Arunima Sinha - The Woman Atop the Mountain

Authors note: This post was a runner-up in the #SpreadTheVibe contest


You are a twenty four year old woman in India. Against social norms and expectations, you have risen and are today considered a national level sportswoman. You are a few steps away from your lifelong dream - to represent India. It still lingers in the back of your mind as you sit in the train headed for Delhi to attend the exams for joining the Central Industrial Security Force. That is when you feel the tug of the chain at your neck.

You are being robbed and you instinctively rise to defend yourself. In the days to come, people will actually taunt you for that reaction. They will tell you that you were wrong to defend yourself. That you should have just allowed the thieves to have their way with you.
You defend yourself single-handedly as no one comes forward in a crowded train to help you. In the end, you are thrown off the edge. Before you can even rise, another train on the opposite track runs over your foot, mangling it below the knee.
49 trains pass by as you lie there, crying in pain and bleeding away as night turns to dawn. Even when you are discovered, there is no rush to get you to a hospital as bureaucracy and paperwork override your suffering pleas.

By the time you reach the hospital, you already know the fate of that lower limb. And yet, your suffering refuses to end.

Ill-equipped, the hospital apologetically informs you that they have no anaesthesia to provide you even though the surgery needs to be done urgently to prevent gangrene and septicemia. In scenes that you thought existed only in Hollywood horror movies, you are wide awake and aware as your limb is finally severed from your body and even as you lie in the operation theater after it is all over, you watch a stray dog walk into this 'sterile' room and start to feast upon the amputated leg.

Lest you worry that your dignity remain intact, outside the hospital doors, the various government agencies are busy pointing fingers at each other for culpability and eventually decide to point it back at you. Yes, you - the woman who just lost her leg. They imply that you must have voluntarily jumped off the train because you had no ticket or perhaps because you wanted to commit suicide.

This is you now. Your dreams shattered. Your reputation being torn to shreds while you lie in the ICU. A limb lost forever.
It feels like the end of the first act of a horror movie. What would you do?


Here's the ironic thing - as you read this, talks are still ongoing for the above mentioned paragraphs to be the first act of an actual Bollywood movie. Only this is not going to be a story of horror but instead one of inspiration.

For rest assured, Arunima Sinha's story is nothing short of true will power and determination to beat the odds.
With the whole world dismissing her as a tragic victim, Arunima decided that she needed to rewrite her story. And for this, she decided to dream the most impossible dream for a woman who had only one leg (that too, held together with metal implants).

She decided to climb Mount Everest.

Image source: here

Amidst all the cries branding her a lunatic, she would find solace in the encouragement given by Bachendri Pal, the first Indian woman to climb Mount Everest. Prosthesis in place, she would undergo the grueling 18 month training and face multiple near-death experiences with far smaller mountains than her goal.

Her eventual trek up to Mount Everest would be just as eventful as any third and final act of a movie, mind you.
The prosthetic limb kept swiveling around as she climbed, causing her to lose her grip on several occasions. At the notorious Camp Four/Death Zone of Everest, she would bear the sight of hundreds of dead bodies of unsuccessful fellow climbers, including people she had known. And yes, for an iconic final twist, as she neared the peak, she would be informed that she did not have enough oxygen to climb down so it would be wiser to abandon the dream for now as she would surely die if she kept climbing upwards.

This is you now. Your dreams once more about to be shattered. Your body hanging once more off the edge. Once more, I ask you - what would you do?

Arunima disregarded her Sherpa and made it to the top of Mount Everest on 21st May, less than two years after she was thrown off the edge of the train. She took a few pictures and videos of herself after hoisting the Indian flag at the peak, determined that there should be proof of her victory, even if she died.

She was prepared to die for this photograph to exist.

She did not die though. For once, lady luck shone her way. There, on the summit of Mount Everest of all places, as her own oxygen cylinders ran out, she found an extra cylinder. And 52 days after she started her climb up the mountain, Arunima made the precarious trek downwards with that one cylinder, till she reached her safe haven finally.


Arunima Sinha became the first female amputee to scale Mount Everest.
Since that day in 2013, she has just putting new targets in front of her and obliterating them as she swishes them aside. Her impossible dream complete, Arunima could just as well sit and soak in the laurels of her Wonder Woman-esque achievement. But that just would not be her.

In 2014, she was one of the most loved speakers at INKTALKS 2014, receiving a long and well-deserved standing ovation from every person in that room when she finished telling her story.
I know... I was there in that crowd.

2015

Women Innovators for Excellence in Research

& Science (Winner 2015)

Link: here

Among many other awards that she received, 2015 was the culmination of a tale of redemption unlike anything India had ever seen. It was the year that Arunima Sinha was finally awarded the Padma Shri by the Government of India. 

And yet, for this woman, there were still new highs to attain in 2015 -

• Her book "Born Again on the Mountain" launched by the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi went on to become a national bestseller in 2015.
• She still continues to passionately fight for the poor and differently-abled, donating all financial aids she gets towards their well being and in hopes of starting a sports academy for them. 
• And yes, she stills aims for those mountainous highs - On December 25th 2015, as you and I awoke to Christmas gifts, the woman thrown off the train and left to die on a seedy railway track successfully climbed Mount Aconcagua, the highest peak of South America. 

The highest peaks in Asia (Everest), Africa (Kilimanjaro), Europe (Elbrus) and Australia (Kosciuszko) have all been hosts to Arunima's presence as well. 5 peaks down, only North America & Antarctica left to traverse. All this in less than 4 years after the incident.  

You cannot tell the story of the rise without acknowledging the pain of the fall.

This story began with a literal fall. But the true lesson is not in the fall or the evil of mankind.

It is in the rise of Arunima Sinha.
The rise that should inspire you never to give up, no matter how impossible the odds.
To be ready to change your dreams if necessary but keep persevering for excellence.
To be ready to accept the consequences of your fall and begin your rise once more to be born again on the mountain.

Above all else, I still remember the one question she posed to us during her speech at INKTALKS and I think it is something that really affected me and hopefully will have a similar impact on you too, especially now that you know her story - "So what excuse do you have for not reaching your goals?"

Image source: Arunima Sinha (Twitter)

Author's note:
I am writing this for Indiblogger's & YouthKiAwaaz #SpreadTheVibe to share an inspiring tale.