A night not in Sugapa

Dori Schmidt towers over the Moni Tribe

The Moni tribe occupy the village of Sugapa. Most are barefoot. Their wide feet have spread out to half again that of our own. Some wear western clothes, gym shorts or T-shirts endorsing sports teams they cannot possibly understand. Others are nearly naked, a few men wear the traditional penis gourd.

The penis gourd combines the simplicity of the fig leaf with the pride of Trojan battle armor, resulting in a gift to fashion that somehow implies the present to be larger than the package it comes in.

Several men and women sit atop the hill just inside the crude wooden fence that defines the yard of the "hotel" we are shown to. They stare at us and comment to one another in a language we do not understand. I imagine they are discussing which among us would look best in a penis gourd. Sometimes they smile at us. We smile back. We have been encouraged to be extra friendly. Our team cook and coordinator of the Porters, Jeremy, is negotiating wages with those looking to join our expedition. Jeremy is from Jakarta. He speaks several dialects of the local tribes, as well as excellent English. The careful balance of power he seeks to establish does not allow him to smile when dealing with the locals. Otherwise Jeremy always wears a warm smile and encourages the rest of us to do the same. "Remember," he reminds us, "always smile." Finally a price is agreed to. Each Porter carrying a 37 pound load will receive $70 a day for his efforts whether the team is moving or not. This is a VERY good wage relative to anything else these people can do to earn a buck. A man can work two expeditions a year and nearly support his family on that alone. 

A new problem arises. The traveling ballot boxes for the upcoming election will be in Sugapa just two days, on July 17 and 18. If the expedition runs long the Porters will miss their chance to vote. Jeremy and our local lead guide, Steven (also from Jakarta) reassure the Porters of the fitness of our team and their confidence we will return no later than July 17. The Porters are dubious. A local Official is summoned. He assures the Porters they will get to vote one way or another. This video shows the scene. 

 The shack in this video is our hotel. The floor is wooden instead of the more typical dirt, making this a 4 star hotel by Papuan standards. We are fine with this. It beats pitching a tent for the night. We eat some Ramen Noodles and discuss how we will configure the sleeping bags. We are asked to not leave the yard area and go off exploring. But soon our guides become itchy and decide to move the team on to camp 1, the village of Sunama. They allude again to safety considerations. The motorcycle boys are called in to jumpstart this move. 


There are no roads into Sugapa. The only motorized transportation is motorscooters flown in by cargo plane. These are largely concentrated in the hands of young local men who go out of their way to throw a pose of dashing mystique while hiring out as taxis for people clutching live chickens. The Motorcycle Boys were hired to give each of us a ride to the end of the dirt road 15 kilomoters away. It was exciting. It might have worried me to be a passenger wearing a full pack on the back of a small scooter driven by a man I could throw 15 kilometers, but I had already seen families of four weaving through traffic on a single motorscooter in Timika. But things did not go well for all of us. Dale's driver, who probably did not realize he weighed more than an Indonesian family of four, came into a corner a little hot and lost control. The dusty crash which followed left Dale scratched up and bruised. But he was still keen to press on, so our marshalled band set out up the trail to Sunama. 

Soon it is nightfall and the rains begin. We don waterproof layers and headlamps, then continue up the trail into dense jungle. Our course traverses steep hillsides, descending occasionally to cross a river. Our pace is fast. The trail is narrow. We fumble to keep up with one another in our clunky rubber boots. A few team members fall off the trail and have to scramble on hands and feet back up to it. The air is so saturated with humidity that my breath clouds like a steam engine before me. It feels like we are being herded.Between the warmth of the air and the heat my body was generating I became far too hot inside my rain shell. Realizing I was as wet with sweat inside of it as I was wet from rain outside, I removed the coat and stuffed it into my pack. If I was going to be wet I might as well be cooler. 


After 3 hours we arrived at the village of Sunama, a tiny collection of huts on a hillside. Dreading the notion of then having to set up tents in the mud, I was pleased to see ready shelter for night. We were led into a 13 x 13 wooden shack, all fourteen of us and our soaked gear. Dale was last to arrive. He immediately stretched out his sizable personage on the floor and commenced groaning. Dale complained of various difficulties which seemed to stem from his earlier motor scooter crash. After considerable prodding on the part of Jason, Dale sat up and ate some Ramen Noodles. Our duffel bags began arriving and team members changed into dry layers. They set up their inflatable cushions and sleepingbags, hung wet clothing from ceiling beams. My duffel did not arrive. Jeremy made inquires with the other Porters and learned that the Porter carrying my duffel had called it a night at the village just before Sunama. I would have no mattress or sleeping bag that night. It helps that I had spent a good bit of time preparing myself for hardship before the expedition. As well, Jason and assistant guide Dan Zokaites seemed busy enough dealing with Dale. So I said "no problem. I'll just put on an extra layer from the gear in my pack. One of the Schmidt boys offered me his sleeping bag, feeling he would be warm enough packed tight among his brothers. But Jason insisted I take his bag and Dan gave me his mattress. The two shared a mattress and sleeping bag. I was grateful. 


The decision is made to take Dale back in morning. We lay in silence for a moment taking this in. The loss of a single team member affects the team in excess of their proportion. We have bonded, imagined succeeding together, helping each other, relying on the other member to be there for us when events turn difficult. When a team member is lost there is a complete recalculation that each of us must do to then assess the viability of the expedition. As well, it is sometimes necessary to equip that departing team member with stove, tent, fuel and food rations for his trip out. This leaves the remaining members without backup in the event their equipment fails. 


My attention drifts to the night sounds of the jungle around us. The rains have rested and in their place I hear birds of the darkness. We are packed together so tight that I feel it when someone two places over moves. Still, it is good. We are dry and warm and fed. Sleep comes.



 

The Schmidt Family

Fully half our team consisted of the Schmidt Family. Dale, 47, and Dori, 46, own a company that prepares medical school aspirants to take the MCAT entrance exam. They brought their four boys along, and though the family's collective climbing resume did not list any major mountains, they did bring an impressive list of ice climbing successes including "The Devil's Thumb" and "Ham and Eggs." As well, they brought a physical presence which testified to their promise in this endeavor. Dale stands 6' 4", Dori 6', Benjamin (19) 6' 4", Josh (17) 6' 3", and twins Jeremy (14) 6' 3", and Nathaniel "Nano" (14) 6' 1". I imagined easily sneaking my gear into their packs without them knowing it. 


It was fun watching the Schmidt boys. Like any brothers they would pick at each other during moments when boredom offered no better alternative. But it was always good-natured and the brother receiving it would typically just ignore the fact that a sibling was pulling his ear or jabbing a finger between his shoulder blades. Just as often they would hang off each other like tired puppies or drape an arm across the shoulders of one another. Sometimes I would miss my own boys as I watched the Schmidts.


The warmth and personable nature of Dori and Dale set the tone for the members of the family crossing over to become members of a larger team. I looked forward to this dynamic and was pleased to connect quickly with the boys, who showed enthusiasm for my tattoos, labeling them "sick"  ...which means good. 

Flight to the other side of nowhere.

Two weeks later I would have a conversation in Bali as I checked into a hotel after the climb. The friendly Concierge asked where I had come from. When I said I had just spent 18 days in Papua he commented "Oh. Papua. I think you look for trouble." Mountain climbing and jungle trekking did not enter into his opinion. The concierge was referring to the political unrest throughout Papua.


There just seems to be something about the places my mountain climbing takes me. When I climbed Kilimanjaro in 2008 there had just been a highly disputed election result in Kenya. Which is to say people were killing each other. In one particularly horrible incident a group of villagers were locked inside a church and it was set fire. Not fully aware of this, I was delighted to find my flight from Amsterdam to Nairobi half full. I stretched out across an entire row of seats and slept the sleep of babes. But in Nairobi we were led around the airport by well-armed military. Our departing flight was delayed until after sundown. We were ordered to run from the terminal to our waiting jet. Remarkably, all my bags arrived in Tanzania in good order, something Delta Airlines cannot accomplish even with an absence of hot whistling lead.


A year later I traveled to Russia to climb Mt Elbrus. A tense ceasefire was in effect between Russia and neighboring Georgia. Mt Elbrus sits on the border of these two countries. Though we got in and out without incident, a village near our base-camp was attacked a week after we left by Georgian rebels. The police station was bombed, killing 7.




There is no tourism in Papua. For the vast majority of Papuans, the only Caucasian people they have seen in Papua work for the Freeport Mine, an employer which is viewed to have taken much and given little to the residents of the world's second largest island. In some respects that same Freeport Mine may be viewed as having interests that are not consistent with an independant Papua. So I believe there was concern the members of our team might be mistaken as Freeport Proxies and become unwilling pawns in a volatile circumstance as a new round of elections was getting underway. I say "believe" because no one was willing to talk about the reasons for our hieghtened caution. When I asked our lead guide Jason about it he would simply comment "this is Papua and you need to be careful." He probably did not want us to get distracted from the climb or caught up in worries over things he and his team were addressing. But even the odd Taxi driver demured to discuss Papuan Politics. In one instance a driver expressed a few opinions then quickly added that I did not hear it from him.  http://asopa.typepad.com/asopa_people/2012/06/elections-in-papua-new-guinea-are-just-different.html This link covers a story about the lengthy process of voting in Papua.


Our walled-in hotel had gated security. Whenever we traveled somewhere uniformed officers would stop traffic and our motorcade of three dark vans would leave the compound at a running start. At some point I realized that traffic lights did not apply to us. We were someone going somewhere and it was best to stay out of our way. One might reasonably ask if going to Papua is a wise choice during such times. But since the Independant Papua movement began in 1961 this has largely been the state of affairs. At various times access to Carstensz has been closed entirely. So this opportunity was better than some years, not as good as others. We are mountain climbers. This is what we do.


The morning we flew out of Timika for Sugapa our team dispatched in two groups. The first group, consisting of the Schmidt Family and lead guide Jason Edwards, got on the early morning flight. This was the third morning they had spent at the airport hoping to get seats. The rest of us loaded up a few hours later and drove to the airport. It was a busy scene with many locals sitting on the grass or curbs, carrying armloads of food or belongings they would take back to their village. Many of the men were chewing Beetle Nut, a red hard fruit that gives off similar sensations to smoking. It permanently dyes their teeth and gums orange. Like chewing tobacco, Beetle Nut is spat out afterward, leaving red splatters mindful of a slasher movie on the ground. We were told to wait in the vans as our local guide, Steven, tried to secure passage for us on the next flight. A half hour later we were led from the vans to a small crowded terminal. We were coached to keep a low profile, which was difficult given the spectacle of our gear and climbing clothes. As well, we towered in height over the average Indonesian. There was chatter and staring. We smiled. Then Roger , who had been absent-mindedly swinging his daypack around and bumping people, took out his camera. The next thing we knew security was removing us from the terminal to wait in a cargo shed out near the airstrip. There Roger tried to strike up a friendly conversation about firearms with the security guard standing watch over us. In general it is ill-advised to gesture toward the weapon of a man who does not speak your language. Again there was tension which we all labored to smother with smiles and light-hearted laughter.


Our flight to Sugapa gave us our first good look at the topography we would be working with, a lush green series of ridges that qued up like dinner plates in a drying rack. Rivers gathered from myriad tributaries reaching up the valley walls. There was no sign of civilization. Not even a village hut. The top of one hill had been scraped away to create a flat area. This was our landing strip, a dirt and gravel runway. We were greeted by an audience of local Dani tribe members, who still marvel at the sight of aircraft landing and taking off. One of the Schmidt boys, Nano, said a man shook his hand as he stepped off the plane and offered "Welcome to the other side of nowhere."

Another day in Timika

July 3, 2012.
The news this morning featured footage of a waterbuffalo running amok in one of Indonesias small cities. He trotted through an open market and into traffic, goring the occasional car as he loped along. Eventually the rogue animal was diverted into a neighborhood, which proved less hectic but much more dangerous for the waterbuffalo. The cameras recorded a slight barefoot man emerging from his cinderblock home with a pistol. The range at which he shot the massive animal suggests the man had low confidence in his marksmanship. And then it was all over.


I am sitting by the rooftop pool of our hotel. Kenny G's Christmas album "Miracles" is playing on the sound system. A moment ago "The First Noel" was drown out by the 4:20 call to prayer of the Muslim Mosque several blocks away. It is a strange moment in a strange place. The Grand Tempaga Hotel is a four story oasis in what can only be described as a landscape of disturbing poverty. Garbage fills the ditches and streams. The stench of rotting organic matter comes and goes as we walk past the stalls, down the alleyways where locals have set up a blanket or stand to sell what they have grown, caught, found or made by hand. Staring is not impolite in Timika, and Carrol, Roger, and I gather plenty of stares.


Carrol Masheter is a university professor and PHD from Salt Lake City, Utah. Her longtime passion for mountain climbing took her to the summit of Mt Everest 4 years ago and has persisted ever since. As her employer was no longer willing to grant the unpaid leave she required to climb mountains, Carrol chose to retire recently. She is an energetic, silver-haired dynamo of positive willpower. Carrol has branded herself "The Silver Fox." She often speaks of herself in the third person and is given to howling when she is happy. I point out that Foxes do not howl, to which she then howls and declares "this is a magic fox!"


Roger is an in-house patent attorney for a major telecommunications company in Dallas. He is affable and ready with the quick wit typical of Texans.Though he does not strike the physique typical of mountain climbers, Roger has summited a number of majors, including Kilimanjaro and Aconcagua. He is in his early fifties and contemplating marriage.


The people we pass are friendly. We wave to one another. Some want to shake my  hand. If we stop to talk with one local many others will gather around to watch the conversation. We are a curiosity. A man holds a large fish above his head for me to see. He is proud of it. I point to my camera and then to him. The man enthusiastically nods in the affirmative. He smiles broadly with his chest pumped full of pride. As soon as I take the shot one of his fellow vendors shouts a comment in Indonesian and all the men roar with laughter. The deflated man throws his fish down on the table before him and stomps off half smiling.

More on Illaga

I have learned more about the "unrest" in Illaga which prompted our change to Suguapa as a launch site. Earlier this year a local tribe killed about 50 members of another tribe near Illaga. As is customary in this part of the world, the aggrieved tribe was then compelled to return in kind. They did so a few weeks prior to our arrival in Timika. The Indonesian military quickly formed a presence in Illaga to stem any further violence, but it goes without saying this left Illaga with a less than tourist-friendly vibe.

The rest of the story

I am back from the climb, hunkered down in Bali, sleeping and eating and sleeping. Working from my journal notes, I will publish once every few days to take you all through the adventure that has been. In so many ways this expedition turned out to be more than any of us had anticipated. More-ness. Our original team of 14 was quickly reduced to just 6 by way of injury, sickness, fatigue, and crisis of will. In the end our muddy band of trolls limped from the jungle after 12 days,but not before attempting a world record along the way. Read on.

The Team Rendezvous

We are in Timika. The last team member arrived this morning from the Dominican Republic. He was delayed in Hong Kong for almost a week owing to Visa complications. While it is widely known one can easily obtain an Indonesian Visa upon arrival, the Chinese authorities would not allow Ivan to board his connection to Denpasar without first obtaining one. He scrambled from one consulate to another appealing to various uninterested dignitaries. We do not know much about Ivan just yet, but we do know his family has connections. Chinese officials were contacted by the United Nations late last night and all of Ivan's Visa problems disappeared. 


It is fortunate for Ivan our expedition has been delayed in leaving Timika. Our original plan to fly from here to Illaga has been scraped. Recent unrest there has made it unsafe. We are now planning to fly to Suguapa and begin our trek there. But there have been complications. 


The plane we intended to use blew a tire while landing at Suguapa two days ago. It skidded partway off the air strip and remained stuck there, blocking the ability of other aircraft to take off or land.  The plane was cleared away the next day and a new tire flown in. But flight priority goes to food shipments gauranteed by the government to arrive daily and by this time those flights are 3 days backed up. So the team will not fly out until the food shipments are caught up. In the mean time poor weather has cancelled the food flights for today. We are all just hanging out, trying to keep a mellow attitude. 

Rock Wall Training

Carstensz is not so much a mountain climb as it is a long trek with a 3,500 foot rock climb in the middle. When I say "rock climb" I mean near vertical inclines, ropes, harnesses, and anchored protection. This is one of the challenges I have spent much time preparing for over the last many weeks. Recognizing my complete lack of skills in rock climbing, I enlisted the help of my good friend David Hutchinson (pictured above). Each Tuesday night we met at the YMCA climbing wall for 2 hours of 1 on 1 instruction. 

David has been rock climbing for over 40 years. He is a rock-monkey, a climbing artist and can probably crack walnuts with his bare hands. In the picture below his hand is on the left. Look at that paw. Compare it to my smooth soft desk-jockey hand. 

When we first started working on my climbing technique I was all will and no skill. Halfway up the wall I would scream "Narf" and peel off into space, hanging by my harness, defeated and panting. But David taught me how to read a route, when to rest and how to hang from my skeletal structure instead of by muscles. He taught me to use parts of the rock and parts of my body that I would not have thought of. He was patient, encouraging, and just a cool Dude to hang out with.