The conqueror of Mt.Everest

12th Jan

The conqueror of Mt.Everest is no more. I remember reading in General Knowledge while in school about Edmund Hillary’s feat. Over the years I had not bothered much about Ed but today he had made the headlines and I read about him in the morning Newspaper. Beyond his achievements and the work done by him in Nepal to set up clinics and schools, which the article mentioned, there were 2 points that brought out Ed's humility which really impressed me.

Though he was the one who started the expedition and Tenzing Norgay was only his guide, it seems he refused to accept till Tenzing passed away that he was the first man atop Mt.Everest. In spite of being one of the greatest adventurers of the century, he preferred calling himself an “ordinary person with ordinary qualities”.

Ed did not have a picture of himself taken on top of the Mt.Everest. The only photo taken was that of Tenzing at the summit, which was taken by Ed himself. It seems Ed remarked later that “As far as I knew, he [Tenzing] had never taken a photograph before, and the summit of Everest was hardly the place to show him how.”