Death zone

In addition to all other preparations I’ve intensified my training, hoping to accumulate the energy that no mountaineer can do without. Human being is a chemical factory and one needs to get to know how it operates: to figure out how the body rebuilds and what dietary requirements need to be satisfied under extreme conditions; most importantly, however, to be aware that we all have our limits, and know what they are. It would be far too late to discover them at eight thousand meters. Thus, this is a wonderful time for me – one that many a woman would be envious of: I need to gain weight! In my past expeditions I lost seven kilos on Cho Oyuand and eight on Everest.

K2 rises into the sky as high as commercial flights’ cruising altitudes… where people on board are happily sitting in an airlock, taking it easy. Not quite the same as what the Death Zone has in store for climbers (Death Zone referring to altitudes higher than 7,500 meters above sea level): thin air of low pressure with a mere 30 % of oxygen compared to sea level figures. And what happens without oxygen? Your digestive system won’t metabolize the food. In order to obtain the energy elsewhere, the body starts eating itself up. Three days and you’re done. This is not about losing weight the healthy way that helps people get rid of the “spare tire”. Some 70 % of body mass disappears from muscles rather than from the pool of fat, which is devastating and incomprehensible at the same time. After all, isn’t fat supposed to be the body’s repository of high energy? Not here. An eight-thousander is like a lab of insane experiments. Once in a while you need to step in and add some genuine medication or let more oxygen in.

Even small injuries refuse to heal, wounds remain open. (Sure, all you need to do is descend a few miles and all gets fine, except that your expedition is over.) You can’t sleep well, no matter how exhausted you may be. You need to deal with minor maladies all the time, such as problems with cavities, cough, burnt nose or cracked lips that make you “not kissable” (my favorite term).  I have enough experience to know that being a woman, I’ll end up as a Smaritan and a pharmacy in one. I’ve bought tons of pills and ointments for everything, uvula for lungs or brain swelling, adrenaline injection to stick into the poor guy’s thigh when needed. Weather is not up for sale, though. At the drop of a hat you’ll be facing a snowstorm, wind of a hurricane speed around 200 km/h, or paralyzing temperatures as low as minus 60° centigrade. Hillary noted after his triumphant expedition of 1953: „We didn’t feel we’d conquered Everest; rather it took pity on us.“