Climb for Hospice

Hey y’all,

I have a present for you!!! Sent to me just a few minutes ago. Enjoy!

-Chris

please excuse the lack of proper punctuation – this keyboard at
schipol isn’t the best. so here i am, a canadian returning from
tanzania wasting my time in the netherlands. isn’t life grand? not
much new to report really. nothing exciting happening in my life at
the moment… oh wait! that’s not true at all! there is something
exciting going on… there’s a spa right across the hallway from me at
the internet cafe! awesome, huh?!

ok, ok… i’ll stop it. yes, there are stories to tell, and yes there
will be some shocks. but… before i divulge my secrets to you, i feel
that it’s very important for me to share them in person first, with
those who have missed me as desperately as i have missed them. i’m
sure you understand. you’re all pretty smart people.

however, to appease the masses, i shall tell you a story. it’s one of
the highlights of my trip, and something i’m still giggling about 5
days later.

our guide on the mountain was a 40-ish year old chagga man named
reggie. he says he has climbed the mountain ‘about more than 150
times’, and judging by his calves, i’m inclined to believe him. one
afternoon, when the rest of the team decided to nap, i chose to stay
up and chat with reggie. with his limited english, and my non-existant
chagga and/or swahili, i knew this was going to be an adventure in
itself. we started off as most do, exchaning information about wives,
kids, and my supremely awesome boyfriend (hi chris!)… then, out of
nowhere, reggie lobs this one my way:

“what crops do you grow in your village?”
“uhhh… well, let’s see…. corn, potatoes, berries…uhhh…”
“do you grow banana?” (banana is a staple of the chagga diet – toasted
banana and cheese, anyone?)
“nope. no bananas. too cold”
“do you grow coffee?”
“nope, too cold for that, too”
“oh. do you grow pumpkin?”
“yes! we do grow pumpkin! well… for a short time anyway. we grow it
for halloween”
“hilawin?”
“halloween”
“hellawin. hellawin. how do you make hellawin?”
“halloween. it’s not a food, it’s a holiday”

here reggie crooks his head. i continue…

“yah, um… on halloween children dress up in costumes…”

head crook

“…and they go door-to-door in the village…”
“for pumpkin?”
“ummm… no. for candy”

head crook

“what do you do with the pumpkins?”
“y’see… we sort of, ummm… cut their tops off, scoop out their
guts, then, uhhh… cut smiley faces into them, stuff a candle in them
and put them by our door”

dead silence

“…and then you eat the pumpkin?”
“actually, nooooo… we uh, throw it away. in the garbage”

“but what about the pumpkin? you don’t eat it?”
“some people do, but most don’t. we do eat the seeds, though!”
“you eat the seeds?!?!”

here, reggie bursts into laughter and i turn a fabulous shade of red

“yeah, we scoop them out, put them in the oven and toast them. they’re
very good! you should tell your wife and daughter to do that next time
you have pumpkin!”
“no. i don’t think i will do that”
“fair enough”

it certainly made me think about how i consume food, especially my
villages crops. things are going to change for me, i think. just wait
until i get to the story about having to explain to reggie how grocery
stores work! awkwaaaaaaard!

anyway, that night we actually had pumpkin soup for dinner, and of
course it was very good. i ate pretty well this trip, but i didn’t eat
enough. my jeans are falling off and i actually had to root through
the garbage for a piece of rope to ghetto-up myself a belt.  classy. i
know.

alright all… i need to go through photos, videos, memories and
vocabularies, but i’ll be back as soon as i can.

– Robyn Thomson

ROBYN IS SAFE!!!

Whew! I was starting to get worried there or a little while. I was expecting to hear from her all day yesterday, and kept checking my email every 30 minutes or so just to make sure that when something arrived I got it as soon as possible. But now that worry can be done!!

The internet was down at the Marangu Hotel when they arrived back, so she was finally able to send me a quick note from a usurped computer when an employee of the hotel walked away for a minute. It was 3 hours until her flight left, which was 4 hour ago, so she should be on her way back to Dar es Salaam for a connecting flight to Amsterdam. She’ll have a 9 hour layover at AMS, so I’m sure I’ll get plenty more information at that point.

She didn’t mention anything about the climb, or the result, and personally I think that’s a good thing. I think the story should be told from the troubadour’s perspective anyways, so I won’t be giving away the ending. She’ll do a write up that I can post when she has the time.

All I can say is what I will be repeating in my head for the next 24 hours: She’s safe, she’s safe, she’s safe, she’s safe, she’s safe……..

Well, for all those who have been keeping track of Robyn’s progress, if they stuck t the plan she should have climbed to the summit sometime last night at around 9 P.M.

After hanging around on the peak for 20 minutes or so, the group would have turned around and descended for about 8 or 9 hours straight. Which means one thing to me. The best thought I could possibly imagine. She’s almost on her way back!! I can’t wait. Even better, I should hear something from her by way of email tomorrow, possibly even Monday, so this period of information blackout is nearly done! Anybody else as anxious as I am to hear from her?

I’ll post as soon as I hear anything.

Well, she should be halfway there by this point. Today Robyn was going to face the toughest part of the climb (besides doing that push for the summit through altitude sickness), where she has to ascend, then descend into a valley of sorts that’s marked by ridges and scree slopes.

Her favorite part of climbing! Scree slopes! One step forward, two steps back.

I haven’t heard from her, so I’m going to assume that no news is good news, because what else can I do? At least there was no emails about having the get airlifted out due to someone falling down a cliff.

Uh oh. *quickly knocks on the closest piece of wood her can find*

Four more days… just four more days…

Today Robyn officially started her climb. Or so I assume. I haven’t heard from her since yesterday, when I got a very short email (due to strict time constraints) telling me she had arrived at Marangu Hotel in Moshi safely. It didn’t sound like she had all that much fun getting to the hotel at the base of Kilimanjaro, and might have hit a bump in the road or two, but she did arrive there in one piece.

So today she starts seven long days of walking uphill to conquer the tallest mountain in Africa, then spends one day possibly rolling down the other side before we’ll hear from her again. These could be eight of the longest days of my life. Whew.

So one more time, from me and the dogs, and hopefully all of you. At the top of our lungs, all together now: GOOD LUCKY ROBYN!!!!!!

Two more days of fun to go for our intrepid voyager.

Tonight they dance and sing and party at the Kendwa Rocks’ Full Moon party! I have no idea what that is, we didn’t speak for long enough to get details on what it could entail, but a full moon sounds like a pretty good reason to party to me!! Except the moon isn’t actually full until August 24th…..hmmm….

Well, any excuse to party while on vacation, right?

The next day they spend in motion as they fly from Zanzibar to Dar es Salaam, picking up one more member of the climb team, then flying to the airport by Mount Kilimanjaro. One more night of rest spent in the Marangu Hotel before 8 days of mountain climbing fun! The count down is on.

Last night Robyn and I had a very nice chat via Google chat as she sat up, fully awake still at 2am. It was great to hear from her and even better to feel like we were having something close to a full-on conversation instead of exchanging emails. She has met up with Amanda in Dar es Salaam, at the New Africa Hotel where they were going to spend the night before waking up early to sort out details for the rest of the trip and catch a 10am ferry to Zanzibar!!

Ah, Zanzibar. I just love to say Zanzibar. ZanZIbar….ZANzibar…ZANziBAR!!!!… it just has this magical way of rolling off the tongue, however it’s pronounced.

So if that was a 10am ferry Tanzania time, it should have left at midnight Ladner time (or Pacific Standard Time, whatever you want to call it), so I figure she should be arriving on Zanzibar by this point. Awesome!!

I know that my mind is at much more ease now that she is with a friend she can have a lot of fun with, and out of Dar es Salaam into a more tourist friendly type of space. From her emails the culture shock was really starting to get to her. And Amanda has traveled in Africa pretty extensively, at least South Africa. But she did have some very good things to say about the trip to this point, including: crazy palm trees that grow too close to the waters edge, Zanzibar coffee that tastes like spicy peppers, the heavy musk of spice that hangs in the air constantly, and definitely the heat. She loves the heat.

Heck, maybe she’ll even have a tan when she gets back. Hehehehehe…..

– Chris

Heard from Robyn again!  It sounds like all of her flights were fairly uneventful. Apparently the airport in Nairobi reminds her a bit of her old high school, which is pretty much what I expected from an African airport. But then again, I watch a lot of movies like The Ghost and The Darkness which I don’t think really depicts Africa quite the way it is today, considering it was supposed to take place in 1896. Shows what I know about Africa. So back to Robyn!

I really think the flight to Dar es Salaam is best summed up in her own words, as she is a much better writer then I and has the advantage of actually experiencing the moment. So here is the excerpt from her email to me. Don’t worry, I edited out the mushy stuff.

“Now… the flight from Nairobi to Dar was… was… wow. Someone sat in my seat by accident, so I got their seat instead, which was nice, as it was an exit row! There we were, flying over Africa, when there it was – Mt. Kilimanjaro. Standing tall above a sea of while clouds, it was MASSIVE. It was HUGE, it was… Mt Mehru??  What? That’s right besider Kili, so where’s….

Oh. My. GOD.

I saw it. I saw Mt. Kilimanjaro right there. And it was BIGGER than Mt. Mehru. It was gorgeous. I could see the summit right in front of me, and I knew it, I knew right then that I would stand there. No second-guessing. That summit is mine, and it will be because Mt. Kilimanjaro will allow me to summit. It’s a beautiful mountain. Of course, I cried. I couldn’t help it. I don’t think anyone would have been able to! It’s very, very wide, and very, very tall.”

Hello faithful followers of the Climb For Hospice,

My name is Chris and I will be your new keyboard pilot for the rest of this journey up to the top of Mt Kilimanjaro. I’ve been tasked with sending along all the news that I receive (hopefully daily) from Robyn in Tanzania, and I will try and relay the info in as timely a fashion as I get it. Sound good? Mmmkay.

She’s made it safely all the way to Dar Es Salaam via Amsterdam and Nairobi. I haven’t heard anything about the flights after landing in Amsterdam, but her KLM flight across the Atlantic was apparently a good start as she sat next to a nice middle-aged couple on the flight, then spent the majority of her six hour layover debating the finer points of pastry.

She is now staying with with a friend of a friend, Alex, and members of his family in Dar Es Salaam. Isn’t it magical to have globe trotting friends? Aside from the obviously TREMENDOUS amount of culture shock that one would experience, all seems well. They went for a nice dinner last night at a beautiful restaurant named the Seacliff. Apparently it is aptly named, as at one point a larger then average wave decided, without consulting the patrons of the restaurant, to smash into said cliff and soak them.

Robyn says the water is warm.

More to come as I get it!!

– Your friendly neighborhood message relay system, Chris

P.S. – The donations haven’t stopped, either. After another yesterday, she is inching up to the $12,000 line. AMAZING!!!

On January 1st, 2010 I started my journey with this blog entry:

I am going to climb a mountain. Well, I’m going to walk up one, anyway.

I haven’t done anything like this before. In fact, I can probably count the number of times I’ve gone hiking, and I know I haven’t been camping more than half a dozen times. Don’t get me wrong, I know what I’m getting into. I’ve watched videos about climbing this mountain. I’ve submitted questions about the climbing of this mountain to semi-popular websites. I have bought (although not yet read) books about this mountain. I feel about as prepared as someone who listens to a song on the radio and then starts hiring roadies to prepare for a world tour.

In August of 2010, I am going to fly to Tanzania, Africa and climb Mount Kilimanjaro as a way to raise money for the Delta Hospice. The Hospice holds a very special place in my heart, and it is my absolute honour to take on this journey to fund raise on their behalf. But this will be no simple journey. Oh no, this will be a flat-out epic.

Aside from the parent-induced membership in Brownies and Girl Guides, I have managed to avoid the outdoors quite sufficiently for about 30 years. I am the anti-camper. I do not like being cold. The sound of rain drops falling on a tent is nearly trauma-inducing. I would rather be in prison than a sleeping bag. (Some of you more astute readers may be able to pick up the subtle hints I am dropping in regards to my views on outdoor life). To climb Mount Kilimanjaro means that I will need to… oh, man… camp for 10 days.

And so, purely for your entertainment, I am going to allow you into my world as I train for this adventure. For the next seven months, I will allow parts of my life to become an open book, and permit you to laugh, cry and shake your head in total disbelief as I attempt to turn myself from Robyn the Indoor Princess, into Robyn the Sobbing Mess of Outdoorsy Semi-Competence.

And so it begins…

Bring it on, Kilimanjaro!

And today, on August 12th, 2010, I am boarding that flight to Tanzania, Africa knowing that $10,000 $11, 850 has been raised (so far!) for the Delta Hospice Society.

I hiked once, twice, three times and four, five times, six times, and seven

I trained

I attempted to camp

I ate, ate, ate, and ate, and ate, ate, and happily ate, and ate, and ate, shamefully ate, ate, ate and attempted to explain sarcasm, ate, and ate, and ate, and tried to avoid eating, and thought about what to eat, and ate.

I fundraised, and had help with fundraising

I was sponsored and sponsored again

I was humbled

I remembered.

This has been an incredible journey on the way to having an incredible journey. I learned a lot about myself in these past eight months, and I learned a great deal about the power of human nature and the strength of community kindness. This whole experience has left me awed. And I am grateful for it. Thank you for letting me share it all with you. This became such a personal blog, and I’ve met some very wonderful people because of it.

And so today, I leave this blog in the capable hands of Chris, who will update it as often as he hears from me. I’m not sure how or when I’ll be able to make contact, but please know that it’s a priority for me to be able to keep you posted.

I want to thank you all so very, very much for following me and for reading this blog. It means more to me than I could ever express to know that I’m carrying your support and kindness in my heart as I scale that mountain.

And guess what?

I’m crying.

And so it begins…

Bring it on, Kilimanjaro!

xoxo

One more sleep.

Today my plan is to unpack what I pre-packed to make sure that I packed what I needed to pack during my pre-pack, because I forgot what I packed when I finally packed for real. And then after I unpack what I pre-packed, I’ll re-pack my pack.

And then I’m going to drink rum.

A lot of it.

One more sleep…