Climbing mountains in a man’s world is something most women do every day in a figurative sense, but these women have taken on the physical challenge to explore new summits and defy society's expectations. With International Women’s Day on the 8th of March, celebrating iconic female travellers who have done the remarkable will hopefully inspire you to take on a new adventure.
Junko Tabei was the first woman to summit Mount Everest on May 16, 1975. She defied cultural and sexist ideas of womanhood; in an interview with the Japan Times, she explained her struggle: “Back in 1970s Japan, it was still widely considered that men were the ones to work outside, and women would stay at home." Tabei sadly passed away from cancer in 2016, aged 77, but her legacy of inspiring women to take on an adventure remains.
Japanese patriarchal expectations led her into teaching, having studied English and American literature at Showa Women’s University in Tokyo, but her true passion was mountaineering. In 1962, she joined several men’s mountaineering groups, where she met her husband, Masanobu Tabei, during an expedition of Mount Tanigawa, a mountain known for its perilous summit. Junko became a pioneer for the inclusion of women’s mountaineering and took a stand in a man-dominated arena, she formed the Joshi-Tohan climbing group for women only in 1969. By 1975, the group aspired to take on Everest. They were faced with many challenges surrounding funding, having been repeatedly told that it was not a women’s place. The team members even had to take to their own sewing machines to make critical pieces of gear!
The expedition began with a nearly fatal avalanche on May 4, but determined to continue, Tabei reached the summit on May 16. Since this achievement, Tabei returned to university to take a postgraduate degree in environmental science, advocating for the upkeep of the mountain environment since the commercialisation of climbing Everest. She also set new records, becoming the first woman to climb the highest peaks on seven continents, finishing in 1992. Though she was diagnosed with cancer in 2012, she continued to climb and continue to share her passion. She took a group of young people affected by the Fukushima nuclear disaster on an expedition to Mount Fuji the year she died. Her amazing legacy has and continues to inspire other women and girls to defy expectations.
"I climbed Everest because I wanted to prove girls could do anything," – Malavath Poorna (TEDx talk).
Malavath Poorna became the youngest girl to reach the summit of Mount Everest in 2014, aged just 13. She got the opportunity to learn rock climbing at school. Her first step, which she describes as her greatest challenge, was climbing Bhongir Rock in Telangana State. She learned rock climbing training, which she excelled at and became the top of her cohort. Out of the 110 students, twenty were selected for the next stage. She advanced to train in Darjeeling. The advanced basic course took place over twenty days, during which she learned how to climb on snow and ice terrain. She took part in climbing the Ranauk Peak in Darjeeling, a mountain of 17000 feet. Experiencing the snow felt like heaven to Malavath. Out of the twenty selected, nine were selected for the next level of training in Ladakh. They spent fifteen days learning how to adapt to the cold, with temperatures as low as -35 degrees. Two were then selected to scale Mount Everest: Anand Kumar and Malavath Poorna.
After three months of specialist training, she was ready to take on Everest. By April 14th, 2014, she had reached base camp but then heard the news that seventeen Sherpas had died during an avalanche. She was determined to keep going. It took another eight hours to reach camp 1. Each person on the expedition held six cylinders of oxygen, which is equivalent to 24kg. By May 24, they had reached Camp 3, nicknamed the ‘death zone’ due to the high numbers of fatalities due to altitude sickness. She describes being very scared when approaching the summit, as she was surrounded by dead bodies. However, she continued to stay determined, remembering her coach, friends, and parents, as well as being determined to prove that girls can do anything. She reached the top on May 25, 2014, where she placed an Indian flag. Her message is to take the first step, as overcoming the first step is the part that holds the most fear.
In 2013, Raha Moharrak became the youngest Arab and first Saudi woman to climb Mount Everest. According to CNN, she said that "convincing them [her family] to let her climb was as great a challenge as the mountain itself!" Her father at first opposed it, holding more conservative views, but she challenged these and went on to climb the mountain, eventually gaining his approval. She was the youngest Saudi to reach the summit, as well as the first Saudi woman. She hopes to challenge perceptions in her own country about women and to ensure she is not the last Saudi woman to conquer Everest. She continues to explore and travel the world, documenting her adventures on Instagram.
I hope these stories inspire you to climb your own mountains too and celebrate the women in your lives who make that first step a bit easier.
