Summing up 2021

 

As the sun shines brightly into the last afternoon of 2021, and I am packing my bag to go climbing (for there is no better place to bid someone goodbye then from the mountains), I am penning this post as my last one of 2021.

Actually when I woke up this morning I wondered where did the year go, how did it go, when did it go. Looking back I realize that I couldn’t even recall the year gone by with any kind of clarity but only through a series of gobbled up hazy images. I think I have clarity of only this month. Am I losing it, is my mind heading into a black hole of anonymity! Or have I now become such an adapt at selective memory (something I have practised all my life) that anything more remote than the past 30 days, my mind automatically deletes from conscious memory. Perhaps that’s the reason why I seem to be getting happier, more excited and optimistic day by day.

Without a memory of the past there’s actually nothing to regret about, and that is a blissful state to be. But nevertheless by stretching my mind to some awesome contortions I could come up with the following snippets of 2021. And as someone (a friend/fan/foe/troublemaker) once asked me, why on earth do I write my yearly summing up reports, who the F… cared what I did or didn’t do in a year. And that person (I will not reveal the gender) was absolutely right. Who the F… (including myself) cares? I know I don’t, yet I write. I write this because in some distant future I can always return to these pages and find something amusing/worth pondering/some wisdom from my past, of which I had completely forgotten. So this yearly summing up is purely a record for my own sake. If you came along (as I hope you did, whoever is reading these words) then do join me in my journey. It may not be sanguine, intellectual, amazing or worth your while in any other ways, but I can promise you that it would be funny. So walk with me, climb with me, and most definitely laugh with me. For what is life if not the biggest F…. joke in the world!

I think my biggest personal achievement in 2021 was to offer myself more personal freedom. Now I am nearly 100% free. I gave away all the things that grounded me, both physically and emotionally, put all my means into such a place where someone else is the caretaker and if I were to disappear right now, nothing would really change for anyone (financially at least). I have handed over the keys to my kingdom to someone I trust, who will continue with my projects in progress and even take them to greater heights. Every bit of materialism that I had created, accumulated has been liquidated and distributed. I now have pretty much what I wear and what I carry around the world. And all thanks to the pandemic along with all her (its a she for sure) variants that once again grounded me within Indian shores for most of the months.

As 2021 rolled through winters, spring and summer and then autumn and now into winters again, I kept my climbs, hikes, explorations and gallivanting going mostly through the Indian Himalaya. I discovered many more uncharted and unvisited vista. Did couple of first ascents of 5000m peaks. And despite not meeting many members of the opposite gender, did manage to keep my ‘heartbreaker’ reputation intact to a large degree (or so I have been told by those whose heart I supposedly broke).

Just when the Himalayan climbing season was drawing to its conclusion due to heavy early snow did the outside world open up. Autumn saw me in Russia for a while, guiding on Elbrus and reaching the summit on a rather stormy freezing day, wrapping up the trip with something not so pleasant as I lost a very dear friend and an inspiration to all who knew him. He died due to Covid, but he died after climbing Elbrus (highest peak of Russia), something he had been dreaming for long. May his soul rest in peace and be happy. As I always say, death by itself objectively is neither sad or happy, it is just an incident that is inevitable. What makes it worthwhile or happy or sad is what you did before you died. If you didn’t die before you died and kept pursuing your dreams relentless then death is just a blink. Did you die while living, or did you just die! So cheers to my friend who is up there somewhere raising a toast of champagne with the angels.

By end of June I got my second dose of Covishield vaccine and joined the elite group of world wide people who were and are fully vaccinated (whatever that means). Everyone said it was a new world order freedom. Suddenly I could move around more easily domestically and just when I got back from Russia, Switzerland opened its doors to fully vaccinated Indians. I immediately applied and got my visa the same day (not joking, really it is the fastest Schengen visa I have ever received). As a final 2021 goodbye to the Himalaya, before I left, I went on a kick ass exploratory hike with my friends. It was an epic battle of four days, and what a fun.

And I finally left in November for the Swiss Alps. It was simply homecoming for it is exactly these same mountains that I had first visited way back as my first adventure out of India when I was only 14. Now at 57, I still had my child’s point of view. Since November I have now been to three European nations, climbing, hiking, eating, laughing and just being myself. It’s incredible that despite all my flaws and non-existent social skills, I still have so many friends who genuinely love and care for me. What can I say! I am the luckiest person in the world. They feed me, host me, buy me gifts, shower me with love, care and tenderness, even concern, while not allowing me spend any money and all such things in exchange of my company and some times my cooking and sometimes not even that, just nothing. Such gestures surprise me, humble me and fill me up with immense gratitude, happiness and endless joy. Because in reality I am the richest person on the planet. And my friends know that.

So as I depart for the snowy hills (what else can I call a pointy pyramid reaching only 1000m in altitude) I would say again that there’s no substitute to life and living, there’s no other option once you are born, but to live truly, fully, into the moment without any fear of dying or losing or anything at all. For today or this very moment could be the last that you have. What are you scared of! Don’t believe in what the world says about the pandemic, nothing lasts forever, everything changes.

Live for today, live now in this very moment and choose to be happy no matter what. Let me wish you all a big, bright, bountiful 2022. I will keep seeing you all on the Top.

PS: statistics: countries visited 4, continent 1, international flights 3, distance covered on ground - who the F... cared!!!!