2003 -
It was back during the GE CAS days. 3T'03 - first audit in Milwaukee. One day I caught a glimpse of a colleague's (Jeff Fleer) screensaver - a photo of him standing in front of some very curious looking rocks. I asked the location - his reply: "I took it when i was climbing Kilimanjaro." It probably was not the first time i heard the name, but it was then that name made its first impression on me. Kilimanjaro - a name even the Masais can't properly decipher. I had no idea where it was, no idea how high it was, no idea about its anything. Yet, I was somehow awe-struck by the sheer might and power that echoed in its name.
2006 -
Years passed. So much had changed since 2003. When i was making my life's to-do list, summiting mt Kilimanjaro still made the cut. The allure of making it there still pulled strong.
2007 -
Mayur was setting up his one-year marriage celebration in Uganda. Of course, I am going. The thought of climbing Kilimanjaro during this trip briefly crossed my mind, but was quickly dismissed. There were many routes, ranged from 5 - 9 days, for ascending Kilimanjaro. According to the available literature, the 6-day route - Macheme, aka the whisky route, was the most spectacular in scenery. So for me, it was going to be the Macheme route or not climbing at all. Unfortunately, I only have 7 days to spare before Mayur's celebration night. There just didn’t seem to be enough time for such a quest.
Believing the climb was on hold, I started to research for other alternatives to occupied my time in Africa. To my dismay, the only two other trips were either too short or too expense - Rafting on the Nile needed only two days. Mountain Gorilla hike needed three days, but costed $1,500+. For that amount of money, I’d rather climb the Kilimanjaro! However, as I was coming to this decision, time was getting close to running out. There were just about 13 days left before my departure. If I were to make the climb a reality, everything down to the wire would need to work like a swiss clock. (Hey, I am thinking Rolex!!)
So began the frantic search for pretty much everything. I needed a tour operator. Needed to compare prices. Needed equipments. Needed flights from Entebbe to Moshi. Needed Visa. Needed arrange for hotels and guides… Remarkably, everything fell into place perfectly. There just happen to be a weekly connecting flight that departed Entebbe four hours after my scheduled arrival from the US and returned on the day of Mayur’s wedding. The seven-day gap in between gives me just enough days to hike the mountain via the Macheme route. Despite being the tail-end of the raining season, I was able to find an operator who agreed to take me on the hike. In addition, just by pure coincidence, the day of my planned summit attempt was going to be a full-moon night. Perfect.
After multiple trips to Campmore, I was ready to be on my way. Unfortunately, what I failed to supply myself was a good companion. No one coming on the Africa trip, as least I thought at the time, was interested in joining me for the climb. Although a score of other people were interested, including the doctor who administered my yellow-fever shot, the thirteen-day window was just too short a notice for me to recruit another friend to drop $4,000 and everything else to visit Africa with me for two weeks. Though i was feeling a bit concerned about doing such a major hike solo, I decided no to let this opportunity slip by. If I waited for others to do things with me all the time, I probably would not have done half of the things I did. This decision, as it turned out later, became the biggest obstacle that I had to overcome during the climb.
Sunday, July 1, 2007
Day 0 - We lost one before we even started
Morning of May 25, I got up around 3am to meet up with rest of the crew, Mayur, Meenal, Ambrish, and Nikit at Meenal’s parents’ house.
Mayur was already up when I got there – looking a bit stressed out. What surprised me was the amount of luggage they had. From the look of things, I’d have guessed their entire family was moving out. Of course, instead of a regular luggage tag, someone stuck full letter-size paper with name and address printed in 40+ fonts on most of the luggage. I have only noticed this practice amount Indians. Perhaps it’s a national paranoia that only the largest and the boldest of fonts will be intimidating enough to deter anyone from mistreating these cardboard boxes.
We got to EWR exactly two hours before the flight. The line for check-in was not long, but moved very slowly. Most of the travelers were in family groups and almost all of them were making demands on seating arrangements that took forever to satisfy. This inevitably annoyed everyone else in the queue. When our group moved up towards the counter, I could almost feel the icy stares from folks who were waiting behind us. And what do we know, they were right.
The agent who received us was Nova Patel. A potential legal-grade idiot with emotional swings worse than the most flamboyant of homosexuals. He took our passports and started punching away on his keyboard. After finishing some sort of essay, he looked up and informed Mayur that he doesn’t have the transit visa required by the UK government, and therefore, will not be allowed onto the flight. hm.....WOW. Timeout!!
What followed was about one and half hours of begging, yelling, crying and utter freaking out. When all negotiations, threats, and tears had failed, reality started to set in – Mayur was not making it on to the flight - a flight that he himself had organized!! As the teary Meenal said her goodbyes, the group started to make its way towards the gate - but for some reason the trip felt a bit different now...
As if my confidence about climbing the mountain was meant to be undermined all the way to the bottom, rest of the flight didn’t go that well either. We were upgraded to the Traveler-Plus class, but only Amerish’s TV was working. We made our connection in London, but we had to do some serious sweet-talking to the flight attendants to ensure that our luggage made the same flight. Admittedly, to create some sympathy in hope for some upgraded services, I sold the “my-friend-got-kicked-out-of-the-flight-for-his-wedding-and-now-his-wife-is-going-to-Africa-alone” story extra hard to all the flight attendant whenever I had the chance. Funny enough the plan paid off. One of the flight attendant actually swayed the Capitan to hold the flight for almost thirty minutes so our luggage can be loaded.
When the plane approached Entebbe, it passed right over Lake Victoria, whose shores were not visible even from the altitude of the plane. The sun was casting its golden rays through the clouds shimmering over the lake. The immense green of Africa, contrasted by the red soil, started to take its presence. For how the Mediterranean defined the color blue, Africa did for green. Unlike the lush jungles in Cambodia that were borderline imposing, Africa’s green was just intense – color in its purest forms.
I wished I had a camera on hand to capture the arrival hall as the plan landed. The place couldn’t have been larger than a local Starbucks. While we waited in line to clear the immigration, Mayur’s dad strolled in from the back entrance of the controlled area with some sort of special id hanging around his neck. It got better from there. When it was my turn to have my passport stamped, Mayur’s dad, who knew I was heading to Tanzania later, instructed the immigration officer not to stamp my passport. I, on the other hand, didn’t mind getting another stamp in my passport from Africa and instinctively told the officer to go ahead and stamp it. Now, the poor immigration fellow looked confused. With the stamp in hand, he looked back and forth between Mayur’s dad and I, perhaps hoping one of us would give him a final word. Realizing that I needed to convince Mayur’s dad that I wanted a stamp before I can get one, I informed him about my multiple-entry visa and that i didn’t mind getting my passport stamped. “Ok, go ahead” he agreed. Almost instantaneously, thuuuump – my passport was stamped. I had always known Mayur’s family had some connections in Uganda. It was not until then, however, I started to feel its magic - where else in the world could I have told the immigration offer what to do?
After collecting our luggage, which was one short, I said my goodbye to rest of the group and headed into the small departure hall. There were only three benches. I took one in the middle, showered myself with mosquito spray, and started my long four hour wait. The place was barely air-conditioned and not that action packed; all the counters were empty, the main monitor was off. In the corner, a lady was sweeping the floor with a mop. In the mists of dust and trash she has gathered was a cockroach about the size of a miniature 747. The sucker was having trouble getting back onto its feet after being flipped over by the mop. The sweeping lady have surely seen the bug, but has chosen to ignore it and kept on her own business. With its wings flapping and tentacles waving wildly about, the cockroach provided bulk of my pre-flight entertainment before the chubby middle-eastern guy showed up.
When he approached me, he certainly looked tense. He asked me if I was waiting for the same Emirates flight. I was shocked to learn that his flight was not until 5pm that day. It couldn’t have been later than 10am when he showed up. This airport was probably one of dullest ones I have been. Even that cockroach probably would not want to spend so much time here if it could get itself upright. Why the hell would a person want to unnecessarily prolong such a mind-numbing wait? As it turned out, this guy was feeling really unsafe in Kampala. According to him, there were just way too many military folks wondering about. While I thought it was pretty amusing to hear such an assessment from a middle-eastern guy, his words added a sublime layer of worry on my mind about the trip. If the city was rough enough to intimate a person lived among on the teachings of martyrdoms and jihads, I wondered how it will treat me? This was no Peninsula in Bangkok anymore, I thought. (Of course, it was not after I saw Kampala first hand later did I realize how over dramatic this guy was)
About 30 min after the middle-eastern guy showed up, an officer-looking person interrupted our conversation. Apparently, for some reason, he was not happy to see us waiting inside and instructed us to leave the waiting area. Half annoyed by such a ludicrous request, we both protested that we were causing no trouble and wished to stay in. To the complete contrast of the indecisive officer i met at the immigrations, this one was determined to kick us out. Eventually we gave in to the risk of visiting the Ugandan jail house and headed out into the heat. Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait outside for long before the boarding of my flight was announced. As I walked back into the waiting area, the middle-eastern guy had he forehead almost stuck on the window looking right at me with puppy-eyes that seemed almost sad. For some reason his look at that moment brought the imagery of Oliver Twist to my mind. A miserable kid with sad eyes looking through the window, wishing he was on the other side. Then again, the hungry kid was yearning for the lavish banquet dinner on the other side of the window. This chubby middle-eastern, on the other hand, merely wanted to feel the imaginary safety of being inside of the hot and humid Entebbe airport and to watch bugs.
How basic, yet fickle, are our desires in the face of adversity. Things that we often take for granted can suddenly seem so vital. When the adversity passes, however, we promptly set off to chase other invented aspirations that ultimately meant absolutly nothing to us. Along the way of such pursuits, what once made us genuinely happy fade away fast into the memories, then are quickly forgotten. Only our empty skeletons would remain, continuing the aimless chase towards the imaginary happiness. Perhaps, the only events that can break us away from such foolishness are encounters with hardships and agonies. They are most effective in offering insights to what we truly want in life. Happiness without tears is just ignorance. May be this is the real reason why i wanted to climb Kilimanjaro - to awaken myself with certain privations - to restore things that i once took for granted back into priority again.
The three hour flight to Tanzania was uneventful. I slept for most of the time. I never caught the sight of Kilimanjaro from the flight as the entire mountain was covered in the rain clouds. When I arrived at the hotel, I was instructed to meet my guide, sign the consent forms and be ready to head out tomorrow at six in the morning. That early meeting time wasn’t really a problem for me. I had traveled for 30+ hours straight upon that point and was duly exhausted. My hotel room had no AC and it was hot. I, however, promptly passed out without any issues. Before I drifted out, I wondered why I was not excited about tomorrow’s climb. May be I was just too tired I thought. Or, may be, for the first time since countless other trips, I felt alone.
Mayur was already up when I got there – looking a bit stressed out. What surprised me was the amount of luggage they had. From the look of things, I’d have guessed their entire family was moving out. Of course, instead of a regular luggage tag, someone stuck full letter-size paper with name and address printed in 40+ fonts on most of the luggage. I have only noticed this practice amount Indians. Perhaps it’s a national paranoia that only the largest and the boldest of fonts will be intimidating enough to deter anyone from mistreating these cardboard boxes.
We got to EWR exactly two hours before the flight. The line for check-in was not long, but moved very slowly. Most of the travelers were in family groups and almost all of them were making demands on seating arrangements that took forever to satisfy. This inevitably annoyed everyone else in the queue. When our group moved up towards the counter, I could almost feel the icy stares from folks who were waiting behind us. And what do we know, they were right.
The agent who received us was Nova Patel. A potential legal-grade idiot with emotional swings worse than the most flamboyant of homosexuals. He took our passports and started punching away on his keyboard. After finishing some sort of essay, he looked up and informed Mayur that he doesn’t have the transit visa required by the UK government, and therefore, will not be allowed onto the flight. hm.....WOW. Timeout!!
What followed was about one and half hours of begging, yelling, crying and utter freaking out. When all negotiations, threats, and tears had failed, reality started to set in – Mayur was not making it on to the flight - a flight that he himself had organized!! As the teary Meenal said her goodbyes, the group started to make its way towards the gate - but for some reason the trip felt a bit different now...
As if my confidence about climbing the mountain was meant to be undermined all the way to the bottom, rest of the flight didn’t go that well either. We were upgraded to the Traveler-Plus class, but only Amerish’s TV was working. We made our connection in London, but we had to do some serious sweet-talking to the flight attendants to ensure that our luggage made the same flight. Admittedly, to create some sympathy in hope for some upgraded services, I sold the “my-friend-got-kicked-out-of-the-flight-for-his-wedding-and-now-his-wife-is-going-to-Africa-alone” story extra hard to all the flight attendant whenever I had the chance. Funny enough the plan paid off. One of the flight attendant actually swayed the Capitan to hold the flight for almost thirty minutes so our luggage can be loaded.
When the plane approached Entebbe, it passed right over Lake Victoria, whose shores were not visible even from the altitude of the plane. The sun was casting its golden rays through the clouds shimmering over the lake. The immense green of Africa, contrasted by the red soil, started to take its presence. For how the Mediterranean defined the color blue, Africa did for green. Unlike the lush jungles in Cambodia that were borderline imposing, Africa’s green was just intense – color in its purest forms.
I wished I had a camera on hand to capture the arrival hall as the plan landed. The place couldn’t have been larger than a local Starbucks. While we waited in line to clear the immigration, Mayur’s dad strolled in from the back entrance of the controlled area with some sort of special id hanging around his neck. It got better from there. When it was my turn to have my passport stamped, Mayur’s dad, who knew I was heading to Tanzania later, instructed the immigration officer not to stamp my passport. I, on the other hand, didn’t mind getting another stamp in my passport from Africa and instinctively told the officer to go ahead and stamp it. Now, the poor immigration fellow looked confused. With the stamp in hand, he looked back and forth between Mayur’s dad and I, perhaps hoping one of us would give him a final word. Realizing that I needed to convince Mayur’s dad that I wanted a stamp before I can get one, I informed him about my multiple-entry visa and that i didn’t mind getting my passport stamped. “Ok, go ahead” he agreed. Almost instantaneously, thuuuump – my passport was stamped. I had always known Mayur’s family had some connections in Uganda. It was not until then, however, I started to feel its magic - where else in the world could I have told the immigration offer what to do?
After collecting our luggage, which was one short, I said my goodbye to rest of the group and headed into the small departure hall. There were only three benches. I took one in the middle, showered myself with mosquito spray, and started my long four hour wait. The place was barely air-conditioned and not that action packed; all the counters were empty, the main monitor was off. In the corner, a lady was sweeping the floor with a mop. In the mists of dust and trash she has gathered was a cockroach about the size of a miniature 747. The sucker was having trouble getting back onto its feet after being flipped over by the mop. The sweeping lady have surely seen the bug, but has chosen to ignore it and kept on her own business. With its wings flapping and tentacles waving wildly about, the cockroach provided bulk of my pre-flight entertainment before the chubby middle-eastern guy showed up.
When he approached me, he certainly looked tense. He asked me if I was waiting for the same Emirates flight. I was shocked to learn that his flight was not until 5pm that day. It couldn’t have been later than 10am when he showed up. This airport was probably one of dullest ones I have been. Even that cockroach probably would not want to spend so much time here if it could get itself upright. Why the hell would a person want to unnecessarily prolong such a mind-numbing wait? As it turned out, this guy was feeling really unsafe in Kampala. According to him, there were just way too many military folks wondering about. While I thought it was pretty amusing to hear such an assessment from a middle-eastern guy, his words added a sublime layer of worry on my mind about the trip. If the city was rough enough to intimate a person lived among on the teachings of martyrdoms and jihads, I wondered how it will treat me? This was no Peninsula in Bangkok anymore, I thought. (Of course, it was not after I saw Kampala first hand later did I realize how over dramatic this guy was)
About 30 min after the middle-eastern guy showed up, an officer-looking person interrupted our conversation. Apparently, for some reason, he was not happy to see us waiting inside and instructed us to leave the waiting area. Half annoyed by such a ludicrous request, we both protested that we were causing no trouble and wished to stay in. To the complete contrast of the indecisive officer i met at the immigrations, this one was determined to kick us out. Eventually we gave in to the risk of visiting the Ugandan jail house and headed out into the heat. Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait outside for long before the boarding of my flight was announced. As I walked back into the waiting area, the middle-eastern guy had he forehead almost stuck on the window looking right at me with puppy-eyes that seemed almost sad. For some reason his look at that moment brought the imagery of Oliver Twist to my mind. A miserable kid with sad eyes looking through the window, wishing he was on the other side. Then again, the hungry kid was yearning for the lavish banquet dinner on the other side of the window. This chubby middle-eastern, on the other hand, merely wanted to feel the imaginary safety of being inside of the hot and humid Entebbe airport and to watch bugs.
How basic, yet fickle, are our desires in the face of adversity. Things that we often take for granted can suddenly seem so vital. When the adversity passes, however, we promptly set off to chase other invented aspirations that ultimately meant absolutly nothing to us. Along the way of such pursuits, what once made us genuinely happy fade away fast into the memories, then are quickly forgotten. Only our empty skeletons would remain, continuing the aimless chase towards the imaginary happiness. Perhaps, the only events that can break us away from such foolishness are encounters with hardships and agonies. They are most effective in offering insights to what we truly want in life. Happiness without tears is just ignorance. May be this is the real reason why i wanted to climb Kilimanjaro - to awaken myself with certain privations - to restore things that i once took for granted back into priority again.
The three hour flight to Tanzania was uneventful. I slept for most of the time. I never caught the sight of Kilimanjaro from the flight as the entire mountain was covered in the rain clouds. When I arrived at the hotel, I was instructed to meet my guide, sign the consent forms and be ready to head out tomorrow at six in the morning. That early meeting time wasn’t really a problem for me. I had traveled for 30+ hours straight upon that point and was duly exhausted. My hotel room had no AC and it was hot. I, however, promptly passed out without any issues. Before I drifted out, I wondered why I was not excited about tomorrow’s climb. May be I was just too tired I thought. Or, may be, for the first time since countless other trips, I felt alone.
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