The best cup of tea...

The tea is black and very strong. Gombu always brought it in a tinfoil ball. Each time we met over the past 30 years or so, he would bring me a “ball of tea”. He liked the big Hershey chocolate bars that I gave him and we both enjoyed exchanging these small gifts.

Sherpa Nawang Gombu, the first person to climb Mt. Everest twice, died over the weekend and, yet another of the people who have had great influence on my life is gone. We met through our long-time friend, famed mountaineer Lou Whittaker. Lou and Gombu had a newly established relationship with JanSport backpacks and I was the corporate liaison from Cummins Engine Company that owned the budding backpack company when we first met on Mt. Rainier.

Gombu’s English was not that good then and, frankly, not much better when we were together last on the Mountain a year or so ago. But communicating was never a problem. His big broad smile told you very quickly that things were fine and, if he scowled, you knew something was wrong. Even better, he would make it right very quickly and there would be that smile again.

Rainier Mountaineering guide service relished Gombu’s summer visits. He came as often as he could and would stay as long as time and weather would allow. He was the guide’s guide…an energizer bunny of sorts…who never ran out of stamina or oxygen. I still smile at the film of Gombu’s ascent of Mt. Everest with Lou’s brother, Jim. The first thing he does when they get on top is light up a cigarette…not PC, for sure, but definitely a testament to his fortitude.

Fortunately, I got to travel with him and Lou in the Himalayas. Those mountains were his home, like the Cascades and Olympics are for us. He loved it there and was in his element. He was a major player in opening the trekking and climbing routes that are now flourishing in the Himalayas. Sir Edmund Hillary gave great praise to Gombu and his family for their efforts at mountain conservation when we were working on the 50th Anniversary of Hillary’s climb of Everest.

During the 1980’s and 90’s, I put together an annual event called the Mountain Summit. It was hosted on Mt. Rainier, at Snowbird and Sundance and Tokyo too. All the top mountaineers of the day from Reinhold Messner to Tim McCartney Snape and Ed Viesturs came together to talk about access issues in the mountains of the world. With the possible exception of Rick Ridgeway, Gombu was the most diminutive guy there. But his presence was big and when he talked, everyone listened. In one of the sessions, we got into a discussion about taking care of the mountains for future generations. Gombu spoke up, after a little prodding, and said, “If you love the mountains, they will love you.” That pretty much said it all.  The rest of the discussion was just rhetoric.

Nawang Gombu was a great man and a great friend. His legend and his memory will live on. His obituary says he was 79 but he had the heart of a teenager. News reports are calling him a "Tiger of the Snow", which may be true but I think it would embarrass him a bit. What is for certain is that he was a leader among his people, the Sherpa, and a highly respected ambassador of the mountains he loved. I miss him already as I sip his tea, which I will now use quite sparingly, and think of our quiet times together high in the snow. I know he’s still climbing.