Most guys won’t admit this, but my name is not ‘most guys’ so I’ll. We love our romantic movies -at least I know I do. I’ve always been a sucker for romance especially the romantic comedies. Not the silly slap-stick type of comedy, where almost every character is clowning and acting a fool, but the ones in which the humor is subtle and intelligently implied. I’ve seen quite a few (romantic movies) and among my favorites are “City of Angels”, “Sleepless in Seattle”, “You’ve got Mail”, “The Fault in our Stars”, and the morbidly romantic “Meet Joe Black”, just to mention a few (Please try to ignore the fact that the first 3 movies I mentioned are by Meg Ryan – story for another day). But my new all time favorite romance movie is “The Mountain between Us” starring Idris Elba and what’s-her face from Titanic? Man o Man that movie moved me to tears. Okay, so I didn’t actually cry, but something got into my eye and you know how it goes…Any way never mind. The movie is mostly about survival and adventure in the cold mountains of who knows where.
What was I writing about again? Oh yes. So there I was right, just minding my own business, having my usual dinner and a movie. Little did I know that the movie I was about to watch would sweep me off my feet. So I saw through the whole setup of the movie. Seriously it wasn’t that hard to figure out. It’s like when you can see the punch coming and you brace for impact. But it still hurts. I knew Idris Elba’s character – Ben Bass and Kate Winslet’s character – Alex Martin were going to get stranded and end up falling in love. But the way the story unraveled was like the noodles I was having for dinner – cooked to perfection.
If it wasn’t for Alex, Ben would have died on that mountain, though Ben saved Alex – literally, it was Alex who actually saved them both. She got him to leave the crash site. Ben was content with just freezing on the mountain in the hope of being rescued. So any hoo, the whole freezing on the mountain thing reminded me of the time I climbed to the very top of Mount Sinai in Egypt – that is an experience I do not want to repeat ever again. Except may be if I’ll be meeting the love of my life up there like Ben and Alex. I wouldn’t want us to get stranded though. I’d probably bail on her. Just kidding. Or am I.
Climbing Mount Sinai is by far the most difficult and painful thing I have ever had to do in my entire life. Every part of my being was screaming in pain. I have had some near death experiences in life like the time I fell some 10 meters from a mango tree. The branches broke my fall. While the fire ants that made me trip in the first place stung me all the way down. But that experience doesn’t even come close to Mount Sinai. I remember at some point I just wanted to sit there and drift into the eternal sleep induced by oxygen deprivation. If it were not for my companion – Jise, I doubt if I would be writing this story today. Jise kept urging me to go on,
“just a little bit more. Almost there…” he would say. Lying to me.
“Really…we’re almost there?!” I would reply. Believing the lie.
Now let me paint a picture of what Sinai is like. For starters it’s very much like the mountains in the movie. Except for the snow. But with all the cold and then some. We started out at night, around 10pm. I later find out that this was because it was less scary at night. The base of the mountain where we assembled was cold and windy. I wondered why ‘Mother Nature’ was so mad. We started out at a gentle slope, and I remember thinking, “Puhlease! This is going to be easy”. Oh how wrong I was.
Mount Sinai is like a snake. It creeps up on you stealthily and before you know it has you wrapped around its cold, jagged death embrace. Am not even trying to be poetic here. At the hotel before we left I put on a pair of sweat pants, and a pair of jeans over them. I had four layers of clothing. An inner vest. A long sleeve wooly shirt. A sweater, and finally a heavy jacket. On my feet I had only a pair of socks and sneakers. My head was warmly tucked inside my head warmer. I also had one of those checkered Middle Eastern type scarfs wrapped around my neck and face. I also wore a pair of gloves. And finally a thick layer of ‘Aboniki’ balm generously applied all over my chest and neck area to keep warm. If you don’t know what ‘Aboniki’ balm is then imagine hot pepper extract mixed with fire. But in the innocent looking form of a balm. I’ll bet you thought I was all good right? Wrong.
By the time we were about 2 hours into the hike, the slope had gotten steeper. My legs and feet were asking me what they ever did to me to deserve the punishment I was putting them through. I remember the Bedouins (Nomadic Arabs that lived around the mountain area) with their camels saying “Fotee dala Fotee dala” as they tried to persuade us to take a camel ride up the mountain instead of walking. Some people took the camel ride up the mountain. Upto the point where it got too steep for the camel. Then they hiked the rest of the way to save energy. Being the manly man that I was I thought camel riding was for sissies. Plus I was definitely not going to part with my forty dollars. “Najera no strong, ride camel, yes?” the Bedouins persisted greedily.
I was no sissy, and I wasn’t going to punk out to a Bedouin who said Nigerian’s weren’t strong. I had my pride to protect. In retrospect I wish I parted with the forty dollars. At least I would have been able to say that I have once ridden a camel.
There are times in life when you just stop and ask yourself “what did I just get myself into?”, or “just what am I even trying to prove?”
This was definitely one of those times for me. Remember all those layers of clothing I told you about? They seemed to melt away in the unforgiving cold. I felt naked. Literally. It felt like all I had on was just a pair of boxers and singlet. The wind had picked up to like the speed-of-sound-kilometers per hour. But in a whispering and subtle kind of way, the cold crept through every layer of my clothing, past the Aboniki balm and through the pores of my skin, it had frozen my blood stream, and was making its way into my bones. I kept checking to see if my shoes and gloves were still attached to me. It felt like I had dipped my fingers and toes in cold freezing waters. But I couldn’t stop. I had to keep going. There were no more rest stops on the way for me to at least consider giving up.
Oh I forgot to tell you about the rest stops. They are like these little cabins along the mountain trail, set up and run by the Bedouins. Inside you enjoy the warmth of a fire, a blanket, and hot cup of beverage. Herbal tea or coffee. There were may be about 3 or 4 them on the trail- I can’t be sure. I stopped counting after a while. I thought to myself, “Am no chicken, I can do this” so up I kept going. Past the very last one. A lot of people chickened out and gave up the hike. In they went to the comfy confines of the rest stops. Later I found myself saying “Yes I am a chicken I want a rest stop!” but I had reached the non-existing sign that said ‘You are doomed, no more rest stops beyond this point’. I had to look within for the courage to continue.
Now if you think that the cold is the only thing to contend with, you are in for a surprise. Mount Sinai is 2,285 meters high (7,495 ft) almost half the height of Mount Everest base camp – 5,500 m. Let me give you the science of the predicament I found myself in, at sea level effective oxygen is 20.9% at about 7000 ft it drops to 16%. It was early January the temperature hovered around 5⁰C to -4⁰C. At this altitude the atmospheric pressure is low which decreases the partial pressure of inspired oxygen, and also the pressure for oxygen in the lungs. Basically the low pressure at high altitudes makes it feel like there is a lower percentage of oxygen to breathe. This can negatively affect your lungs, pulmonary circulation, heart, central nervous system, and blood – possibly leading to hypoxia, hypothermia, and such.
All these fancy words are just a way of saying “The climate up there will kill you! Leave…leave now!” Ideally adequate and progressive acclimatization is required before embarking on such climbs. Sadly we did not have the luxury of the time and resources for all that. Plus no one told me it was going to be this cold. They just said “Take a jacket and gloves with you”. What they should have said was “Don’t do it. You will die up there!”
The words you just read sound like something out of the movie “Everest” or “Encounter at the End of the World”. Well this wasn’t a movie, it was reality and I was in it. You know how Holly Wood movies usually have the one black dude that dies in the most horrific way. I felt like I was that black dude. The hot tropical climate of Nigeria that I have known all my life did not prepare me for the minus temperature ranges. My body went into some kind of shock. Like the scary scene in a horror movie when the black guy turns around and sees the monster that had been creeping behind him all along.
My heart was working overtime pounding loudly like a combustion engine. A few steps felt like I walked a thousand miles. My lungs were working overtime. Struggling to breathe in the freezing air that did not seem to exist. Breathing went from difficult to impossible. I had a massive ache where my head used to be. My brain become sluggish like a computer with an over tasked micro processor chip. I began to struggle with basic cognitive functions like walking. I believe I was even hallucinating at some point. Something about my burial ceremony without a body. “He died on the Mount Sinai, they never found his body” I imagined the clergy man saying at my funeral.
In a somewhat semi-unconscious state I heard a voice saying to me “Stay away from the light, don’t go into the light!”
“But the light is so warm and beautiful” I heard myself reply.
Turns out it was actually Jise saying to me “You need to get up…can you hear me…here let me help you” as he reached down and pulled me out of the dark abyss my soul was sinking into. We finally got moving again.
“What was that you said about a light?” Jise asked me.
“Uhm, never mind” I retorted. shamefully.
Jise helped me carry my small back pack. Which at that point felt like a tonne of bricks to me. All I had in it was a bottle of water, my camera. Oh, and the ton of bricks someone had put in there without my knowledge. The low oxygen environment made everything like a Gajillion times harder and heavier. It felt like someone cranked up gravity to the max, walking felt like I was dragging along with me a 747 jet. I imagined the experience must be similar to what Kryptonite does to Super Man. I wasn’t even that out of shape. okay may be just a little. Okay, actually a lot out of shape, there was in fact a massive bulge where my 6 packs used to be. Over the months I had watched helplessly as my 6 packs slowly morphed into a single pack. My high cholesterol diet and lack of exercise had finally caught up with me. Jise on the other hand unlike me was like a 6 foot 13 inch Arnold Swazznegger looking dude. He didn’t seem to get tired at all. I trailed behind him wondering how the weight of two back packs didn’t slow him down.
I can’t believe Moses had to go up the mountain twice! If I were him, I would have beaten those sinful Israelites with the rod screaming “Do you know what I’ve been through!! Do you!! I almost died up there!!”
I think at this point I should tell you about the Bedouins. Ah yes, those wonderful aliens that live among us disguised as humans. Those guys are not human at all; I remember our tour guide said something about centuries of living on the cold low oxygen environment had made them to acclimatize. I think not. They are really aliens with superhuman strength. While I was crawling my way up the mountain gasping for breath with every step, someone/something just ran past me. Hopping from one step to another. I thought “impossible! I must be hallucinating again”.
I mean the guy literally skipped about like a happy mountain goat. He was a Bedouin guide who had had been patiently following us all along. Monitoring us to make sure no one got lost or died on the way. I suspect he ran out patience at my slow pace and decided I was going to die anyhow. So he abandoned us. He was completely unaffected by the cold and lack of oxygen. He just skipped from one rock to another. Like literally. I just stood there with one hand on my knees and the other pointing at him in horror. I had seen it all, “Aliens!” I muttered under my breath.
Somehow I found the will to go on, I had come so far. Plus I didn’t know if I would ever have the opportunity to do this again. Mostly I didn’t know how I could face myself if I gave up. I realized I wasn’t just trying to conquer Sinai but it was really a battle of will. Mind over body. It was John Mason that said “In life the best victory is to conquer yourself”. As I began to ignore the limitations in my mind. My body complied with the spirit within.
So any way, the terrain had become like the scene on ‘Crematoria’ mountain in the movie “Chronicles of Riddick”. Precariously steep with jagged edges is an understatement to describe the scenery. Someone – the alien Bedouins I believe, had carved steps out of the mountain sides. I don’t know how many there were. But after about 10 steps I felt like I would rather eat the rocks of the mountain than climb another step. The steps were winding. Narrow. Uneven and steep. I had to use my hands to climb. All I had was a tiny flash light to light the way. It was at that moment I understood why they made us climb up at night. Now am not scared of heights or anything. But I’ll bet the sight would have made most people quit. The narrow steps seemed to stick out of this spiraling tower of rock that wound all the way to the very top of the mountain. I could make out some form of the terrain from the dim light. It was not pretty. And I was definitely not hallucinating.
After what felt like an eternity, I finally made it to the top of Mount Sinai. It was amazing. Like an outer body experience kind of amazing. There was this Greek orthodox chapel and in the dark it looked like it had somehow morphed out of its rocky surroundings. I raised my head up and the sight my eyes beheld was amazing times infinity. I have never seen the stars sparkling so brightly. There was no visual interference from city lights to diminish their twinkle. They sparkled like diamonds in the night sky. The strange constellation I beheld humbled me to my core. The overwhelming beauty of it all screamed the glory of God’s creation. I thought I had died and was on my way to Heaven. Some other people who had made it to the top were praying – what I suspected was their last prayers. I tried to speak but the words barley came out. I prayed in my heart. To this day I can’t remember what I prayed. I just knew He heard it all before the thoughts even made sense in my head.
At the summit the temperatures were sub-sub zero! There was like literally no oxygen, it was so cold even my camera and phone wouldn’t work. Though back at the hotel I had a full battery charge in both of them. We were warned to rest just a bit, and go back down because it was too cold. Apparently people got hypothermia, and died in their sleep. The Bedouin aliens carrying their frozen corpses away. I definitely did not want my frozen corpse to be carried away by Bedouin aliens. I was glad when we started back down the mountain. Very glad. After a while the air became normal again. Though my feet hurt with every step like a thousand knife wounds. I smiled all the way down.
As we made our descent the sun came up slowly and finally peaked over the distant horizon and I witnessed the curvature of the earth. I was like at eye level with the clouds, and I saw how they shimmered as the sun light tickled them with golden rays turning them from blue to pink and something in between.
So I went up Sinai filled with the excitement of youthful exuberance and I came down with a humbled heart. My senses were intensely overwhelmed, my body by the severe cold and low oxygen. My mind overwhelmed by the beauty of the stars and terrain.
Against all odds I overcame my limitations on Mount Sinai. So, if you’re reading this and experiencing some difficulties and challenges and it seems as if there is a mountain before you, and you’re thinking about giving up. Then know this “It’s not the mountain we conquer, but our selves” – Sir Edmund Hillary.
ArchitectSly 