The Insulin Express

by Oren Liebermann

  Krishna made all of our transportation arrangements. We spent one night in Kathmandu before hopping on a bus to Pokhara, the town where we would stay. The bus ride is only about 150 miles, but that equates to a full day of travel in Nepal. The eight-hour bus ride lurches along some of the steepest, most twisted roads I’ve ever seen, barely wide enough for our decrepit vehicle to navigate. When we pull into the Pokhara bus park, Krishna is waiting for us, standing next to his motorbike. After months of exchanging emails, we are thrilled to finally meet. He is a foot shorter than me and half my size, which describes nearly every one of the twenty-seven million people in Nepal. His body language displays the reticence of a culture not used to physical interaction—any American would consider his handshake half-hearted, which is only exacerbated by his rail-thin fingers—and his smile never quite fills his face, but he is warm and welcoming, and his English is excellent. He speaks with a slight Nepali accent, which in most ways resembles an Indian accent.

  We follow him in a cab to Lakeside, the tourist district in Pokhara, made up of guest houses and restaurants that all claim to have the fastest Wi-Fi in the city, a mathematical impossibility that seems to bother no one. Even in the nicest section of the city, we are light-years away from Western amenities. Cows wander the streets, leaving steaming piles of excrement in their wake. Considered sacred by Hindis, the cows here are immune from any form of persecution, and they lazily zigzag along the dust-covered roads. Or sit down in the middle of a busy street. Or shit on the street. Or chase each other down a sidewalk. It is the sort of life I may aspire to one day.

  If there is a Nepali national anthem, I conclude within a few minutes of arrival that it must be the blast of the car horn. Every driver beeps constantly at other drivers, at people, and at nothing in particular—but never at cows. The sort of reverence we have for luxury cars or fine wines they save for bos taurus indicus. One guide book even recommends experiencing and enjoying the car horns as a way of showcasing the personality of a car and its driver. This is patently hogwash. The horns are an endless assault on my eardrums.

  Krishna sets us up in one of the guest houses on the main street near Phewa Lake and lays out our next few days. We have two days of sightseeing in Pokhara before we begin trekking.

  “I thought we were supposed to do our hike after volunteering?”

  “It will be too late. It is winter in the Himalayas, and there will be too much snow. You will hike on Wednesday,” he says matter-of-factly. We have been sealed to our fate. We will hike on Wednesday. I’ve been feeling a little tired lately, but there’s no use in trying to switch our hike to the end of our time in Nepal. We don’t have the equipment to hike in bad weather.

  Between seeing the sun rise over the Himalayas in the nearby village of Sarangkot and taking a short class in Nepali, we grab the last few supplies we need for the eight-day trek and buy a few Snickers bars to celebrate at the end of each day of hiking.

  We meet our guide and porter on the way to Naya Pool, a trekker’s checkpoint that marks the beginning of the trail to Annapurna Base Camp. There is, of course, a varied menagerie of gift shops. Naya Pool—or Nayapool or Nayapul or Naiapool, depending on who made the sign—is a tourist town. Its sole purpose is to feed trekkers who are just starting or just finishing their hikes.

  Laxmi is in his early twenties, an independent trekking guide who has hiked to all of the nearby sites many times. He is confident, both in his trekking skills and in his English. He has led trekkers from all over the world to ABC, and he already has a plan for us, which he cheerfully shares with a bravado that is rare for Nepalis. His international hikers have rubbed off on him. He wears a gray imitation North Face jacket and a backpack that looks like it was made for a few books instead of a few days of trekking.

  Tulasi, our porter, is around the same age, and he shoulders the weight of our main pack. He is half my size yet carries twice my weight. Two sleeping bags, two small bags of clothing, our toiletries, and his own bag. I thought the combined weight of our gear might break his back. He proves me wrong very quickly, walking faster than us downhill and nearly as fast uphill.

  The first day is hot, the rays of the mid-afternoon sun adding just a little more weight to our packs. We stop often for short water breaks, but we’re moving well. Laxmi announces that we will eat lunch at Birethanti, one of many small, nearly identical guest towns along the hike that cater to backpackers. Over the course of the hike, we will gain more than ten thousand feet, and each step up brings us a few inches higher into the Himalayas.

  From the very beginning of the hike, the trail is narrow and clogged with donkeys. The donkeys deposit piles of their manure along the trail as they walk, which their hoofs then pulverize into a fine dust that covers the path and the grass on either side. Between the donkeys, we pass supply porters, Nepalis who make a living ferrying supplies up the mountain. Many of them walk barefoot, supporting the weight of food and drinks slung across their back with a strap around their forehead. That seems physically impossible to me, but they do it with the sort of ease that makes me want to visit the gym immediately and repeatedly. One even carries a cage with dozens of chickens on his back, hauling the birds into the mountains for their eggs and their meat. It’s humbling to see how effortlessly they pass us, barely breaking stride as they circumnavigate our little group of four inching along the trail.

  After two hours of hiking, we see Birethanti and hike the final few minutes to our restaurant. Within twenty feet of the table, my left calf cramps, forcing me to stretch before I grab my seat.

  “It’s okay, babe. I’ll be fine,” I tell Cassie, packing all of the confidence I can into my voice.

  Every meal we eat always starts with some sort of tea. Black tea, ginger tea, lemon tea, masala tea. Your choice. But always tea. I become somewhat addicted to tea during the hike. Most nights I order a big pot of tea, partly to keep warm and partly because I can’t stop drinking it. I pay for my gluttony in the worst way possible, having to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night in the Himalayas. None of our rooms have toilets, so we have to climb out of our sleeping bags, put on some clothing, find our headlamp, and brave the freezing cold nighttime temperatures to go to the bathroom. In my half-awake state, I have to use a Nepali toilet—little more than a glorified hole in the ground—without slipping on the wet porcelain edge of the latrine.

  At lunch, I order some vegetable momo, which are little Nepali dumplings, steamed or fried. We eat our meals and rest a bit. Laxmi smiles at me. “Now we begin the steep part,” he says, grinning and pointing at the jagged stone stairs that lead away from the restaurant.

  The cramps strike immediately, paralyzing first my left leg, then my right leg. My calves, my quads, and all sorts of muscles I didn’t know I have lock up. I try to make all sorts of excuses. I’m dehydrated. I’m tired. I’m trying to be a vegetarian in Nepal and don’t have enough protein. The true explanation is of course the simplest. I’m out of shape for this sort of trekking. Cassie and I had walked all around Europe, but nothing prepared us for this.

  I stop as often as I can, stretching the cramps out of my legs, only for them to come back with a vengeance. When Laxmi declares we are nearing our stop for the night in Ghandruk, I try to move faster, hoping to reach our guest house before I can’t walk anymore.

  Big mistake. My entire left leg locks, cramping all the way from my hip to my foot. I can barely take a step without falling over. With only a few feet to go, I suddenly can’t walk. In sight of our guest house, I have to take another break.

  When I’m finally able to relax with a cup of tea at night, I keep thinking the same thing over and over.

  This is day one.

  To say that we climbed 10,000 feet to Annapurna Base Camp during our hike is both accurate and misleading. We certainly went from 3,000 to 13,500 feet, but we also crossed three valleys, meaning we had to descend one mountain and ascend another mountain. In the end, we climbed much more than 10,000 feet before we encountere
d the hardest three hours of my life and one of the most beautiful views I have ever seen.

  By the end of day one, we’re a mile high. The altitude is beginning to affect us now, although very slowly. Each step is a little harder, and each foot we climb is a bit more strenuous.

  Laxmi cheerily announces that we would be going down two times today. “But then we have to go up. Steeeeeep up.”

  I thought descending would be a respite from the challenge of climbing. I was wrong. Sure, it’s much easier on the breath, but the descents into the valleys are so steep, you can’t lose your concentration for a second. Every step must be carefully planned, or you risk tumbling forward.

  The ascents up the far sides of the valleys are brutal. Hundreds of uneven stairs that seem never-ending attack my legs, and my legs slowly relent under the pressure. By the end of day two, I am once again exhausted, though I’m lucky enough to avoid cramps. Stretching at night and in the morning makes me feel old, but it becomes a part of the routine.

  We relax in the evenings, sharing tea and swapping stories between us. We toss casual questions back and forth. What’s America like? How do you enjoy being a guide? One question at a time, we become friends and then family, going through the trek together.

  On our second night, the guest house in Chomrong that promises electricity and Wi-Fi has neither. We have a romantic dinner, with a single candle serving as our only source of light and heat. It’s too dark to notice the clouds that are creeping into the Annapurna range, but the sound of rain late at night is unmistakable.

  We set off on our third day in heavy rain that shows no signs of letting up. I hike with my hood down. The rain on my forehead feels refreshing and keeps me cool. Underneath, I know I’m soaked. At some point, every piece of waterproof gear gives out when it’s subjected to too much precipitation. Water has gotten through my pants, my shoes, my jacket, and my bag. I can stay warm as long as we keep moving, but when we stop for lunch, I’m freezing.

  Guest houses are notoriously poorly insulated, so the temperature outside is the temperature inside. As we drink our tea and eat our lunch, the rain changes to what TV meteorologists would call a wintry mix. Once we start hiking again, it doesn’t take long for it to switch to pure snow. It is now officially freezing outside, and the snow is piling up fast.

  Farther up the trail, conditions are even worse. Hikers a day ahead of us are forced to wait out the weather, or worse, turn back. We’re not that high yet, but we’re getting close.

  As long as we’re moving, though, our surroundings are absolutely beautiful. A layer of snow blankets the ground and the trees. We may have missed a white Christmas in Bethlehem, but we are rewarded with a winter wonderland here. Occasionally, a break in the clouds lets us see the Himalayan peaks around us, soaring skyward. At the beginning of the hike, they seemed impossible to reach. Now they look to be just a few miles away.

  This is my favorite stretch of the hike. Snow falling, boots crunching on fresh snow, all of us moving quietly. It’s hard work, but it’s enjoyable work. The air tastes cold and crisp, and my breath creates small wisps of condensation in the chill air. It is absolutely awesome. I feel alive in ways that I have rarely felt before.

  We reach our guest house in Dovan as the sun sets. No amount of hiking would keep us truly warm with wet gear and no sun. Laxmi promises us a sort of heater at our guest house. The owners set up kerosene heaters in a pit under the table, which give visitors a chance to get warm and dry their clothing, two things we desperately need.

  For some reason, the owners of the guest house refuse to fire up the heaters. At first, they claim that ten people have to be willing to pay for the heat (which cost 100 Nepali rupees, or almost exactly one US dollar), but when it becomes clear that every single person in the guest house wants heat, they claim the heaters are broken, much like the meters in Indian taxis that are always rumored to be broken when foreigners step in.

  Our fourth day of hiking turns out to be beautiful weather. The sun is out, the weather is perfect, and the snow along the path is stunning. It feels good to keep moving, even as we cross the ten-thousand-feet mark. The altitude is affecting us, but we keep up a steady pace as we ascend ever higher.

  A few times an hour, we pass hikers on their way down or porters carrying supplies from one village to another. They always greet us with a friendly “Namaste!” which means a blessing upon you in Nepali. Each time I exchange a namaste with a fellow trekker, I feel a bit more invigorated and a bit less tired. Knowing that we share something with others on the path makes me feel welcome in the Himalayas, even though I am farther from home than I have ever been.

  Our goal on day four is Machapuchare Base Camp, colloquially called MBC. It is the final stop before Annapurna Base Camp. The two camps are separated by two hours of hiking and 1,500 feet. More importantly, MBC has electricity. ABC does not. We stay at MBC, where, this time, they fire up the under-the-table heaters, for which I am eternally grateful. The night is absolutely freezing, and the fifteen or so guests at the lodge huddle together as long as possible in the dining room. Temperatures drop so low that all the pipes freeze in the guest house. They send a porter down to the river to bring water for food and drinks.

  We spend most of the evening in the small dining room, crowded around the table with a mix of hikers, guides, and porters. Anyone who forgets to close the outside door when coming into the dining room suddenly finds himself on the receiving end of a barrage of verbal lashes from everyone huddled inside. Two German teenagers sit across from us, sipping tea from an insulated metal container, bundled up in yak wool sweaters that I’m sure they bought for four dollars at a local stand before the hike. The conversation is fun and distracts us from the cold until we start telling stories about growing up in the States.

  “You remember life before the Internet?” says one of the teenagers, apparently astonished that someone so old could be alive today.

  I have never been so tempted to punch someone I just met. Or curl up in a ball and wallow in my own aging misery. I describe to them an era they’ve never experienced. Remembering phone numbers and sending letters to pen pals and relying on dial-up modems.

  “Do you recognize this sound? EEEEEeeeeeooooowwwwwooowoow,” I screech, imitating the sound of my old 14.4k modem.

  “No, I have no idea what that is.”

  Now I understand why this hike is so exhausting. I’m apparently a dinosaur on the trail, a Tyrannosaurus rex only inches away from the hot tar pits of extinction.

  With the temperature well below freezing and darkness already covering MBC, we call it a night. Our plan is simple. We will wake up early in the morning to make a push to ABC, where we can celebrate and have breakfast. Then we will begin our descent.

  Cassie and I barely sleep. We’re definitely excited, but that has nothing to do with our fitful rest. At twelve thousand feet, our bodies need more time to adjust to the elevation. The thin air keeps us from fully relaxing at night. I wake up more than once with my heart racing, trying to get enough oxygen to pump through my veins. We both sleep in our thermals and our sleeping bags, yet we’re still bitterly cold all night.

  We sleep through Cassie’s alarm at 4:45 in the morning (I had set mine for 4:45 p.m. by accident). Laxmi wakes us up at 6:00 a.m. and tells us to hurry up. We leave most of our gear in the room. Tulasi will wait at MBC for us. This is a quick push to the top, and then we come right back down. Unfortunately, there will be nothing quick about the next three hours for me.

  Only a handful of people have scaled Mount Everest in winter, and for good reason. Hurricane-force winds lash the world’s highest peak, while freezing temperatures blanket anything above ten thousand feet. Weather in the Himalayas changes mercilessly during the coldest months, often shifting from bad to good to bad again within minutes.

  At 13,500 feet, ABC isn’t nearly as high as the tallest mountain on earth. But for a lowlander like me who grew up at sea level spending summers at the Jersey Shore, it is far outside
of my comfort zone.

  We filled our water bottles last night, but in the freezing temperatures of the final push, the water becomes ice. The sun isn’t up yet, so there is nothing producing warmth, and I’m not moving fast enough to generate any significant amount of body heat. In these conditions, I learn what it means to suffer from exhaustion. The trek has drained every ounce of energy. I run out of gas and start running on fumes. Then I run out of those too.

  Someone had written 1 HOUR TO ABC on a boulder along the way. I choke down some Oreo cookies and a few mouthfuls of water to keep me moving. I know it’ll take longer than the predicted hour, but a few minutes later I get exactly what I need. We see ABC in front of us. I know it’s not close, and I know it will be hell to reach, but I have a visual goal. Finally, I begin to believe.

  About thirty meters short of ABC, there is a sign welcoming us to Annapurna Base Camp. Only a final set of steps separates us from our goal. Cassie and Laxmi wait for me there, eager to take a picture of the three of us.

  Cassie switches to her adorable falsetto voice that usually makes me smile. “Stop for a picture, babe!”

  I’m too exhausted to smile and too close to stop. I snap at Cassie, “We’re not there yet,” and keep walking. She gets a picture of my back as I walk under the sign. Laxmi tells her we’ll take pictures on the way down, which I think is the right idea.

  I don’t really remember the final few steps. I know they’re hard, and I know I’m beyond tired, but I push through them as I have every other step on this final climb—one foot at a time. When I get to the top, I order the most expensive can of Coke I’ve ever had, sit down, and sip it very slowly. The sun is out, and it begins to warm everything up a bit.

  I understand exactly what Sir Edmund Hillary meant when he became the first person to scale Everest in 1953. He said, “My first sensation was one of relief—relief that the long grind was over.”