Magnificent simplicity in a Sherpa’s story

Press, 5 November 1977, Page 17

Magnificent simplicity in a Sherpa’s story

Tenzing: After Everest. An Autobiography. George Allen and Unwin, London, 1977. f 13.10. 184 pp. (Reviewed by John Wilson) Descending gracefully from the summit of achievement and fame they reached in 1953 cannot have been easy for the pair who first climbed Everest. Most New Zealanders are aware that Sir Edmund Hillary managed to handle this difficult descent without prostituting his fame or using his achievement for ignoble ends. “After Everest’’ is a triumphant demonstration that his companion, Tenzing Norgay, handled the same difficult descent with the same grace. If anything, Tenzing probably came under more pressure than Hillary to allow his name to be used for political and commercial ends; it would not have been surprising if an innocent mountain man who was unable (and still is, this book is mostly transcribed tape-recordings) to read or write had succumbed to the blandishments of politically or commercially unscrupulous people Instead, as he describes in “After Everest,” he has used his considerable mountaineering and organisational talents to set up and run for more than 20 years the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling. This institute, of which Tenzing was the Director of Field Training, has trained Indian climbers and also numbers of Tenzing’s own people, the Sherpas. The Indians have gone on to considerable mountaineering achievements; the Sherpas have been able to command greater respect and higher wages as members of many international expeditions. When Tenzing has not been in Darjeeling or at the institute’s Sikkimese training ground he has travelled widely. South America and Africa are the only major gaps in his coverage of the globe. To Tenzing himself it still sometimes seems unreal that someone who, as a lad, tended yak on high pastures in a remote mountain area, should as an adult have travelled so far and found himself in so many different countries. The book, for the most part, is simple narrative of Tenzing’s experiences, but not simple in any disparaging or condescending sense. It has a magnificent simplicity which is likely to disarm any reader. Tenzing establishes himself as an archetype of that blend of innocence and astuteness for which sophisticated people envy those who are simple and guileless. Because there is not the least suspicion of pretension or affectation in

his writing, Tenzing has some refreshingly candid things to say about people and their motives. He has not been afraid to say what he means from a fear of hurting anyone’s feelings.

Once he was established in Darjeeling, in a large house and with regular employment, a large number of often-distant relatives flocked to Darjeeling to settle on him. He took them in, hospitality being a large part of the make-up of a Sherpa. But of them he has written: “Most of these people were quite ungrateful. They never seemed satisfied and I do not like them. Some are with me still. It was very difficult. It still is.” Again, while being quite tactful about it, he manages to make it quite clear that he prefers the Swiss (who greatly assisted him in setting up his Himalayan Mountaineering Institute) to the British.

A note of sadness creeps into Tenzing’s words on two matters. A certain justifiable rancour is evident when he writes of the less than fair treatment he appears to have received from the Indians both in his participation in Indian expeditions and in the terms of his employment at the institute and the circumstances in which it ended.

This makes it a little ironic that he has been charged with having done nothing for Nepal. In fact, Tenzing

seems not to think of himself as a citizen of Nepal, but rather a member of the Sherpa tribe. He thus defends himself against the charges that he has done little for his own people by claiming, rightly, that he has done much to make the name of Sherpa famous throughout the world “as a distinguished and trusty mountain people,” not just through his own achievements, but also through the achievements of other Sherpas trained at the institute who have taken part in Himalayan expeditions in the last 20 years. But Tenzing accepts, sadly, some responsibility for the erosion of traditional. Sherpa ways. He writes with grief about the situation in the Khumbu — the Sherpa homeland — and the passing of Sherpa traditions, even, of the Sherpa language. This is most immediately poignant when he describes the deterioration of the Thyangboche Monastery and recounts how the head lama told him that noone today wants to become a lama. Tenzing accepts more direct responsibility for the growth of treking and tourism in the Khumbu which has been the cause of many unfortunate changes, and also for the emigration of many young Sherpas in search of social and economic betterment. Typically, his response is to try and do something practical about this situation and his book concludes with a description of his latest dream — to establish a simple climbing school in Khumbu itself, away from all personal and political jealousies which will, he hopes, help to direct change in the Khumbu in desirable directions. Also typically, he envisages something approching tourist Switzerland in the shadow of Everest, with the Sherpas as much in command of their land and industry as the Swiss are of theirs. The greatest pleasure of this book is the discovery of a magnificently simple man who loves his dogs far more than he is attracted by mechanical devices such as jetboats; who is happiest among his family and close friends, rather than among fawning strangers; a man whose greatest love, apart from his love for people, remains his first love — for the mountains among which a simple peasant lad once tended yak. And yak from long ago figure in an incident which captures fully the flavour and style of the book. In a New York zoo, Tenzing discovered two yaks When he spoke to them in Tibetan, he declares, “they actually turned towards me with an eager look.”