+
THE CHINA MAIL, FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1959.
On Tuesday we gave you the story of 11 women bound for the Himalayan heights. Today,
-Page Four carries a report by the one man who will accompany them..
man:
11 girls
1 mountain
this lot goes too!
by STEPHEN HARPER
NEP
KATMANDU
0 %
CHO-OYU
TIB
28.750 FEET
Sun
Kos]
miles
EL
THE LONG TREK TO THE OBJECTIVE
LEVEN women set out last month on a unique expedition to climb a 26,750ft Himalayan peak without the help of a single man. Their target is Cho-Oyu (which means Big Head), 20 miles from Everest, which has already cost the lives of several male mountaineers.
Eleven women alone on # for their niountain excupi Sherpor. But not quite alone. Where the news gues there in The reporter, and that, in this case, mesk me.
Distraction
As the women take on their mountain I ll be erahteling
Cone-man 11y own
expedition On the right to Big Hend. You can see what it takes to get Just one man, up a Himalayan Dantdu.
shall be the only Euro- I porn mon
iravelling
Wotp:
with many days
distance at Um 12×
Leath Ms inner.
Claude Kogan, who is a swia-
ruit designer from Nice, is a bit worried about this. "I don't want anything to take my com- panion rinds off the moun- tain," she explained.
She was nut reckoning on on-the-spot reporting On the konntado we shall be eight from the doys by runner
enble-office-in Kat- nearest mandu, Nepal.
Getting within sight of my quarry is going to be a rugged diventure. Just to get to the Everest area and back again to The nearest read means a walk of 400 miles over rough country
ging
14.00021. up to
and down again to 2,000 in the valleys.
Harper, who will be the only white 'man on the mountain, and hù burden. Fortunately he won't be carrying it all' himself.
So I went shopping to equip myself for two months out of reach of civilisation. It was all strictly kept down to necessities -but even so I shall set out ou
the dusty road for Katmandu with more than 3owt. of beg-
age.
Precaution
1 shall need five porters to corry it all-the tent that will be my home, the Army assault ratious shall live on, and the tropical pills to keep me going.
One item 1 had to obtain Iondon was foot ointment, In the East, the bare-foot poor have
the soft hardened leet and shoed rich don't walk, so foot ointment is impossible to get. I
WHITE RUSSIA, WHERE MAIN-ROAD
in
emptied 10 small Jars into an aluminium container.
is
A well-equipped first-aid kit necessary not only in case of accidents but because the travelling sahib is expected to disperse medleine to. The ailing
along
his route.
I have tablets against malaria, tablets to ward off stomach in-
fection. lip salve to combat bite
ing winds of up to 100 miles an hour, cream to shield my face from the heat of sun redected off giccial lee,
In the heat of the jungle val- leys I shall wear. locally" bought sandals end cotton trousers and bush shirt.
For the mountains I have u wool-Hined windproot nylon kil,
a Balaclava, leather gloves with BREAKDOWN silk ones underneath, woollen slockings, climbing boots, and crampons and an ice axe.
Reliable
Only by one, as I eat them out of a job, I shall send porters back to Katmandu with my stories for cabling to London. shall also send you news runners from the villages, under a centuries-old system of com muntention sald to be as reliable as the G.F.O.
"What, no
cleft sticks?" zald my collegues, na I set out from the office the other night with my clobber to catch my Comel. Nó. But there's everything but.
NUMBERS
BY
KEY TO PICTURE: 1. Bala- clava; 2. Army assault rations for 6 days; '3, Ice ̃axa; 4. One ration pack's contents; 5, Cook- ing things; 0 Typewrlier; %, Hucknack: 8, Crate of biscuits: Camera:
9. Water bottle, 10. 11, Rope: 12. First ald kit; 13. Spare clothes; 14. Grampons for glacier travel; 15. Alr bed: binoculars, 10, Wrist compass, dark glasses; 17. Pocket chess Ret; 18, Mosquito-proof feni: 18. Sleeping bag: 20, Selection of vills.
-(Lorsten Express Service).
TRAFFIC THRESHES THE CORN! IT'S WHERE SO MANY RUSSIANS WOULD LIKE TO
DOWN ON THE FARM
IT had always been Vladimir's ambition to put his engineering qualifica- tions to use on a Kholkhoz (collective farm). It was not just that the a collective farm he could, in a way, open-air life appealed to him, but on excrcise more control over his own destiny than in any other walk of life. But getting a Kholkhoz job in the Moscow area was not so easy. Vacancies wêre infrequent and the applicants for them numerous. So while he waited for his chance Vladimir took a post at the Mitishinski tractor repair station.
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JOHN GRIFFITHS
was the work of the station to The ordinary agricultural In order to thresh come of sell it to them, together with workers rent a house from the their grain crops, the White more obstruction was put in the Their united excuse, way that spares, fuel and major repairs. farm at (1 rouble a square Russian peasants laid out the way of a visitor who wished to they were not in their best Minor repairs and maintenance metre. Those who wish to build sheaves in the main rond! After talk and take photographs in clothes, and so we would repre- were done by the engineer at- their own are given a plot of sumfelent traffic had passed over the country, than in the towns, sent Russia as a poor country. tached to each farm leaving the land and allowed to do so, with it to shake out the curs thes
I puggested that we were not station free to keep the types of the
In view of the distorted quite such fools result that a village of were swept up into
19 to expect heaper by manner in which this aspect of them to go to work in machinery up to date and to charming wooden houses soon road and re-spread agalo.
their research into agricultural springs up. Thes are the But there was a disappoint- Russian life has been so often Simday best, nor would the mechanisation,
presented by the Western Press people of the workers' own property and can ment awaiting Vladimir and he this is not, perhaps, surprising. They laughed,
West expect it. and twe were did not really care how the
One incident clicks in my harvest was gathered. He learn- mind. I was one of a party Our gulce remained unhappy,
very soon all on excellent terms. ed from Vietor that the meeting visitors who
After Vladimir had spent
A few years earlier this might few months at the station work- the special research have satisfied him, but now that ing with
be passed on to their children,
When Vladimir went to the
workers in the free dining halt,
caurte across a
all Russla's ten thousand tractor wit on the mechankut problems Kilkhoz he ate with the other had turned down his application. group of men and women mend- stations had been reorganised of hay gathering in wuoded there was far less contact with areas a vacancy the actual work of the form. applied for it.
arcse and he
While he had worked at the
Fanciful
It was not that he was
As we left the urea I stopped ing the road by pouring tar inte to talk to some women gathering the cracks.
kind Our "guide" tried the harvest. "What to prevent us photographing harvest have you hnd?" I asked. them, and so at first did the
nal workers, who appeared to have
and listened intrigued to their conversation. Usually this was concerned with the current price of vegetables In the Mos- cow markets, for ch bbourer Vacancy station he had learned more
about life on the farm and his WIK allowed to cultivate a well qualified, but it so happen- The system whereby the chances of getting a job there, quite irge plot of land and sell ed that a young man of equal station had controlled and kept He knew that all the applications the produes for what he could skill whore family had ilved the State and worked on the farm for ten all the machinery, and work would be discussed at a general get. The prices in brigades hid
controlled, but in years had applied at the same gone to the dif- meeting of the farm workers shops were
Naturally he was chosen ferent farms to use the equlp- and the best candidate chosen the markets a little "capitalist time.
price warfare" was permitted, for the job. ment, hind proved rather chaotle, by them.
4
There was still a chance thint
The head of the farm never At first he was rather sur»
It was harvest time, however, knew when a machine might be prised at this workers' control.
so now the talk centred on the he could get a job on a Soviet transferred elsewhere; two separate commands were res-
He had heard it spoken of in chances of earning bonus, farm but Vladimir did not cure
unlike to be Only a few years ago payment for the idea for,
the factories, but knew it ponsible for the work in one
Here fleld and
rarely put into practice.
was largely in kind, but now a Kholkhoz, it would be run by n transport, casts were.
the workers elected a
council trained
labourer received 800 head appointed by the governe high.
that in turn chose a head of or 000 roubles a month and ment and be far less free ond the form.
liked it for better.
casy. Vladimir returned to the elty.
Now the collective farms own- ed their own machinery and it
ARTIE...
Atie
Cowboys and 'Indians are out-dz'a polliletant now...”
· QUEEN'S · ROAD, CENTRAL HONG KONG TEL: 27172.
* Loddon Express Berries
Applications
The practical running of the farm and any immediate deel slons were taken by the chief, had to be ratified by the executive council and again by a general meeting of all the
but
workers over 18.
If they disagreed with their chief on a major point of polley
the workers were free to sack
Victor, who had become Vladimir's, friend, was grumbl- Fanning in Russia today is a ing as usual that the agricul- thriving branch of the economy tural specialist and the chief of with more people wanting to the farm lud made for too lch join than can. But despite the en estimate of the yield that claims of extensive mechanisa- was the norm of the land his tion the fact remains that the brigada was working on. But evidence of one's eyes-I only despite his grumbles Victor speale for a arall usually managed to: carn a
part of 15 Russia-ahows most of the work per cent bonus each harvest being done manually, Nor was Lime.
the machinery that I saw of outstanding quality, although During the harvest, of course, the situation the hours were much longer than proving,
him and choose another. He usual, just as they are every
It
is rapidly, im-
probably fanciful to
in turn, felt free to resign If he where else in the world. Nur remind oneself that the revolt did not have as much support mally he would work 10 hours
as he wanted.
The applications would be day Ave days a week, and six against repeated tyranny in
hours on Saturday.
Russia's history has almost in- discussed in just this way, and
variably begun with pensant Vladimir knew that it he was With their mochanical hat- diroontent. Nevertheless it wan successful he would receive avesting the Moscow farmers in the farming world, that I salary of some 1,100 roubles a rather looked down on their found most freedom; as wo in month. In addition,
a fellows In White Russia, whose other countries would "know" It specialist, there would be π method at farming was a stand- rent-free house walking for ing joks among the copidalicated · Tho - people I spoke to In him, for there is no housing Muscovites, but it still gol re- country districts were -friendly, problem on the collective farms, sulla and the soil was better, -curious, and outspoken. But fir-
been instructed to object.
of
"A good one-trut It is not ours," was the reply.
CHUCKLES
ལ་
"I don't care what she said. I did not pick up
your mother in a slave market”