IdleRich

IdleRich
Weirdly we got into watching videos about climbing k2 a few years ago - particularly that event where seventeen people died I'm afraid. They fucked up (various people possibly at fault) and loads of them got split up and lost at night and couldn't get down but some of them could still radio - this really dark bit where this Dutch guy couldn't locate the team 1000m below but could phone his wife in NL and say goodbye to her... he actually survived but lost a foot and some fingers I think. There was this heroic sherpa who went up into almost certain death and brought soneone down on his back - and then did it again and again.
Many interesting stories though, the German guy who got so near the top 50 years or so before anyone made it but stopped and went back for some trivial reason cos he thought he could go back the next day - but something happened and he didn't.
Also this weird one where some guy got lost on his own for ages but they found him after a few days and were like "Hey man we're here to rescue you" but he was mental from altitude sickness and he said "It's cool guys, I'm just chilling, let me stay a few days and I'll see you on Weds" so they went back down and left him and he just sat there and died.
In fact even the first one who did climb it there was some controversy about him abandoning the guy who brought them the oxygen cylinders so they could make the final charge. I think they got him to throw up the oxygen and hid or something and he had to stay outside all night cos climbing 10m down might have compromised them or something. Also some people think using oxygen was cheating anyway.
K2 known as The Savage Mountain cos of something one failed climber said on his return. Also loads of stuff about it had no name cos it's not visible from anywhere and no-one ever named it, you gotta somehow get to this village in the middle of nowhere and then walk for literally weeks to get to the bottom, in fact just to see it, and apparently some people do that and then they see it and go fuck that and turn round.
Also watched a documentary about the first team to climb Anapurna One by the hardest route - they were a load of part timers from Manchester and they were all smoking as they climbed looking like a bunch of brickies. Always think of that when I go into a Nepalese restaurant which will inevitably be named after a Himalayan peak.
Weird how this stuff is something I think I'm not interested in at all but one time suddenly went crazy and watched every single documentaru available on the topic.
Buried in the Sky also a great name for a documentary.
 
Last edited:

version

Well-known member
Weird how this stuff is something I think I'm not interested in at all but one time suddenly went crazy and watched every single documentaru available on the topic.
That's exactly what happened to me a few weeks ago. I watched four in two days and ended up researching K2 and various other peaks. Perhaps the mountains were communicating with us like Lovecraft's Great Old Ones.
 

version

Well-known member
A few weeks back, maybe a month or so. I watched Touching the Void, Free Solo, Meru, The Dawn Wall and a bunch of YouTube clips then started pulling up pictures and Wiki pages. I actually planned to watch that K2 doc too, but didn't get round to it.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
There is something fascinating and kinda affecting when I think of soneone in a tent on their own in the 'death zone' in the dark... almost kinda romantic... I dunno.
No-one has to be there, they could be at home in a nice warm bed or in a pub.
There was this Norwegian woman who was part of this adventure team with her husband and they did all this amazing stuff... but he was one of the ones who died climbing k2... and then a year or two later she was walking to the north pole on her own. What drives these people? I prefer squash or footie.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
A few weeks back, maybe a month or so. I watched Touching the Void, Free Solo, Meru, The Dawn Wall and a bunch of YouTube clips then started pulling up pictures and Wiki pages. I actually planned to watch that K2 doc too, but didn't get round to it.
Ah this was like three years back for me.
 

version

Well-known member
There is something fascinating and kinda affecting when I think of soneone in a tent on their own in the 'death zone' in the dark... almost kinda romantic... I dunno.
I like what Burial said about lights in the mountains:

"I was once in these mountains, you’d see these fires, other people sleeping out in the mountains, traders across the border, and that gives you this feeling, night time, awareness of other people sleeping. But all it is just a fire light. You see their firelight and you know they are there, that’s all you need. That’s what ties cities to places that aren’t together, deserts, forests, people. You watch over your city or area at night, you see the distant lights, fires burning in other places."
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
When I can't sleep I try to imagine myself in some place like maybe as a stone falling to the bottom of a lake under a mountain. Or in a cave on a hillside, or finding shelter in a decrepit mansion in an abandoned city. It never really works but it feels like it should. I don't know why what you just said reminded me of that but somehow it did - not so much the stone one, but the other stuff, something about weird comfort in bare essentials, that if you're cold and hungry and wet most of the time then being warm and dry and full would be a greater luxury than I ever feel in my comfy feather bed that is always there... and now you say it, knowing that other people are managing the same, is somehow a nice thought that I feel should reassure me and stop me tossing and turning.
 

version

Well-known member
He talks about something a bit like that too:

Burial: I wanna be out of here. I respect working hard but I dread a day job. Or a job interview. I’ve got a truant heart, I just want to be gone. I’d be in the kitchens, the corridors at work, and I’d be staring at the panels on the roof, clocking all the maintenance doors, dreaming about getting into the airducts.

Wire: Looking for a space away from other people?

Burial: Kind of. A portal. As a kid I used to dream about being put in the bins, escaping from things, without my mum knowing she’d put me out in the bins. So I'm in a black plastic bag outside a building, and hearing the rain against it, but feeling alright, and just wanting to sleep, and a truck would take me away. It's stupid,
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Can't believe football is over again... we played three times and the first two I was too hungover to run. One proper game and it's over!
 
Top