Born Again on the Mountain: How I Lost Everything and Found It Back by Anurima Sinha

Author:Anurima Sinha [Sinha, Anurima]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789351187271
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2014-11-14T18:30:00+00:00

THE PRESS WAS WAITING FOR ME AT THE DELHI Press Club.

I was used to the media but this gathering – a mix of Indian and foreign journalists – resembled one usually reserved for celebrities and top politicians. Sporting a nervous smile and feeling a touch edgy, I walked inside the hall longing for the two women who were closest to me – my mother and my elder sister. I didn’t have enough funds to fly them here and it would have been unimaginable for them to blow their little savings away on an air trip.

I would start on my Everest expedition directly after the press meet – who knew if I would be able to see them again. Bachendri Pal perhaps understood the emotional turmoil I was undergoing. So she became extra supportive, cheering and encouraging me all through. Having gone out of her way to train and brief me on the various moods of the mountain, she again cautioned me against becoming overconfident.

‘Even a little mistake can be deadly. Up there, there’s no second chance,’ she said.

Representing family was my brother Rahul who had come from Lucknow with gujiya, biscuits and laddoos – all made by him. Since my mother and sister weren’t able to come, he thought home-cooked food would cheer me up. For a girl, all these things matter a lot. My brother won me over with his emotional gesture.

I was on a strict diet plan but, unable to resist the temptation to test my brother’s culinary skills, I tasted some of the goodies he had prepared. They were delicious!

That made me wonder why the kitchen is always associated with women. Men can cook just as well. There are so many famous male chefs and I think it’s time we do away with gender stereotypes. There are many husbands who would love to cook for their wives and family but don’t due to old-fashioned ideas that women are supposed to cook while men earn. Unless we change our mindsets, all this talk of women empowerment that we keep hearing will remain a sham.

My mother and sister may not have been able to be present but luckily for me, other friends were at the Press Club that day. There were Baba Jagdeo Prasad (a resident of Banthara locality in Lucknow, he had become a grandpa to me), Raj Kishore (someone who called me his sister and played the genial banker) – both of whom had provided me an interest-free loan to partially fund the cost of a spare artificial limb – and, of course, the ever-reliable Sahib. How patient my sister had been to let him go for these fourteen months of training – without Sahib, I wouldn’t have been able to be here. These three wonderful men, along with Rahul, were to accompany me to Kathmandu from where I would begin my climb.

Seeing their faces in the middle of a sea of strangers reminded me of many others who had helped me get this far. There was

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