life, Dorje ached to tell his father about it.

  Not until a month later during the monsoon did Mingma arrive. Recognizing his stride, Dorje spotted him from afar and raced downhill, yelling, “Baabu! Baabu!” He sprang off a rock into his father’s arms and wrapped his bare legs and feet around him.

  Mingma rocked him gently from side to side. “Have you been good?”

  “Yes! Yes! See what I have!” Dorje rummaged in his pocket for the piece of gum he’d saved for his father.

  “Hmmm. Even better than sweet yak curds. And where did my young son get this?”

  “From the men who climbed to the top of the Mother Goddess of World. I want to see it, Baabu. Take me to see where Tenzing climbed.”

  “Shall we go there now?”

  “Yes,” Dorje howled and threw his head back, letting sheer rapture flow through him.

  With Dorje on his shoulders, Mingma carried him fifteen minutes to the crest of the hill north of Namche. Arms tight around his father’s neck and peering over his shoulder, Dorje stared at the triangular peak twenty miles in the distance with its graceful plume of wind-driven vapor arriving from India.

  “Is it far to the top?”

  “They say that when you stand on Chomolunga, you are higher than anything, higher than birds can fly.”

  “I will stand there someday because I am the Tenzing of the future.”

  Marty interrupted Dorje’s boyhood story, “So why haven’t you climbed it?”

  Relieved that he didn’t have to dig up memories of what had happened next, Dorje answered, “Because I was gone from the Khumbu for ten years until the winter of 1964. Since then, my government has not allowed anyone to climb because of trouble during what they call the Chinese Cultural Revolution.” Seeing the disappointment in Marty’s face, he added, “But I hear talk that climbers will return before the next monsoon.”

  “Huh,” Marty said without the usual levity in his voice or expression. “It’s October now and your monsoon starts in June. That should be enough time.”

  “Time for what?”

  “For me to join an expedition. Colorado has a lot of serious climbers. I’ll find a way to get back here and get you hired too.” He hooked his elbow around Dorje’s neck and dragged him stumbling along. “We’re going to attack life together. You and I to the top.”

  A riot of emotions fought inside Dorje: to finally climb Everest, to do so with a man who both disturbed and fascinated him, to face his father who abhorred mikarus for trespassing on the abode of the gods. Dorje tried gathering all these thoughts up to inspect them, but they were much too unruly and kept slipping away before he could corner them. So he squashed them by telling himself spring was months away and anything could happen between now and then.

  When they returned to Namche two days later, Marty wriggled the blue shirt over his head and thrust it at him before he plopped the green hat down on Dorje’s head and flicked the bill. “It says SKI VAIL and I want you to keep it until I get back.”

  “But what if—”

  “No buts. I’ll be here so get ready to climb. You’d better keep these too,” he said, hooking sunglasses over Dorje’s ears. Leaning back, Marty said, “Yep. You’re cool.”

  “Cool means cold.”

  “It also means you’re the remarkable little kid who hopped on one foot to get Hillary’s attention.”

  Bolstered by Marty’s words and the vision of climbing Everest, Dorje raced up the steep terraces towards home with his body always ahead of his feet. He stood outside panting and summoning the courage to go inside. He and Mingma had quarreled bitterly before he left, the usual argument about him not wanting to tend yaks during tourist season. With his heart lodged in his throat, he climbed the thirteen steps representing Buddha’s stages to enlightenment and lunged into the room. Mingma sat with a wad of yak wool around his wrist, spinning it as he gazed out the window where he must have seen Dorje coming up from the village and heard him on the stairs. Determined to make his father acknowledge him even if in anger, Dorje pulled a fistful of rupees from his pocket and cast them onto the bench.

  “What’s this?” his father asked.

  “Money for you. Like it or not, status is measured in rupees now, not the number of yaks. So you’d better get used to it.”

  Mingma pushed off the bench. “Is that why you leave when I need you the most? Two weeks ago, I lost my most valuable nak when it fell trying to reach a tuft of grass on a high ledge. And a wolf attacked the zhums.”

  “Nobody told me,” Dorje said with a sinking feeling. He was losing this battle.

  “Because everyone, including your brother, knows that Mingma’s son cares only about making money for himself.”

  Mingma had struck him a low blow. “My brother doesn’t think this. You have no idea what I want . . . or who I am. You have made no attempt to know me.”

  “Nor have you to know me.”

  His father was right. No matter how hard Dorje tried to resurrect the feelings of a six year old who adored his father, the anger and hurt of broken promises stood in the way like a stubborn old yak refusing to budge on the trail. Since nothing was going to move either of them, all he could do now was turn and walk out the door.

  CHAPTER 4

  Mingma knew his son would soon be bringing the trekkers back down through Namche on the way to Lukla. Waiting at the window every afternoon, he finally saw Dorje racing up the steep terraces from the village after a fourteen-day absence. Every spring and fall his son abandoned all obligations to him and the family when the mikarus arrived. Mingma bristled at the sound of Dorje’s footsteps on the stairs as his son returned from working for the despised foreigners who were destroying centuries of tradition.

  Clad in western clothing, Dorje burst into the room and cast a pile of rupees at Mingma as if to say, Here, old man, see how much better I am than you.

  “What’s this?”

  “Money for you. Like it or not, status is measured in rupees now, not the number of yaks. So you’d better get used to it.”

  Only then did Mingma realize just how much the mikarus had seduced him with their grand ideas and fancy words. What good were these to a Sherpa boy? Nothing. They would only bring unhappiness and tragedy. Of that Mingma was certain, but he would keep his thoughts to himself because his son no longer saw or listened with a Sherpa heart. Like a festering wound that refused to heal, anger had arriv
ed with Dorje four years ago. Perhaps his son still blamed him for not buying shoes that first winter, but it had been impossible then. Abruptly ending generations of trading to the north, the 1959 Chinese closure of the Tibetan border had reduced Mingma to a yak herder selling butter, milk, wool, and dung.

  When Mingma accused his son of only wanting to make money for himself, Dorje yelled in a sharp, biting voice, “You have no idea what I want . . . or who I am. You have made no attempt to know me.”

  As always, the son’s anger and hurt stood between them. So Mingma simply replied, “Nor have you to know me.” After a deafening silence, Dorje turned and walked out the door with nothing having changed in these four years. Mingma had lost the little boy who rode on his shoulders and had fallen asleep nestled in his lap. Someday they would talk of the past but for now the words remained unspoken. Watching Dorje’s rage leap over a rock wall and almost collide with a yak on his way down to the village, Mingma feared losing the man too. He knew that each year as soon as the monsoon ended, mikaru tents sprouted like wild orange poppies in the open space near the village spring and intoxicated Dorje more surely than even the strongest chang.

  Perhaps the love of a beautiful woman would bring him back. Having heard rumors of Dorje and Sungdare’s daughter Shanti at summer pasture, Mingma decided to arrange a marriage that would provided a good alliance for both families since Sungdare owned a large potato farm in Khumjung. Surely selecting a girl for whom Dorje had some affection would please his son. Was this not the way of his mikarus whose young people married for love? Mingma had not met Dorje’s mother until months after their betrothal. His father an animal trader and hers a farmer, it made a good economic partnership and Mingma had grown to care for her over time. Staring at the bedding they once shared, he regretted not feeling more. Perhaps with Shanti, Dorje would discover the passion that had eluded his father in marriage.

  With a lighter heart, Mingma resolved to travel soon to Sungdare’s home in Khumjung to present him with a flask of chang and propose a marriage between their children. The acceptance of the beer and proposal would conclude the sodene. Knowing that this relationship could be broken by either side with no legal liabilities, Mingma also decided to set a date for the dem-chang ceremony to give the betrothal a more solid basis. Crossing the open room to the wooden shelves by the door that contained gleaming brass and copper vessels, he checked the ones with barley and millet. Almost empty. The loss of his most valuable nak meant less milk and dung to trade.

  Back on the window bench, he sat with his elbows on his knees. His fingers stiff and splayed, he touched and then spread them, trying to picture himself as he used to be—one of the wealthiest men in the Khumbu, a great trader who traveled to Tibet and India and then home again bearing riches. But in the darkest time of his life, the Chinese invasion of Tibet had destroyed everything by slaughtering thousands and making refugees of those he loved. Memories from long ago crept from their hiding places and spread through him like smoke from the hearth trapped within a room, enveloping him in such a dark, dense cloud that he could no longer see or breathe. Only prayer stilled the voices and muted the images into shadows. Opening the folio of Tibetan scripture on the table before him, he began the low, monotonous intonations that temporarily numbed his emotions as he once again sought forgiveness.

  * * * * * * * * *

  After leaving his father, Dorje leapt over a rock wall and almost ran into a yak loaded with tents and sleeping pads. When the large head swung around and grazed him with its curved horn, he smacked it on the rump and yelled, “Get out of here,” before heading to the pasture while massaging his sore arm. His father’s words, Because everyone, including your brother, knows that Mingma’s son cares only about making money for himself, nagged in Dorje’s head. Surely Nima didn’t believe this falsehood.

  Trudging up the hill, Dorje yelled at his brother, “It’s not my fault the damn nak died or that you had to fend off wolves. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “You weren’t here, never are during trekking season.” His gaze averted from Dorje, Nima sat peeling a long strip of bark from a branch and flicked it skyward.

  “You don’t have to be here either.” Sitting beside him, Dorje picked up a rock and hurled it at one of the yaks straying from the herd. “Taking care of these brainless, unruly beasts. Come with me to Lukla. I’m the sirdar and can hire you as a guide. All you have to do is walk along with the mikarus and keep them happy.”

  “Doing what? I don’t speak English the way you do.” Seventeen now with their mother’s gentle eyes and a dark brown spatter of freckles across his nose and cheeks, Nima was growing into a man and Dorje hadn’t noticed. “Just give them your smile and you’ll win their hearts.”

  Nima stared straight into Dorje’s eyes the way he did before pronouncing one of his truths. It was frustrating the way he could see things clearer than his older brother and often felt the need to set him straight. “And who would watch the animals? Both of us can’t desert father.”

  “Like he deserted us at three and six years old?”

  “That was a long time ago. Forget it.” Nima shot him a reproving glance. “And another thing. You know that as the youngest son I’m obligated to stay and take care of him. So don’t talk to me of working for your mikarus.”

  Tugging on the denim jeans his brother was wearing, Dorje said, “But you’ll take their clothes I bring.”

  “Especially that hat,” Nima yelped and swiped it off Dorje’s head.

  “No. You can’t have that one.” Dorje grabbed for it but missed.

  Already on his feet and scampering up the hill, Nima donned the hat with the brim turned upwards, and then sashayed behind a large, black yak. “Mine now.” On the opposite side of the beast, Dorje lunged for it but Nima jumped back inches out of reach. Circling the irritable, grunting animal as they bantered with one another, Dorje was surprised at how clever and quick his little brother had become.

  “What’s so special about this hat?” Nima asked.

  “I got it from the American I’m going to climb Everest with.”

  “You . . . climb Everest! Then it belongs here.” Crouching over a pile of steaming yak dung, Nima threatened to smear the precious hat in it. “Have the mikarus blinded you so much that you no longer see?”

  “I see what a fool you are thinking that you can get the better of me.” Dorje laughed and dived at him, hurling him to the ground. With Nima’s arms pinned over his head, Dorje snatched back the hat before rolling his brother over and using him as a pillow as they had lain together when very young, lazing away the afternoons in meadows where wildflowers mingled with marigolds and begonias had just begun to bloom. Things were better then.

  “I don’t want you to climb,” Nima murmured after a long silence. “You’ve seen the bodies coming down from the mountain. Our own uncle died up there.”

  Another of his irritating truths. After all the years of Dorje protecting his younger brother, Nima was now doing the same for him. “I have to go. You know that.”

  “Yes, yes, the Tenzing of the future. You told me all about that. But it was just some villager shouting at a young boy riding on a man’s shoulders. It meant nothing.”

  “It did to me and I promise not to do anything stupid or reckless.”

  Nima plucked a handful of grass and tossed it in Dorje’s face. “You’re as stubborn as the yaks you hate so much.” Sauntering towards to the herd, he yelled over his shoulder, “Father will never let you go.”

  “He has no say in my life. None at all.” He slapped the hat back on and marched down to Marty’s camp, mumbling to himself.

  The American was in the dining tent with a book. “Have you read this Tiger of the Snows?” he asked. “One of our group lent it to me. It’s about Tenzing Norgay.”

  Having never seen a picture of him, Dorje glanced at the cover and shook his head. “I don’t know how to read.”

  “You’re kidding. How’d you learn to speak such good Eng
lish?”

  “From mikarus who talk too much like you,” Dorje answered with a grin.

  “Well, it’s a great story about his climb with Hillary. You and I are going up there. Marty and Dorje to the top like Hillary and Tenzing. Give me five!”

  “Five what?”

  “Five fingers like this” Marty raised Dorje’s hand and slapped the open palm. He tossed the book on the table and stood up. “Here, you need to go to Marty school and learn the hand jive too. Just follow me. It’s sixteen counts.” He gave Dorje a questioning look.

  “Yes, I can count,” Dorje answered a little insulted.