The Red Bulletin December 2020 (UK)

Nims Purja
Annapurna, April 2019
More than 30 per cent of climbers who attempt to summit the world’s
10th highest mountain perish. Avalanche risk forced Purja’s team to
ascend along a rarely-traversed route called the ‘Dutch Rib’ (pictured).
to boarding school, where, by his own
estimation, he excelled.
“I used to be top five; I could have
been first, but I’d finish a two-hour exam
in an hour so I could be first to leave the
test room. But I didn’t want to be a
doctor or an engineer, I had two options:
one was to be the Robin Hood of Nepal,
seeing off those rich people who don’t
pay tax – you know, politicians and all
that – and distributing that money to the
poor.” He chose option two: the Gurkhas.
“Getting in was tough. In my time,
32,000 young Nepalese applied and only
320 made it. I started training at 15, in
a hostel. I’d wake up at 3am and run with
weights strapped to my legs. I had no clue
what that did, but I used to go back to bed
at 5am and pretend I hadn’t left. I passed
the selection on my second attempt.”
Purja’s time in the armed forces – he
joined the Gurkhas in 2002 and moved
to their UK Infantry Training Centre in
Catterick (he now lives in Hampshire),
and the SBS in 2009 – is one he is deeply
proud of, but for every detail he isn’t
willing to reveal (“What I can say is I
have been shot; I have been into the most
sensitive operations across the globe.”),
he is candid about one aspect: “I had
what others didn’t have – I could climb
an 8,000m peak in two weeks. When
I got leave I’d empty my savings and go
climb.” Indeed, when Purja finished
partying after his five-day tour of
Everest, Lhotse and Makalu in 2017,
he had to go straight back to work.
“I was supposed to get a heli ride to
a Special Forces mission, but the heli
didn’t come because of the weather, so
I ran all the way from base camp – six
days’ worth of trekking in 18 hours,
NIRMAL PURJA/PROJECT POSSIBLE
36 THE RED BULLETIN