…the ultimate ‘city girl’ is having severe withdrawal symptoms for the fresh air and mountains of Nepal?! But it’s true…ever since landing at Heathrow late on Tuesday night and hugging my fellow trekkers goodbye, I have been surprising myself with emotions I didn’t expect to feel. Sure I expected to feel proud and relieved that we [...]
…the ultimate ‘city girl’ is having severe withdrawal symptoms for the fresh air and mountains of Nepal?!
But it’s true…ever since landing at Heathrow late on Tuesday night and hugging my fellow trekkers goodbye, I have been surprising myself with emotions I didn’t expect to feel. Sure I expected to feel proud and relieved that we as a team had all made it to base camp and back in great spirit, and more importantly, good health…and if I’m honest, I’d started craving for my home comforts ever since we reached base camp…but somehow waking up after a long and restful sleep in my own bed for the first time after camping for almost 2 weeks, I felt a strange sadness wash over me and it took me a while to understand why.
Over the last 2.5 weeks, I have had many ‘first experiences’…my first time in Nepal, my first time flying in a 16-seater plane, my first stay in a teahouse, my first-ever camping experience, my first experience of symptoms of AMS, my first Tibetan blessing at extreme altitude…and the list goes on, not forgetting to mention successfully reaching base camp… But what has made each and every one of these milestones, from the seemingly small to the big, special was being able to share them with my 7 fellow trekkers, our leads Steve, Neil, Matt and Tony, our hostess-with-the-mostest Sarita, and the wonderful team of local Nepali staff that made sure we were fed, watered and comfortable throughout our trek.
It’s quite extraordinary how quickly bonds form between people when you’re essentially living out of each other’s pockets…I mean, how many of us would be comfortable talking about our bowel movements, or lack of, with people they’ve only really met a handful of times?! And when you’re up at the crack of dawn with puffy eyes and swollen fingers that are freezing in the crisp cold air, it’s the sight of your fellow trekkers with toothpaste smudged lips that brings a smile to your face and remind you you’re all in it together!
Yes, a nucleus family was born out of the many experiences we were lucky enough to share and it’s this unit that I miss the most now that I’m back to the ‘normality’ of life. I miss hearing the boys (and girls!) snoring through my earplugs, I miss exchanging water purification tablets over the breakfast table, I miss dancing to drum beats in teahouses, I miss calling it a night at 8pm!….I miss so many of the little rituals that became our ‘routine way of life’ and most of all I miss the warmth of friendship that accompanied me all the way to base camp and back…
I know as reality resumes and our lives return to normal memories of the snow-capped mountain tops, barren-looking Middle Earth, out-of-this-world glacials and gigantic boulder fields may start to fade…but whenever I look up an evening sky, I will remember that breathtaking night in Thame when I walked out of the teahouse to be confronted by a mountain range standing proudly afar cast in a ghostly silver sheen by the full moon. And whenever I see another dog poo on the sidewalk, I’ll remember the boys competing to see who could hurl dried yak poo the furthest.
You see the thing is, even if we let the hustle and bustle of city life take over again, there will always be little reminders of the wonderful time we spent together, isolated from the rest of the world even if it was just for a brief few days, that will always bring a smile to my face and warm my heart…