

Everest: is it right to go back to the top? - jonathansizz
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/12/mount-everest-sherpa-disaster-one-year-on

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linschn
I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, which is a sad circus where money is king, and
wrote about my experience here :
[http://rdklein.fr/essays/kilimanjaro.html](http://rdklein.fr/essays/kilimanjaro.html)

I really hope Everest will never get to this point. The difficulty of this
summit protects it a bit, as (more or less safely) dragging an inexperienced
climber up the mountain is not going to be cheap, but what I hear these last
few years about the Everest is alarming.

To people that love mountaineering and don't want to climb in America or
Europe, I suggest Kirghizstan. It's relatively safe, pristine, and it's really
beautiful. There is no infrastructure and no mountain rescue, though, so YMMV
depending on what you want to experience.

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grogenaut
Your altitude chart seems truncated. It talks about symptoms > 3 but stops at
3 urination.

Otherwise a great article. I had always thought that climbing Kili was easy
from slide shows that I saw when I was a kid from retirees who I saw who had
done it.

I guess I'll try my local first. Rainier is a mere $1k. Park fee is $25 per
party of up to 25. Or I'll just try and complete the wonderland trail first.

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linschn
I should change the explanation under the chart, thanks for the feedback : you
have to add together the points of every symptom you experience, and compare
that total to the text below.

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peteretep
When she says "Should Nepalese guides continue to be put at risk", what she
doesn't realise she means is "Should Nepalese guides continue to be allowed to
put themselves at risk to feed their families".

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sukilot
80 years ago, Nepalese didn't need to guide climbers to feed their families.
what changed?

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wmil
Who says they didn't? Perhaps their families used to have more hungry nights.

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soukiab
“People ask me, 'What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?' and my answer
must at once be, 'It is of no use.'There is not the slightest prospect of any
gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behaviour of the human
body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to
some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of
it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any
coal or iron... 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

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cushychicken
I can't help but feel that this quote kind of helps illustrate the point the
author is trying to make. Mallory was trying to tell the world, "Yes, I'm
doing this for me, and nothing else". Nobody bothered to question whether it
was OK to gamble with the native porters' lives at that point.

The question remains - is it really OK for you to pay a massive amount of
money to gamble with others' lives, in pursuit of your dream?

~~~
sukilot
Mallory went for joy. Gambling someone else's life can be a joy.

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ericcholis
I'm conflicted as a whole in regards to Everest. Being a climber who's paid
for expedition services on Denali, I can see where it is often necessary.
However, adding luxury items and allowing inexperienced climbers on the
mountain is dangerous.

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tomglindmeier
There is obviously too much money in mountain climbing at the Everest.
Everywhere that happens, things are getting unhealthy.

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vorg
Strange how the Guardian published this story about Everest on the annual
anniversary of the event which made Everest obsolete as a destination for
ultimate challenges: 8 years after the first ascent of Everest, the first
manned spacecraft went into space. And because Gagarin "did it alone"
(ignoring support work such as base camp and mission control) instead of with
a partner, his achievement wasn't superceded in any way by the moon landing
another 8 years later. His solitary orbit around the earth stands as the
beckoning event right in the middle of the span of time from 1953 to 1969 when
humankind went "higher and further" far faster than at any time before.
Whereas ascending Everest is too easy and landing on the moon too difficult,
to ride into space and return to Earth all alone will define the pinnacle of
achievement for explorers well into the forseeable future, regardless of any
effort by the Guardian or Western media to suggest otherwise.

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sukilot
Ignoring base camp and mission control is extremely arbitrary. Neil Armstrong
walked on the moon alone, ignoring the people in the capsule.

A dog went into space alone before Gagarin did.

Alan Eustace went into space in a suit, while Gagarin was juat in a ship that
went to space . if you fiddle with the rules, you can say many things are
greater than each other.

It's nonsense. All achievements are achievements, you don't need to fight to
argue that the Russians had the "best" achievement by inventing qualifiers.

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StephanTLavavej
Uh, Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon, with Collins in orbit.

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sukilot
Why "uh"? Armstrong walked out of the moon lander without anyone carrying him.
Aldrin followed. Collins was at "base camp".

