Ringing Tones

by Surnaí Ó Maoildhia (Ireland)

A leap into the unknown Nepal

I remember fear. Details fade, but this I remember. It was not easy to leave home. I had chosen to unclip myself from the world where everything was familiar; where reality was subdued. I had to unclip myself from that carabiner and leave myself unclipped. And I was afraid. An irony, or a comfort, is that the process of unclipping oneself is a very familiar process of sleep deprivation; of clutching passports and squeezing backpacks into tiny airport bathroom cubicles; of hunger and body odour. The root of fear in my stomach was numbed by this. Arriving in Nepal however, the noise and the crowds and the dirt stripped away my emotional stasis. The cacophonous chaos of Kathmandu was too much for me. I went up to my hotel room and sobbed like a child. I phoned my Mom and said I was scared. Finally, I slept. The next day, a tiny precarious plane lifted us out of the cluttered filth of the city and wobbled us over the triangles of the Himalayas. In the tea house where we waited to begin our adventure, the bathrooms reeked to such an extent it stirred my stomach. This is what I remember. When we walked, my discomfort eased. Surrounded by the forest and heights and wild beauty, I knew why I’d come. But on the second morning of the trek, my roommate told me I’d cried out in my sleep: “I’m scared! I don’t want to do it.” Eventually, fear - that fear of being unclipped and left unclipped forever - was dissipated by wonder and awe at the presence of the mountains. This I remember too. I sat on the dirt path winding around the edge of the valley and studied the wall of mountain in front of me; the stained, creviced rock which the clouds pressed themselves against, occasionally snagging on a sharp jutting piece. A sheet of clouds concealed any blue, but once, a window opened far, far above and it revealed a sky of rock and I realised that the mountain continued rising. Fear was dissipated, not disappeared. I remember terror, in crossing bridges swinging from one side of the forested valley to the other, dangling a hundred feet over the white, rapid river that plummets from Everest and shouts as it falls. That noise, like the clouds, presses against the silence of the mountains. And that terror, of my life being so precariously balanced, was coalesced with exhilaration. Watching eagles floating in circles above us at an altitude of four thousand metres, never once twitching their dishevelled feathers, did not bring fear, nor even wonder. It brought delight. As did learning Nepali. Climbing over the muscled roots that broke the earth of the path, spotting unnamed polychrome birds in the leaves, playing UNO in the evenings while drinking lemon and ginger tea. These were all very simple, very genuine pleasures. I remember feeling breathless from the altitude and breathless from the views and feeling so definitely that the latter made up for the former. I remember feeling homesick for the sea when I heard the rolling of avalanches in the distance. I remember an aching headache on the day of making it to Everest Base Camp and I remember the sight of the group in their waterproofs winding their way through the rubble of the valley like a multicoloured caterpillar. I remember the misery of rising at four in the morning to hike up Kala Patthar and I remember how surreal it was to watch the dawn slowly bring definition to the immensity of the mountains surrounding us, Everest being one of them. And I remember the sheer shock of turning around and seeing a white dome of a peak behind us that hadn’t been there before, and laughing like a child. In stories, every moment of every experience is remembered. But my recollections are vague and fleeting. Oh, but there is an extra thread of colour in my spirit now. Intuitively, I know it will not fade. I have sat by the sea, in art galleries, on the slopes of Connemara, and I have thought: “Here are the ringing tones of the Himalayas.” No, I have not forgotten.