Sean Swarner and the Cancer Hospital in Bhaktapur - March 19-March 25, 2002

In May 2002, Sean Swarner hopes to be the first cancer patient/survivor to climb Mt. Everest. For the last year, my company has worked to help make it happen. With all the right connections in Nepal, we have put together a one-man Everest expedition -- now in progress.

The day after arriving in Nepal I met Sean's personal climbing guides, Gombu and Kami, wonderful and amazing men, with climbing resumes that literally touch the sky. Kami has climbed Everest four times and Gombu has climbed Everest seven times! Gombu has also climbed Cho Oyu twice, Ama Dablam twice, Annapurna, Manaslu and K-2! That's five of the world's tallest peaks and the world's most beautiful mountain, Ama Dablam. Sean got lucky.
National Geographic is also involved in an Everest Expedition this year with famous names such as Peter Hillary, son of Sir Edmond Hillary, the first man to scale Everest in 1953. Also Jamling Norgay, son of Tensing Norgay, the first Sherpa to summit Everest with Hillary. Also Brent Bishop, son of Barry Bishop, the first American to summit Everest in 1963. National Geographic is making a movie featuring these men who will be climbing "in their father's footsteps". Jamling is part of the team but will not be climbing. I guess his wife helped with that decision.
The man I am working with in Nepal, Wongchu Sherpa, led and organized the Everest IMAX movie in 1996 and was an important part of the rescue efforts during the storm that killed so many people that year. Wongchu and his company have organized Sean's expedition. They are also working with National Geographic to help with the filming on the mountain – Wongchu's specialty. He and I have worked closely over the last year to make sure everything will be as smooth as possible for Sean.

There are seven expeditions this season. Wongchu said some years there have been thirty-three or more.
During the week before Sean and his brother, Seth, arrived, I began an Of Global Interest Random Act of Kindness project. In the past year, I have collected $1,000 to spend on random acts of kindness in Nepal. Since Sean is a cancer survivor I thought it would be appropriate to visit the Cancer Hospital in Bhaktapur. I was looking for children with cancer. I wanted to find five families and give them each $100.
Wow, I wanted to cry imagining Sean standing there among the patients. The doctors and I made a plan to meet the families of the four children who are receiving treatment at the hospital and one older woman who is very poor. The money may help a little, but Sean's presence will help more.
Finally Saturday arrived and Sean and Seth were in Nepal. We raced first to the hotel and then to Wongchu's office where the climbing Sherpas anxiously waited to finally meet Sean. Thankfully, everyone was just as impressed as I was the first time I met Sean. The Sherpas were uncertain of what a cancer survivor looked like and were happy to see a strong man in the office that day.

Sean is a healthy 28 years old. When he was 13 he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease and later the doctors discovered a golf ball-size Askin's tumor on his lung. Sean is the only known person to have had both diseases, and obviously, the only person to have survived both. TWICE while he was sick from age 13 to 18, the doctors gave him only a few weeks to live. He is lucky and today grateful. He has been in remission for nine years.
Now through his nonprofit CancerClimber Association, he is determined to change the attitude toward cancer to one of adventure and adrenaline. He hopes to inspire anyone in a hospital bed to dream big and climb out of the hospital bed. He wants to demonstrate that there is life after cancer – one of the more noble reasons to climb Mt. Everest. Sean has been living in Colorado and training seriously for this climb for the past year. He was ready.
Seth, Sean's younger brother, would also trek to base camp and stay during the entire time, posting live updates about his brother's progress on their website. We chatted for a while in Wongchu's office and learned how the base camp radios worked. We even met the executive producer for the National Geographic movie. How did he, in his early twenties, get that job?
After our meeting we raced downtown through the busy market area to Dur Bar Square, the ancient center of the city. Here several large temples stand with pagoda style roofs towering into the sky. In one temple lives the Kumari.
Kumari is the living goddess, a young girl maybe 5 years old who is believed to give the Nepali king his power. Worshiping the Kumari is a practice that has survived in Kathmandu for thousands of years (despite several civil rights activist groups). Kumari lives in her temple on the main square and only comes out in her chariot for festivals. Her feet are never to touch the ground.

I've been to Nepal several times but have only seen the Kumari twice. She showed her face almost the instant Sean and Seth and I walked into the courtyard of her temple. A glimpse of Kumari is considered auspicious, and there she was looking down at us from the second floor window.
We walked down Freak Street, the old hippy stomping grounds of the 1960's. After passing through a few more narrow busy streets, we soon found the small golden temple for Ganesh, the Hindu elephant god. This particular temple is where the locals come to worship before going on a long journey. Sean thought it was appropriate but he asked, "What do I do?" I said, "Just do what feels right," and he did. He waited his turn as the locals were bustling around him. Finally he kneeled inside the small doorway of the temple where an image of the lucky Elephant god was carved in stone. When he stood up he wore a red tika mark on his forehead to ward off evil spirits. Perfect!
Then we raced back through the busy streets to be back at the hotel by 7PM in order to meet Wongchu and Gombu. They came to check all Sean's climbing gear. Soon their hotel room looked like a Himalayan church bazaar with jackets, sleeping bags, ice axes, crampons, gloves, boots, mittens, and more, all over the beds, all over the floor, all over the room. It was amazing to see what came out of the four red duffle bags they had. The Sherpas looked carefully like specialized scientists, wondering, discussing, questioning, testing, measuring, mixing Nepali and Sherpa languages to determine whether each item was good enough for the Everest climb. Most everything passed inspection, however there were a few things for the shopping list.
The next morning we were up early. Pemba the trekking guide, met us with a car and we drove to Syambu Nath for a quick visit. Syambu is a Buddhist temple area that is crawling with monkeys – thus its second name: The Monkey Temple. We climbed the 365 steps to the top for a good view of the Kathmandu Valley. That afternoon we drove to the Cancer Hospital in Bhaktapur to meet the patients. The doctors gave us a tour of the hospital first, saying that most of the patients couldn't get out of bed. As we toured each room, where 9 or 10 beds each separated by a thin green curtain filled the cold concrete space, we saw the Nepali faces and personalities living with cancer.

In Nepali the director of the hospital explained Sean's story to the patients. His voice became louder when he said, "This man is a survivor -- and you will be too!" The patients looked surprised. Then the doctor said, "He is leaving tomorrow to climb Mt. Everest." I could hardly stop my eyes from blinking to hold back tears. The patients smiled. Sean was good news to them. He was HOPE incarnated.
Sean brought a special T-shirt his father had given to him when he first became sick. On the front of the shirt it said, "I don't always look like this." And on the back it said, "I'm on chemo." Sean thought the shirt might bring good luck to someone at the hospital as it had brought to him. He gave it to a boy who was currently on chemotherapy. The boy promised that if he got better, he would pass the shirt on to someone else in need. After the tour we met with all the doctors in the director's office. The four families of the four children and the one poor woman were invited in separately. We gave a bright pink envelope with $100 (in rupees) to each patient, a gift from the Of Global Interest Random Acts of Kindness Fund.
One small boy had cancer of the eye. His right eye was totally swollen, maybe a large tumor. It was sad. His father deserted him then his mother and now his grandmother held him and received the money. She was alone and took care of the boy even though she was old and frail. Each patient had a story. Medication and health care is expensive and hard to find in Nepal. Many of these patients traveled great distances to come to this hospital. For each of the twenty-five patients receiving care, there were many more in the villages and countryside who were not. These were the lucky ones.
After visiting the patients we drove to Boudanath, the huge Buddhist stupa in Kathmandu with the famous Nepali eyes painted on the tower overlooking the city. It is a quiet place, the home and pilgrimage site for Tibetan Buddhists, mostly refugees from Tibet. We walked around the stupa and watched Buddhists, young and old, performing full prostrations on the ground in devotion to Buddha.

Soon we were back at the hotel. There was still a lot to do before our 8AM flight to Lukla the next morning. We would be on the trail to Mt. Everest the next day.

Heather O'Neal
Of Global Interest LLC
www.ofglobalinterest.com

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