Free Beyond the Summit by Linda Leblanc Page A

didn’t share their love of this roasted barley flour. When Eric frantically looked for a polite way to dispose of it without being rude, the porters and Dorje burst into unrestrained, innocent laughter. Beth remembered Marty’s comment about them being easily entertained. Finding this an endearing quality, she laughed right along with them. Grinning, Dorje offered some tsampa to the ladies who took note of Beth’s rapidly shaking head and politely declined.
     
    Less pleased with their childlike humor, Eric seemed to need to prove himself. Walking over to the heaviest-looking doko, he asked Dorje, “Can I try it on?”
     
    The laughter-containment quotient doubled. As usual, the porters were squatting on their haunches with their feet flat on the ground—an impossible position for Beth who toppled backwards every time she tried it. Elbows on their knees and chins cupped in their hands to hide smiles, they watched with mirthful eyes. This would be Eric’s shining moment. At 6’ 1”, he towered over them. Other than Dorje who was about 5’ 9”, the tallest porter was no more than 5’ 2”. Slight and wiry weighing little more than 110 pounds, they seemed no match for Eric. Dorje instructed him to sit on the ground and slip the woven straps over his arms. Adjusting the hemp tumpline on top of Eric’s head, he said, “This is the naamlo and this a teko walking stick to help you up.”
     
    Wearing a smug expression, Eric dismissed him with a backhand wave. As soon as he tried to stand, the doko shifted to the right and he caught himself on an outstretched arm. In a semi-squat and leaning 45 degrees with all his weight on one arm and the doko slowly sliding toward the ground, he had to do something fast. Eric pushed off and tried using that momentum to stand upright, but the basket swung the other way and tossed him on the ground. Dorje and three porters came to his rescue.
     
    “Jesus Christ, this thing’s going to crush my spine,” Eric groaned.
     
    Afraid she’d break out laughing, Beth didn’t dare look. Fingers to her tightened lips, she said, “Try walking with it.”
     
    Listing heavily to the right, he took three steps, winced, and yelled, “Get this damn thing off me. It’s obviously a two-man load.”
     
    Snickering, the porters relieved him of the basket and realigned the load. Embarrassed for Eric, Beth whispered, “I’m sure that’s right because you’re the strongest guy I know.”
     
    “Oh yeah?” he said as the old man who had served them tsampa walked past carrying the same doko. In bare feet with quarter-inch calluses, he climbed up from the river with a steady stride, seldom pausing for breath. “And look at that!” A porter was hiding several large rocks in another man’s doko .
     
    Beth laughed. “I bet they’re rivals for the heart of some Sherpani.” She alerted Dorje, but instead of rushing to squash the inevitable conflict, he asked her to quietly point out the two porters involved so he could observe the fun. She stood agape as he explained they often played such tricks. It was expected and relieved their boredom. Shaking her head, she whipped her notebook out and wrote. The people are even more incredible than the mountains. I’m ashamed of myself for grouping them all as porters and not seeing individuals. They are what I will carry home in my heart, not pictures of Everest.
     
    After cautiously crossing two wire suspension bridges and a narrow cantilever bridge with no handrails, they headed along the stony bed of the valley until they came to the confluence of two rivers below the mountain wall upon which the unseen Namche perched. “It is very steep from here and very high,” Dorje warned as he relieved the ladies of their daypacks. “You will get sick if you do not go bistarai, bistarai and drink much water.”
     
    Eric’s ego apparently still suffering, he announced, “I’m going ahead and will meet you in Namche.”
     
    Despite Dorje’s warnings,