Partnership Forged in Ascent of Everest The Nepali Association celebrated the 61st anniversary of Ed Hillary and Tenzing Norgay conquering the world’s highest peak over Queen’s Birthday weekend. The climbers’ partnership laid the foundation for an enduring relationship between their two countries, Nepal and New Zealand. It was fascinating to listen to Peter Hillary together with Michael Alsop and Peter Cammel, Kiwis who have all reached the top of Everest. It was a sad occasion too as the loss of the 16 Sherpas helping others to climb the mountain in April this year was commemorated. I talked about what made us so proud about Hillary. It is more than his feat in being the first to climb Everest. It was his huge commitment to bettering the lives of the Sherpa people afterwards, building schools, health clinics and hospitals. And it was his basic decency and humility which we would like to think epitomise the best traits of being a Kiwi. I had the tremendous privilege in 2007 of spending a week with Ed Hillary in Antarctica, commemorating his trek to the South Pole. We enjoyed his stories and especially an address he gave to a packed hall at McMurdo Sound where he told our American hosts what he thought of their plan to build a marked road from the Ross Sea to the Pole!
Posted on: Mon, 02 Jun 2014 22:21:01 +0000
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