The Sherpa of Midtown

Deep in a valley amidst the man-made mountains of Manhattan, lives a man who has climbed with the likes of Peter Hillary and David Breashears, who has reached the summits of Everest and Kilimanjaro many times, and who has worked with National Geographic and the Everest Imax Film crew. He works in a 5th Avenue gift shop, and he is a Himalayan Sherpa.

Standing among “I heart New York” t-shirts, miniatures of the Statue of Liberty, coffee mugs, fiber optic wands, snow globes, and magnets, Lakpa Gelje Sherpa tells me of his globetrotting adventures.

He was born in 1971 in Nepal, a small country deep in the Himalaya Mountains of central Asia. In 1996 Lakpa joined the elite group of climbers that his Sherpa culture produces. The job of a Sherpa climber is not for the faint of heart or the inexperienced. They are the first assault team on the slopes of Mount Everest. They free climb the mountain and lay the paths and the ropes for the comparatively novice westerners who follow in their footsteps.
The Sherpas are the ones who bear the burdens when the climb begins; with their altitude acclimated lungs, sure feet, and strong backs, they leap up the world’s most unforgiving mountain while others crawl.

When someone needs rescuing, it is the Sherpas who undergo the challenging trek to recover them, daily laying their lives on the line to protect their clients. The Sherpas are some of the most noble and adventurous people in the world, annually ascending to a peak which the world aspires to. So what was this one, who had at least 5 Everest summits under his belt, as well as Kilimanjaro and peaks throughout the Himalayas, doing in a kitschy gift shop in Manhattan?
A tourist walks in, ducking out of the endless torrent of people rushing by the tiny shop. He looks around, a blank expression on his face as he examines the New York propaganda. His slogan covered t-shirt isn’t enough and he wants a new one, he hearts New York. Lakpa exchanges the shirt for the man’s cash with his grizzled rope worn hands. Dark eyes which have apprehended the world from its very peak follow the tourist as he shuffles off to join the queue for a view off the top of the Empire State Building. What causes a man to leave his job, his wife, and his son in the mountains of Nepal to sell T-shirts to fat Americans?

It isn’t for lack of friends. Lakpa considers the legendary climber, filmmaker, and author, David Breashears to be a father to him. The Bostonian adventurer has taken Lakpa with him on climbing expeditions around the world, ascending the peaks of Africa, India, China, and the United States.

Through Breashears he has had the opportunity to be part of the Imax film about Everest, an Emmy Award winning documentary. He has climbed with the son of legendary adventurer, Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to reach the summit of Everest. Through Peter Hillary, David Breashears, and his many climbing expeditions, Lapka has rubbed shoulders with all the best climbers the world has to offer.

It was Breashears that helped him get his visa to work in New York at the gift shop, owned by a friend of his from Nepal. But the question remains, what is such an accomplished and extraordinary climber doing at work among the vapid and empty walls of a New York gift shop?

I was struggling for an answer to this bizarre street paradox, American pop music blaring above me through tinny speakers, tourists with bright t-shirts perusing painted clay mugs, and an internationally seasoned climber spilling his story to me in broken English.

How do these people get lost in translation? Why is it that the people who forge the path up the mountain get a generic footnote in the adventure books and end up working in gift shops, while the people who pay them to pull them uphill in a sled go on speaker circuits to discuss their heroic adventures? What gives?

Let me give you a hint: Beijing Olympic Games 2008.