Kathmandu, May 25, 2006

Lhakpa Sherpa, the first woman to have scaled Mt Everest six times, is all set to set a new record by scaling the world’s highest peak from the North Col (Tibetan side) and descending through the South Col (Nepali route) next year.

There is nothing women cannot achieve, she said, urging all women to dream big and realise their dreams. “I hope to become the first woman in the world to have climbed Everest from the North Col and descended through the South Col.

There is hardly any difference between men and women. I left the men far behind while climbing Mt Everest on May 11 from the North Col,” she said at a press conference organised by the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA) to felicitate Lhakpa and American climber George Dijmarescu, the only foreigner to have scaled Everest eight times.

Calling on women not to confine themselves, Lhakpa said she used to run a Tongba shop and had to struggle a lot to realise her dream of climbing Everest because “people used to disregard my dream of climbing Everest by refusing to give me a break.” “I would continue climbing,” Lhakpa, who has been training women on ice climbing in an institution at the Sunny Mountain Guide, Colorado, USA, said.

Felicitating Lhakpa and Dijmarescu, Ang Tshering Sherpa, the NMA president, said, “I am happy that Lhakpa made it to the top of the world six times.

I can’t believe she is the same girl who came to me in 1998 asking me to give her an opportunity to climb Everest.”

Nation’s docs on three-day strike

The hospitals and nursing homes throughout the nation went on three-day strike today suspending all work except emergency service to protest the vandalism in Everest Nursing Home in Kathmandu and Lumbini Zonal Hospital in Butwal and asked the government to ensure the security of medical professionals.

Dr Sudha Sharma, chairperson of the Nepal Medical Association (NMA), said there appeared to be some lapses in the treatment at Everest Nursing Home, adding that action in such cases is taken by the Nepal Medical Council only after an inquiry committee is set up and its report submitted. “To err is human.

In case of Everest Nursing Home the patient was admitted in a state of shock and collapse. In such cases the patient can die though the doctors do their best,” claimed Dr Sharma. “The government should ensure the security of the medical staff,” she added.

Everest Nursing Home in a press conference today said the patient died as he was admitted in a critical state.

Dr Ramesh Chokhani, who had been treating the patient for years, said 69-year-old Tulasi Ram Gautam was a chronic asthma patient. “He was even suggested that it was necessary to have an oxygen cylinder at his home,” said Dr Chokhani.