13 Days in the Khumbu Valley

“ In Kathmandu you have car traffic. On the mountain you have people traffic.” Arjun Adhikari, one of my Nepalese guides, grins at his own analogy. His zinc-caked lips widen across his leathery, weather-beaten face as he squints through electric blue glacier sunglasses at a cavalcade of porters and yaks approaching in the distance, slowing his lope to examine the impending congestion.

On a suspension bridge some thirty stories above the vibrant turquoise river crammed with ice and boulders, a throng of yaks comes into sight, bearing colorful loads of North Face duffels and sleeping bags. Not far behind them, barefoot young porters, some not more than thirteen years old, strain under backbreaking loads filled with kerosene, camera equipment, rice, toilet paper, soda and generators — whatever their clients would pay for, it seems — as they march in a dreamlike procession. The narrow,chain-link bridge sways with each step. Horses, donkeys, climbers, trekkers and robed monks jam the steep, narrow trail behind them. Tattered Buddhist prayer flags cling to the sides of the bridge, thrashing violently in the early afternoon wind. Adhikari wasn’t wrong. Although “civilization” by most standards is, at minimum, a good two-day trek and a 45-minute plane flight away, it would seem almost fallacious to call the bedlam of the lower Khumbu Valley, the region surrounding the world’s highest mountain and the main bloodline to Everest, authentic wilderness.

Before mountaineering took off in the region, the valley was virtually untouched; a vast, icy scope of land, wedged between jagged peaks, adorned with fluted glaciers and elegant icefalls.

Our destination, Mount Everest Base Camp, is lead northwest toward the Tibetan border by the Dudh Kosi, a river that viciously surges with icy runoff from the Khumbu Glacier — a slow-moving cascade of ice higher up in the valley that snakes between Mount Everest and the Lhotse-Nuptse ridge. In the brief window between February and May where Everest tourism is at its highest, the legendary route toward the tallest mountain in the world, a symbol of ultimate solitude and adventure, reminds me strangely of a snail-paced line at the grocery store, except with a stunning backdrop.

It’s two in the afternoon — rush hour. Prayer wheels and rocks scrawled with Buddhist mantras act as red lights, regulating the flow of traffic as Sherpas, yaks, monks and foreigners alike amble to the left to spin the sacred wheels: a Buddhist tradition symbolizing the collection of good karma.

This growing obsession with the dangerous, “untouched” parts of the world is driven by a search for the most “authentic” experience possible. People are no longer satisfied with superficial tourist activities — instead of going to Nepal simply to tour Kathmandu, more and more people are opting for activities such as high-altitude treks and for the more serious, high altitude climbs. However, this “authentic experience in the mountains” with local guides and local food served at camps and teahouses is a contradiction in terms.

As Adam Dennett, author of Why Tourists Thirst For Authenticity points out, “when places or experiences are discovered and populated by tourists, they ultimately change by the demands of tourists themselves and the economic opportunity this presents to providers.” He calls this “Disneyfication,” a process whereby “a place becomes contrived in order to sell itself to consumers.”In turn, this often leads to manipulation and exploitation of the local cultures and their people. On Everest, the concept of “authenticity” has translated into thrill-seeking tourism.

The commercialization of Everest is nothing new. Ever since the mountain was declared the highest in the world in the early ‘50s, it was only a matter of time before it had to be climbed. Following Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, the first summiteers of Everest, upwards of 30,000 masochists and adventurers swarm toward the mountain each year driven by some sort of unquenchable thirst for thrill.

Nepalese authorities say that the number of visitors to Sagarmatha National Park, where Everest resides, has tripled in the last two decades. With the increasing number of tourists comes a rapidly-growing amount of trash left on the mountain: granola bar wrappers, climbing gear and plastic water bottles. The often-frigid temperatures at high altitude means that the trash does not biodegrade. Blinded by the allure of the summit or achieving a lifelong goal, the human cost on the mountain seems almost trivial.

Currently, the Khumbu Valley faces not only issues with waste, but deforestation caused by increased consumption of timber and firewood, creating a dramatic loss of habitat for many species. In addition to this, the trampling of vegetation on the well-traveled routes has increased soil erosion, reducing the ability of the soil in the Khumbu to store nutrients and water. This has also caused higher rates of runoff and nutrients otherwise used for crop growth — one of the key economic factors in Sherpa communities besides mountain guiding.

Despite the fact that Everest has been coined “The World’s Highest Garbage Dump” and other environmental repercussions, the mountain has become a crucial part of the Nepalese economy. Each year, the government collects roughly 270 million rupees (3.3 million dollars) in revenue from Everest climbing permits. In addition to this, mountaineering and trekking have helped stabilize the economy by bringing employment and income opportunities to indigenous Sherpa communities in the Khumbu Valley. As a result of this, the Khumbu Valley is in a much more economically prosperous condition than other Nepalese regions, leaving the valley in a paradox. Is the money that this thrill-seeking experience provides worth the environmental impact?

The Sherpas, nomadic people of Tibetan descent, are an ethnic group now synonymous with mountaineering in the Himalayas — a group whose name is now used vernacularly as a job description. Sherpas settled in the Khumbu Valley approximately 600 years ago — a region that was once equally as holy as the “beyul,” a sacred valley set aside by Guru Rinpoche, the founder of Buddhism. The Dudh Kosi had no bridges, the cliffs had no carefully chipped out steps, the pastures had no grain. There were no huts boasting “oxygen” or “western toilet,” no Everest paraphernalia. The first settlers farmed, prayed to the mountains, drank glacial water and wore wool from the yaks. Life was simple.

“It used to be a sacred mountain,” Phurbar Sherpa tells me. His dark eyes shift from his steaming glass of lemon ginger honey tea toward Konde Ri, a beast of a mountain that towers to the left of us. We stopped a stone’s throw from the town of Namche Bazaar, the largest Sherpa community in Nepal. Namche sits cradled between two mountains on a rare slab of flat ground overlooking Konde Ri, a stunning sharp peak. Dozens of gear shops and cafes fill the dusty streets, boasting the word “Everest” from every angle. Everest Laundry. Everest Cafe. Everest Massage. Red and blue roofs sprawl over the bowl-shaped village. An Irish pub blares music out of a shabby basement, while climbers and trekkers mill between shops in flashy labels, enjoying their acclimatization day and the last comforts of “real” civilization before roughing it at a higher altitude.

Many older “pre-Everest” Sherpas still see mountaineering as disrespectful to the gods. In traditional culture, the mountains were not thought of as hunks of rock and ice, piggy banks or conquests of vanity, but as spiritual, living beings. Goddesses resided on the spines of different sacred Himalayan mountains,

dancing among the glaciers and kicking avalanches onto mountaineers who disrespected her. Sherpas who have summited Everest often leave an offering on the summit to the goddess, apologizing for hurting her and thanking her for letting them climb. According to a modern cultural belief, the only reason that Everest in particular allows so many to climb her is that she knows that it provides income for Sherpas and their culture. The power of nature is deeply rooted in their culture. However, as government corruption continues to plague the Nepalese economy, younger generations of Sherpas see the mountains in the same way that westerners do: a cash machine.

The average annual income in Nepal is around $700. Sherpas who climb Everest can make between $3,000 and $5,000 in a single season and even more if they summit. In the same way that Western climbers and trekkers are tempted by the mountain’s allure, Sherpas are tantalized by a rather unbeatable salary. Now renowned for their genetic advantage and unique ability to function at high altitude, Sherpas have been providing climbing support for Himalayan trekking and climbing expeditions since the start of the 20th century. However, despite the fact that Sherpas make a considerable amount more than the rest of Nepal, the average Sherpa still makes about 90 percent less per season than his Western employer — a Western guide makes $50,000 on a summit expedition, a Sherpa will make only $5,000.

Not only has Everest become the poster child for the daunting environmental crisis we face as a global community today, but the throngs of tourists in search of an authentic Nepalese experience or the urge to fulfill a lifelong dream have essentially diminished the cultural authenticity of not only the mountain, but of the entire Khumbu Valley.

It is unclear whether anyone can define exactly what provides an “authentic” experience. To the average trekker or climber Everest seems as authentic as it can get, but the modern version looks much different than the Everest of 1953, let alone that of hundreds of years ago. Not to mention that the native Sherpa people are continually exploited and put into dangerous, life-threatening situations with each Western expedition.

“The conversation about how to make Everest safer needs to begin with the international climbing community asking ourselves how to make Everest more just,” as Mike Chambers from the New York Times points out. “All Everest climbers are, without exception, megalomaniacs… Not the Sherpa, I think. They don’t come here seeking adventure, they aren’t here in protest of the mindless routine that weighs them down at home. They come here to feed their families. There is no way to reconcile that.” In what used to be the territory of indigenous people and a small percentage of highly experienced climbers, the industry has created a new type of tourism in which any authentic experience can be purchased, regardless of economic, ethical and environmental consequences.

I suppose the best word to describe my relationship with the mountain and the valley would be convoluted. Or, possibly, infatuated. Of course, I am touched by the rich history and stunning beauty of the Himalayas and the Khumbu Valley. But at times, perhaps more so in the months following my return, I am perplexed and somewhat ashamed at the consequences of the human impact on the mountain and my own selfishness to want to climb it. However, as much as I hate to admit it, like many others, that doesn’t stop me from wanting to return. In fact, the small bit of the mountain that I tasted has left me feeling frustrated and unaccomplished. Whether I like it or not, I have on some level contributed to this issue.

I suppose it would be ridiculous to stop mountaineering completely to prevent climate change in such a small corner or the world. Doing so would leave the Sherpas completely unemployed. Perhaps it is even more ridiculous to tell every climber, every dreamer, to give up on lifelong goals in order to halt consequences that may seem almost trivial on a rather selfish, individual level. But climbers happen to be the ones who spend time in places like the Khumbu Valley and see it first. They are the ones who should be responsible for moving forward in more environmentally and ethically responsible ways. As Chambers points out, “There is so much humanity on Everest, and not nearly enough.”

WRITTEN AND PHOTOGRAPHED BY SIGNI LIVINGSTONE-PETERS