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A handful of short stories 1 page or less.
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2 Sunrises Over Dhaulagiri
 Its midnight and the next day will be our 14th day on the Annapurna Circuit, a 180 mile trek that circumnavigates the world's 10th highest mountain. After walking downhill for the last 4 days, the next day, the trek from Tatopani to Ghorepani, offers the most elevation gain of any day of the entire circuit. I’m getting sick, I can’t sleep, and I want to get it over with. I get out of bed, stuff my pack, and tell Tom I’m making the day’s trek alone in the dark. We’re in a more populated and therefore more regulated area then we’ve been used to, and the front door to the teahouse was padlocked from the inside. Furious at being locked in, I start exploring other escape routes. I find a door on the 2nd story, held closed with a 2 x 4 across the door medieval style, and it leads to freedom. The teahouse is on a steep hill, so the 2nd story in the back of the building leads to the ground. I stumble down around the outside of the teahouse, accidentally kicking some rocks down and frightening a couple in the nearby room who come to the window to see what the hells happening. I’m out and on the trail, my headlamp leading the way. Within the first half mile, I cross a swingbridge high above the Kali Gandaki valley, and for the first time on the trip I’m actually a little scared. The midnight wind is moving the bridge around pretty good, and with large holes torn in the mesh on the sides of the bridge, I’m not as protected as I would like. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea, but there’s no way I’m going back now. The guide book talks about 2 forks in the trail after this point, but when I reach a third fork, I’m at a loss. The only thing I know is that I need to head towards Sikha, a small cluster of teahouses on the way to Ghorepani. Usually the local Nepali people would be around, excitedly pointing lost foreigners in the right direction, but not so this time of night. I bust out my map and compass and make an educated guess as my lack of sleep starts to catch up to me. I have no idea if I’m going the right way for about an hour and a half, when a small sign lets me know that I had actually set foot in Sikha. For the third time, an angry dog wakes up and barks uncontrollably, not used to anyone walking by in the nighttime. I’m certain I’ll be deservedly mauled, but the only dog that actually gets close to me is a quiet little guy that follows me for an hour before finally losing interest. I feel badly when I frighten yet another person, this time a Nepali man defecating in front of his house.  The trail starts to gain some serious elevation, and I can see Dhaulagiri as clear as ever in the moonlight. I pretend that I’m the only person who has ever seen shooting stars over the world’s 7th highest mountain, and I feel a little guilty that I can’t share this experience with Tom or the others that I had befriended on the trek, probably still sound asleep. Soon enough, it starts to get light out, and I stop at the first open teahouse to get breakfast and watch Dhaulagiri turn a glowing orange as it reflects the sunrise. The teahouse has outside seating with fabulous views of Annapurna South, and the beautiful Nepali girl serving me asks me where I had come from that day. When I tell her Tatopani (about 6 hours back at this point), she almost doesn’t believe me but starts to flirt a little as she brings out tea, coffee, boiled eggs, and finally some Tibetan bread with honey. I have a quick daydream about settling down with her and helping to run the teahouse before paying my bill and finishing the trek to Ghorepani. I check in at the first inviting teahouse, and wake up at 3pm to the sound of Tom and the others’ voices outside wondering if I had made it. I run outside to greet them, and they tell me their story of heading the wrong way at that third fork in the trail. We relax the rest of the day and all meet early the next morning to make the traditional hike to the top of Poon Hill, a final and crowded viewpoint before completing the Annapurna Circuit and heading out to civilization. Poon Hill is specifically known as a place to witness the sunrise and its reflection on Dhaulagiri, usually the only time on the entire circuit where you’ll see the sun rise on such a spectacular mountain, that is, unless you happen to make the trek from Tatopani to Ghorepani at night.
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Banana Beer
 The road is anything but smooth and the air in the jeep is full of dust. Bahari (my guide) and I are pulling through Arusha on our way back from safari. Technically he was still on my time, so I made one last request. Before my trip was over I had one last thing I needed to do. I had read in my guide book that there was a local beer in this area brewed out of bananas; something I just had to try. “Banana beer? Hmmm, I don’t know.” I tell him its in my book. He pulls over and shouts back and forth in Swahili with some people walking down the road, but I can tell there was no luck. After the third of fourth try, he tells me that he thinks he found what I’m looking for. Wow, that didn’t take long. We drive just a few minutes further and pull over on the reddish dirt. I follow him on foot for about 10 minutes down a narrow side road, and I begin to feel a little uneasy. He cracks open a door, sticks his head in and mumbles a few things, then opens the door to let me in. I walk into a teal colored room the size of my bedroom, with a wooden bar on one side and no chairs. Metal grating separates the two “bartenders” from the rest of the room, occupied by 10 or so very curious customers. All eyes on me, I walk up to the bar with my guide, savoring the sweet smell and checking out the giant drum of banana beer, being mixed with a stick. Bahari talks to one of the bartenders and then asks me if I want my beer in a bottle or in a cup. I felt out of place and regrettably took two bottles to go. I carried them home to the states where I drank one and gave one to a coworker, who kept it on his desk for a few years as a souvenir, not realizing that I had intended for him to actually drink it. A few times I was tempted to say, “dude, if you’re not gonna drink it, then I’m going to!” The beer was sweet and definitely unique, but nothing too outstanding. Next time, I’ll have one on draught!
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Its Good to Have Friends in High Places
I had just set foot onto the summit plateau, cresting the steepest part of the day’s climb. A 20 minute walk and I’ll be on the true summit of Russia's Mt Elbrus, the highest point in Europe. An American man, his nationality made obvious by his clothes and general appearance, greets me in Russian, “pri-vet!”, as he stumbles on his way back from the summit. I was exhausted and alone, well, as alone as I could be in the near 200 people going for the summit that day. It seemed odd that this guy didn’t recognize that I was American. I continue my slog to the top, finding my new friends Ryan, Rigori, and Francesco already there.
We take our pictures and head down to the saddle, a resting point 1000 feet below, to recover for our descent to camp. People are talking about a man who had fallen down the steep snow slope on his way down, and was now lying in the snow nearby. I already knew who it was, and now felt extremely guilty for not doing anything to prevent the fall. Luckily he had not been hurt, but he was suffering from cerebral edema, a life-threatening form of altitude sickness caused by fluid leakage and swelling of the brain. He was now in a comatose like state, unable to walk, talk, or stand up, and getting down to thicker air was critical. There were a few guys tending to him and searching for any climbing partners he might have, but they don’t waste much time. Two of the men involved each take a side and escort the man down the mountain, carrying his weight on their shoulders with no help from him whatsoever. They struggle hard on the steep traverse down from the saddle, and occasionally yell at the guy to walk, making the situation seem desperate. At one point he actually seemed to hear them and tried to stand up. They slowly let him stand on his own, and my stomach turns as he falls flat on his face and slides down a few feet in the now softening snow. The rescuers pick him up and beging to carry him again. The place is swarming with climbers, and we felt comfortable enough with his rescue to continue down and relieve some of the congestion. About an hour after we arrive into basecamp, the man arrives with his escorts; they set him down and talk to him as he begins to regain consciousness. Within 15 minutes of being in the lower altitude, he starts walking around and talking again, but he’s still in a daze as to what had happened when his rescuers leave him and continue down to their own basecamp. He makes a full recovery and I find out later he was from New York, not that it matters. I still wonder if he has any idea who really saved his life. The whole experience made me question the definition of a hero. The people I think of as heroes have no Nike endorsements, no million dollar salary and sometimes, no recognition.
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I Believe the Correct Term is "Transgendered"
Our trip was coming to an end. 3 weeks in Peru and Argentina, and only a few days left to kill here in Mendoza and Santiago before we head home. We were proud of our thick beards and weak legs, temporary souvenirs from the 2 weeks we spent carrying loads for our chance to stand on top of an Andean giant. The one thing we had left to do was to find some decent souvenirs for our friends back home. Finding something for the parents was easy – wine. This was beautiful wine country, but that would  not cut it for my beer-drinking friends. For them, something special. A foreign girlie magazine! Okay, so that’s not really special, but certainly more entertaining than the meaningless trinket. This would be something that for sure would be passed around at a get-together or two. It didn’t have to be anything too crazy, just the foreign equivalent of a swimsuit issue or something. We hit the street to check out one of many newsstands scattered around Mendoza, and they had a ton of magazines with a provocative girl or two on the cover. Lets just pick one. The woman running the stand asks us if we’re sure, a heavy accent but very clear. The childish embarrassment of my purchase was emphasized by this seemingly out of place question. Yes, we’re sure, we’ll take a few of them we say, and I really just want to get this over with now. She has a giggly smile as she places the magazines into a bag and gives up our change. We head back to the hotel, curious to check out our foreign “reading” material before we wrap them up for our friends back home. “ARE YOU SERIOUS?!” we say as we simultaneously drop our magazines to the ground. We had just bought full nude transvestite magazines! No wonder she had reacted that way! Then we notice the title in small print at the bottom of the cover (which had been covered by other magazines at the newsstand, swear), Travesti Hard. Oh man, what had she thought about us?! Forget bringing these home to our friends, now I didn’t even feel comfortable throwing these away in our hotel room trash can! From now on, meaningless trinkets for all, and maybe a Spanish lesson or two.
Photo credit Stock Photo.com |
Moses and the Orange Soda
 I staggered back into high camp, not yet able to enjoy success on my first high mountain. Moses, a porter that had been with me for the past 6 days was waiting. He had seen me coming down the mountain, and was holding out a bottled orange soda (which he had carried on his back for the last 6 days) with a huge grin on his face. “Congratulations!” he said with his thick accent, as he grabbed and held one of my hands while we spoke, the traditional way to show friendship even between males in East Africa. I had felt a connection with Moses, and his excitement for my success was genuine. He was younger, maybe 18 or 20, was under-equipped for the mountain, and was putting in about 8 days of hard labor for what I guessed was about $20 U.S. This trip, more than any other, had changed my view of the world. The contrast between the poverty and the passion that people here have for life and their loved ones is staggering, so much that it had brought me to tears one night as I slept alone in my tent. I was thankful for my experience, something I had largely attributed to being on the mountain. Mountains are the ultimate leveling ground. They don’t care who you are, where you’re from, or how much money you have. Here, you’re the same. You’re cold together, you’re tired together, you’re sick of being on the mountain together. Sure, we were here for different reasons, and admittedly, he carried more weight than I did and didn’t have the nice clothing I had, but our hardships did not have to be identical. It became easy to connect, something that never would have happened had we met on the street. After a quick celebration, we descended together into a more populated camp lower on the mountain. I crawled into my tent that night, exhausted from the days climb, but I smiled as I heard Moses laughing and joking around with his friends, a day’s walk away from returning to his home.
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