Show Me Your Chin

En-route Morsana camp. Around 6000 ft.
1st row from left: Ashish Singhania, Rupesh Kumar
2nd row: Digvijay Gupta, Subhendu Barik, Vaibhav Misra, Arunima Sinha, Rajender Rawat, Charanjiv Mohanty
Pic taken by: Souvik Chatterjee

Trekking in the mountains at 6000 Feet is tough. Back-breaking in fact. Extremely taxing on the body; and if there are contoural dangers present; strenuous for the mind as well. We weren't entirely prepared for this. And one hour since we started, we felt our morale dropping. The shoulders started sagging, we took frequent rests, and there was a lot of bickering in our 8-membered team.

We stopped again to take a breath. The instructor, Rajendra Singh Rawat, a mountaineer himself, is angry.

"Do you recognise her?" he asks, pointing at a girl of about 24 who had accompanied us since we left our base-camp an hour ago. I stood aside to let her pass by as I took a closer look at her. She was a pleasant-looking girl, had a friendly gleam in her eyes, walked with a limp, walked slower than the others and seemed to have a very strong chin, something that comes from sheer determination. All this I knew, but I couldn't identify her. She wasn't one of the locals either.

The instructor grumbled, "She doesn't have a leg, has a rod inserted in the other, has spinal complications and has recovered from a life-shattering accident last year. She has started training in the mountains since February. Can't you pick up a lesson from her??"

We were stunned to hear this. No one said a word till we reached our camp at Morsona at 7500 Feet .

By then I had recalled all about her. She was in the news last summer. Arunima Sinha, a national-level volleyball and football player who lost her leg when a train ran over her after she was pushed out of a moving train by some robbers near Bareilly on the night of April 11, 2011. She had resisted a robbery attempt on her. Her left leg was amputated twice, her right leg had compound fractures, there were multiple fractures in the spine and in the pelvic region. She was able to stand on her feet after 96 days.

After we had pitched our tents at Morsona, I get an opportunity to interact with he.

She tells me that its not her amputated leg that troubles her, but the right one with a rod inserted in it. She has acute back pain if her rucksack is too heavy, and has to take frequent halts. She wants to conquer Mt. Everest and these treks that she undertakes with Tata Steel Adventure Foundation (a department of Tata Steel that solely looks after adventure sports for Tata Steel's employees) are training sessions for her. If her body permits, she will make an attempt to scale Everest this summer itself. 

She is a sweet girl, gentle. Speaks freely, in an uninhibited manner. Shows no arrogance, pride, complacence that sports persons tend to have. But there is that strong chin. That determination. The obstinacy.

She has only one complaint. It is about the local media. They tend to follow her everywhere, take videos of her, write reports about her. It distracts her. "Abhi to main kuchh ki bhi nahi hoon aur ye log aisa kar rahe hain... Ye sab ye tab karein jab main Everest ke liye chadhungi... Abhi to sirf practice hi hai... "

"I didn't step into mountaineering for money or publicity. I just couldn't have sat idle after that accident. I wanted to pursue my passion in sports, in adventures. I also wanted to prove that disability can be overcome if you have the belief and passion." She adds before leaving for her tent.

Dusk sets in. So does cold; inside the shirt, shoes and under the skin; tries to touch the heart. I try to grasp the fundamentals of what she had said. Life is tough, has always been; whether in the mountains or in the plains. But, the choices one makes, and the way one conducts oneself to go for his choices are what matter in the end.

I go back to my tent and ask my team mates to read my chin. The stubble, a full growth of a week now, hides the determination part. :P

Post Script:

At times one faces 'moments of truth' in life. Situations which are difficult to tackle. Challenges which are insurmountable, so much so, that the heart asks one to back away. It says that this is too difficult. Impossible. Not worth the trouble.

But that is when the mind takes over. The person grits his teeth, hardens his shaking knees, takes a deep breath, closes his eyes; and jumps into the situation. He takes the challenge head-on. He gives a fight.

You have got to give a fight, whatever the situation. This is one of the major learnings I had in this Adventure Programme I paricipated in. Seems easier written than done though. :-)

Below are some attachments about Arunima Singh and her accident in April, 2011.

File pic.- In AIIMS. April, 2011

A video that contains the entire story as well as an interview of hers.