Pushing boundaries: the Nepali woman climber up for National Geographic award
She’s scaled the world’s highest peaks and made a name for herself as Nepal’s first woman climbing instructor. Now Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita is in the running for the National Geographic People’s Choice Adventurer of the Year award for her courage on and off the mountains
Born in Khumjung in Nepal’s Everest region, Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita recalls watching tourists coming from afar to climb the mountains near her home when she was a little girl. By the time she’d finished high school, she had decided to find out what all the fuss was about, and began trekking, rock climbing and training for mountaineering.
Since then, she’s become Nepal’s first woman mountaineering instructor, and not only conquered Everest but is one of the few women to have reached the summit of the world’s second highest peak, K2 in Pakistan – considered the most dangerous to climb.
Pasang Lhamu was recently nominated for the National Geographic People’s Choice Adventurer of the Year award 2016 for her courageous relief work in rural Nepalese communities following last April’s earthquake.
“I’m just a simple woman doing my job,” she says, laughing. “At first I didn’t want to tell anyone because I couldn’t believe it. I feel very excited – it’s a very special opportunity for me to promote Nepal, to give back to my people, my country.”
Her father died when she was very young and her mother when she was 15, forcing her to take on the responsibility of bringing up her younger sister, just eight at the time. “Even though I wasn’t yet fully grown up myself, I had to face those challenges. It was a very sad time for me, I couldn’t handle it, but I had no choice. I guess it made me pretty strong.”
