After blind climber Erik Weihenmayer of Golden wowed the world with his record-breaking ascent of Everest in 2001, he got a letter from Tibet. It was from a blind globetrotter and adventurer named Sabriye Tenberken who had opened a school for blind kids in Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, where the blind are shunned. The students were fascinated with the mountaineer who had climbed the world’s highest peak without sight. Would he come for a visit?
Even better, answered Weihenmayer: Let’s go for a climb.
In the fall of 2004, the famous mountaineer led a team of accomplished climbers, a film crew and six blind Tibetan teenagers to the base of Everest. They planned an audacious ascent of 23,000-foot Lhakpa Ri, on the north side of Mount Everest. Seemingly as impossible as the Himalayas are high, the expedition was wrought with danger, victories and inspiration. The award-harvesting movie, “Blindsight” (showing at the Starz FilmCenter) weaves a majestic, provocative yarn that goes so much further than the typical man-vs.-mountain theme that clogs the adventure- film landscape. We talked with Weihenmayer about his experiences in making the movie — and shepherding his blind teenage charges.
Q: Were you glad to see the expedition’s conflicts and tensions included in the film?A: That adversity is really what makes the film so great. I’ve seen the film like five times and each time I walk away with real big questions in my head. That, I think, is the hallmark of a good film. As a mountaineer and expedition leader, I’m juggling a lot of responsibility. Usually on these trips, everyone has similar experiences. We were bringing inexperienced kids into the mountains and not only that, we had a film crew, which always creates tension. All the natural tension that happens on an expedition gets bigger with wild cards, and there were a lot of wild cards on this trip.
Q: The teachers in charge of the blind kids weren’t necessarily focused on reaching the summit. How did you balance that with your mountaineer’s drive to reach the top?
A: I said, “Let’s go on a mountain expedition,” and that meant something different for everyone on the team. The big mountains don’t have to be a dangerous place, but they could potentially be a dangerous place. The best way to stay safe is to stay focused. As an expedition leader, my goal was to create a safe, successful experience while others were hammering, like, “Let’s just have fun.” I said it’s fun in a different way. If we were just going to sit around a campfire and sing songs, I wouldn’t have brought them up Everest.
Q: What did you walk away with after this expedition?
A: It’s not so black and white. If I could do this experience over again, I think I’d do it the same way again. This trip taught me a really different lesson. A summit is different for everyone, and this expanded my definition of what a summit is. While the summit is the whole experience, everyone has different ways of reaching their summits. They are all equal; they are just different.
Q: What do you think the climb did for the kids?
A: The kids now are just doing so well. They are flourishing. The outdoors is such a good teacher. So many adversities in life will crush you, just flatten you. And in a place where the culture says you have evil spirits inside you because you are blind — oh, it’s just so much tougher. In a mountain experience, you learn trust and the systems you need to be successful and you push through a lot of adversity. And that adversity can be the very thing that becomes a fuel in your life.
Q: That one kid’s mom says a man without eyes is not a man. Was the brutal treatment of the blind as outcasts in Tibet — as possessed by evil or being punished because of sins in a previous life — shocking for you?
A: It’s not necessarily a problem just in Tibet. It is, in some degrees, a problem in the world. Who slips to the bottom? If somebody can’t contribute, if they can’t go out and watch the yaks or gather yak dung for fuel, you are at a big deficit as a family. It is not necessarily an indictment against Tibet. Under the right situation, this could happen anywhere.
Q: Proceeds from “Blindsight” are helping to fund several different projects, right?
A: We’ve already been able to raise about $200,000 for (Braille Without Borders). They are building a school in southern India where blind people will come from all over the world to learn how to start their own Braille Without Borders school and go back to their own countries and serve.
Jason Blevins: 303-954-1374 or jblevins@denverpost.com
