On mountain updates

Day 5
Yesterday a group of 12 of us 'coached' children cricket at Khumjung school. 'Coached' is a loose term as so many of the children were too young for specific skills training, so that gave way to fun games. To see the joy in their faces was uplifting and as the school was at the bottom of an 'indiana jones' type set of stone steps, it felt like cricket was on some sort of frontier journey. Selecting the 12 people from 50 was a tough task and ultimately we went for those whose behavior still resembled that of who we were visiting - it was a wise choice! At the end we presented a full bag of cricket kit to the school.

Days 1 - 3
The third day in and the first chance to write. Two hours sleep in three days as we went from London to our first trek night meant that I really felt the pace on day 1 when I thought I may be suffering from altitude, fortunately it was only sleep deprivation, but after 18 months planning it is only today on day 3 of the trek I feel relaxed and that we are actually here. My biggest thrill so far was the professionalism of the medical team, I spent a lot of effort recruiting them and to see them not only deliver the goods but gain the trust of the team has been so rewarding. On a personal note I have managed to get lots of stunning film footage with easily the biggest challenge persuading enthusiastic people to ignore the camera!

Result

It is funny trying to get the balance between the offbeat nature of our project and capitalise on its commercial appeal. We've been keen from the start to get partners rather than logos, with Qatar Airways, Met Rx, Medirite and North Face etc we were on the right path.

Now after a long time coming we have secured our title partner, Nokia, and more specifically Nokia Maps. Really chuffed as in the current climate it has been tough, especially consumer sectors like mobile phones. We were determined that we were going to go with a brand who shared our passion and vision and actually had relevancy to our project, and Nokia Maps ticks all of those boxes.

So far it has been a pleasure working with the guys at Mission Media who look after Nokias account. Am especially looking forward to getting a wicked phone now to do some cool funky things on the mountain.

Also a big shout to Bulldog who have come on board as a grooming partner. Again it is going to be a huge positive in the evenings but mainly we've got a huge reception dinner party when we've finshed the expedition and after 18 days on the mountain we're going to need all the help we can get.

Why?

Spent some time properly back on the coal face recently, potential sponsor meetings, admin central, but also two great experiences one seeing the impact one of our charities is having and the other being the impact we can have on school children.

Yesterday I was lucky to visit the Lords Taverners Table Cricket at the Oval. Children with a range of disabilities playing a game that puts cricket in a table tennis environment. It struck me how much excitement that these children were having, and that is the same experience we will hopefully be getting on the mountain. How the world and expectations are relative. It is always a tough question what comes first helping charity or the event? It is a strange one to answer, they kind of come hand in hand. The event is taking advantage of what opportunities we have but in doing so we can create similar opportunities. Ultimately it is an awareness thing, getting the story out there. I spoke with a girl today on MSN Messenger, I'd worked with like 2 years ago, for a few months, I was able to talk about the charity and it's work. The next second £20 in the Lords Taverners account. She through me knows where it is going and that is will bring a smile to someones face the sort of smile she doesn't get too often because she isn't taking advantage of her opportunities, she said that not me.

Today was possibly my highlight so far, holding a talk / Q&A session and Avon House school in East London. They have spent the previous week making prayer flags which we will take to Nepal.

Basically nepali prayer flags are hung outside near everest, a prayer is written on them, every gust of wind takes the dream to the mountain and when the ink has worn off the dream/prayer is said to have happened.

The number of questions, hands up, and so on was phenomenal, as was the in unison 'good morning' response everytime one of use stepped up to speak.

Highlights would be:
Wes: Does anyone know who holds the world record for the 100m?
Year 7 pupil: Yes, my dad
Wes: Guess you win the my dad is better than your dad competition.

James: So does anyone have any wishes
Answer number 3: I wish that there wasn't knife crime
Answer 5: I wish that smokers lungs would get better
Answer number 7 or 8: Yes, I wish that Amy Whinehouse would have to take drugs

Glen: Doing stars jumps with 5 school children on stage

I will write some of the prayers on the flags at a later date, suffice to say they are phenomenally moving.

What I really took away from this morning was how global the issues were on these childrens radars, and how they were issues that dominated their wishes not too many wishes for being Nadal or Hamilton. It shows how much filters through to them at this age. Also how they enjoyed us being there, it is something I remembered from school having people come and talk, and I did love being on the other side of the fence. Their enthusiasm for all things Nepal, Everest and adventure was outstanding, and it was a girl who knew who Andrew Strauss was too!!!

Back to where I was brought up

Haben't blogged for a while, been using Twitter!!!

Had a great weekend at Boconnoc which meant I was able spend some time in Cornwall, where I grew up, before I headed off. Also stoked some of the guys like Glen and Tooves were able to see the stunning cornish coast for the first time.

A small article in the local press

Other peoples comments

I just loved this so much I wanted it on my blog, from JC's recent blog on general progress:
'Other than the usual medical precautions you take on board when doing an adventure like this, we where also informed we better take a test for 'Sudden Death Syndrome'. I think the clue is in the title and it makes you think that if it is so sudden, how do you test for it but I will no doubt find out soon.'

Intergration

I've managed to get my twitter embedded into my blog, quite chuffed, and got it integrated with my blackberry, amd now fully connected and going to be much easier to bore people with progress of the project!

I know this still isn't twitter but...

loved Jamo's 'how to get a west indian cricket name' game today, where you were born + middle name.