Chapter 60 Xue Ji

I just got off the plateau, drunk with oxygen, and my mind was full of wind and snow. The woman fell more than 70 meters down the snow slope and hit a rock as big as a house. She died immediately, her face was blurred by the fall.The man is not dead, but his bones are scattered.The companion fished him out of the snow ditch with a sleeping bag and put him on a large rock.At an altitude of 5,200 meters, rescue could not come up for a while, there was no medicine or food, and the temperature was getting lower and lower. The man had been resisting the pain.Four hours passed, and the great pain finally made him lose his sense of pain.In the end, the subconscious mind was also lost, and the body cooled down along with the stone, and he left.

This is the whole process of Haba snowing on the National Day.I think that man's death was heroic, like "Vertical Limit".Sun Bin told me a real classic, the documentary "North Wall": Two awesome men vowed to conquer a mountain called the North Wall in northern Switzerland, and finally went up.It was only when descending a vertical snow hole that the previous estimate was wrong, and the snow hole was far longer than the length of the rope.The two of them had descended halfway, unable to go up or down, so they had to hang in the cold snow cave for a while.Surrounded by a transparent world, time is safe, life is impermanent, and no one knows that there are two poor flies hanging in the long ice and snow tunnel... The next day, one of the men smiled, cut the rope and threw himself die.The other didn't want to do it so stupidly, but just let himself hang in the snow cave and let it dry slowly.

All those who came after paid homage to these two great mountaineers, who chose their preferred way of death. The mood has not improved.This is because a man and a woman also died in the Haba village where we lived on the eve of the snow disaster.No wonder the dogs in the whole village barked miserably all night.In the morning, I found out that the couple had quarreled, but they didn't think about it. One drank pesticide and the other hanged himself.Later, some people said that the snow on the mountain was difficult, and the couple at the foot of the mountain asked for a replacement for the dead ghost... fearing that it would affect the climbing the next day, the team did not mention this matter.

Hit the mountain right away.All the way without talking, I crossed the river and entered the forest, watching the leaves slowly soaked red by the transparent wind, the trees were as silent as a group of tall mutes.When I was in a trance, I heard that something happened on the mountain.You can see a person with a faint snow line in the binoculars, but you can't help him.At this time, it was the juncture when he lost his sense of pain and went to another time and space. It was evening when Sun Bin transported his body down. The sleeping bag was bulging with ropes and had a strange shape.People don't want to look at the sleeping bag, but just look at the bad weather, the sky is glowing with metallic gray, like an upside-down aluminum pot, covering the nearby snow-capped mountains with a gloomy expression.The people were speechless, drank some hot and sour soup, and then fell asleep in the simple base camp made of a few pieces of wood.The wind was as strong as moving a mountain, it was very cold, and the air pressure was strangely low. Some people were withdrawn overnight because of high altitude.I hugged my sleeping bag in the tent where the luggage was placed outside, and fell asleep for a while.

Waking up in the early morning, there are already people shouting and screaming outside, and the stars are dazzling.The collision of ice axes and crampons made a sound like cold weapons.Quickly lit a handful of Tibetan incense and bowed to Haba. I am a superstitious person. I must burn incense every time before climbing a mountain. There are gods living on the snow-capped mountains. If you are presumptuous, you will die. All mountaineering starts in the early morning darkness.Because the most difficult part of mountain climbing is not climbing to the top but descending. If you haven’t reached the top by noon, you may never be able to get down.That time limit is called "closing the door".In order to fight for the "closing" time, we set off at two o'clock in the morning. Looking back, we saw the headlights that everyone was wearing, which was strange and spectacular, just like a tomb robber.

At the beginning, climb a kilometer-long volcanic rock.This is a huge slide formed after the erupted magma cooled during the Quaternary orogeny, and it will fall if you don't pay attention.The rock is so hard that an ice ax cannot go into it.We had to crawl for nearly two hours.Suddenly, I passed a high gravel mountain, and I heard the gravel rolling down continuously, and it took half a minute to reach the bottom of the valley.The wind is getting stronger and will blow the soul away.The Tibetan guide said that this meant that there might be a storm in the afternoon.Some people started shouting and complaining, saying that they were going to die.

The voice of the people gradually died down again, it was they who retreated.There were only about 20 people left, and they continued to crawl. Suddenly, it was as if a piece of gold foil had been pasted on the sky, illuminating everyone thoroughly, and a strange light appeared on their faces, only then did they realize that it was seven o'clock in the morning.Haba is called "golden flower" in the local dialect.But no one has dug gold here for centuries, and looking down, the stones are all black.Tibetans pointed to their feet and said that it was the famous U-shaped valley, in which there were wreckages of planes that crashed on the "Hump Flight" during World War II.

Arrived at the C1 camp at 9:30, which is the snow line, and only a small number of people made it in time to "close the gate".The white snow is like ice cream on black bread, it looks beautiful, but also fake.But the big ice crevices with grinning mouths under the feet are so real.This is also the place where the man and woman died.We didn't say anything, and we didn't look at the huge stone that had killed people, but we walked up carefully stepping on the fragile ice beam.Sun Bin roared like thunder because several people tied their crampons backwards.This will kill people.

Above the snow line, everything is still, and so is time. Occasionally, snow particles roll down to remind me that I am moving.Walking silently, obviously everyone is together, but you only feel yourself. This is the case when you climb above 5,000 meters. No one can help you, and you can’t help anyone. A group of people are walking alone with themselves. There is no relationship with each other. The sky turned a strange gray-blue color, and the mountain shape also changed dramatically, as if dancing.This is the visual difference caused by the flow of wind and snow.In order to reduce water consumption, I tucked the scarf directly under the snow goggles, but the exhaled air quickly covered the lenses with a thick layer of fog, and the visibility was less than three meters.Like a blindfolded donkey, I rushed to the first place.This paved the way for my crisis later, and I didn't know it at the time.

The reason why the Slope of Despair is called the Slope of Despair is because the angle of this slope is very steep and the top cannot be seen.In terms of altitude, Haba is not a snow mountain that is difficult to climb to the top. It consumes a lot of energy in the volcanic rocks and gravel mountains below the snow line. Ding, I found that Ding is simply an illusion.The most difficult thing in life is not that you can't climb to the top of the mountain, but that you don't know where the top of the mountain is. Passing through Moon Bay at around 11:10 is a very narrow ice ridge.Such a beautiful name has buried many mountaineering masters.Moon Bay is actually an ice slab that has been around for tens of millions of years, but the snow wind blows in for years, and many snow holes are rolled up like making ice cream cones, and they will fall down if you don't pay attention.The famous Shanghai "Old Antique" just slipped down from the row of huge snow caves, and there were no bones left.

I dug a snow pit to sit down so I wouldn't fall, and a woman stood in front of me talking to me, but I couldn't hear or speak.I found out later that it was Li Shuanke from National Geographic.The so-called woman is just my hallucination, I am dehydrated. There was heavy fog, and I couldn't see the surrounding things clearly for a moment. I felt a force floating me in the air, which was very comfortable and very sad.I walked slowly towards the snow cave, getting closer and closer.Dehydration has made me unable to control the hallucinations in my heart. I slipped and fell into a deep hole... Fortunately, the guide quickly grabbed my backpack and grabbed a big piece of ice with an ice ax, before I fell This life was recovered.I drank a raw egg to supplement my strength, and then I woke up.The altitude was seven or eight meters away from the peak, and I could hear the cheering of the people above. Haojie had a boy hoarsely courting his mobile phone.But I was disheartened and didn't want to go up anymore, so I turned my head and said to the guide: "Go down." The snow path down the mountain is very straight, and the lack of reference objects is prone to hallucinations.The scene of the man and woman slipping and falling kept appearing in my mind... When the team doctor measured the blood oxygen and pulse of the whole team at the 4100-meter base camp, I was the first in the team.However, when going down the mountain, the psychological disadvantages were fully exposed. One time, after doing the wrong move, the crampons were hung on the charging pants, and the whole person slid on his back to the bottom of the snow ditch.Fortunately, after sliding for more than ten meters, I caught the ground pile and stopped. When I met Li Shuanke at Dashibi, I could already distinguish his face.We slumped together on the big rock wall, looking at the base camp just a short distance below the cliff, the smoke from the kitchen was curling up, as if there was a warm stove waiting for us to return, but the journey would take at least two hours.Li Shuanke shouted angrily: Why is there no helicopter?I was as angry as a gossamer: otherwise, let's just jump down.Everyone nodded, got up, walked slowly to the edge of the cliff, waved affectionately to the bottom, turned and left, and hurried on their way. No one can help you, on the snow mountain, only you can help yourself.Not even death can help you.Life cannot be escaped. It was evening when we returned to the base camp, the weather changed drastically, and the jacket crackled from the hail, so the whole team rode down quickly.Only then did I realize that I was riding a donkey in a hurry. The donkey had no thoughts. When it saw the shit of the horse in front of it, it would shit, and if it drank water, it would drink water.And the shape of the forest is changing. I always feel that there is a tree in the front of the tree that looks like a huge Jesus. No matter where I go, he is always in front of me. He has a long beard and ragged clothes, and I can feel it from a distance. Seeing the sadness in his eyes, it seems that he is still suffering after two thousand years.Maybe it's a hallucination, and I would like to ask other people who have boarded Haba if they have such an experience. The dog named Huahua raised by Lama’s eldest sister always likes to run far away to look back at us with deep eyes, or rush to the depths of the forest to growl with yaks in a low voice.There is also a pug named Lele, who eats everything including earthworms, is very dirty and happy, and makes out with everyone.It goes up to 4,100 meters above sea level with its owner every day, and then comes down again.The pug's respiratory system is very poor, but this pug persisted for three years without missing a single day of work, and climbed mountains like walking on flat ground. He is the best mountaineer. It was already late at night when we rushed back to Haba Village. People lined up at the entrance of the village to welcome them, laughing and laughing. Although two people had just died in the village, there was no sense of sadness.The couple who were hard to get away in the snow the day before yesterday have already settled down according to local customs.We drank rice wine that had already been cooked in the wooden house, ate dried beef, and told each other thrilling details on the snow-capped mountains.It was very cold outside, causing steaming and indescribable shapes to appear on the glass window. I drew some shapes on the window with my fingers, always hallucinating that they were the man and woman in the snow, knowing that I was a little drunk. There is a faint signal in the village to go online.I saw a message from a netizen: That woman is your reader, and before going up the mountain, she was still telling the people around her that she must buy big-eyed books and read big-eyed books. A sadness like a knife across the throat.I was unhappy, and suddenly my whole body was extremely cold. I went back to my room to sleep, and had many strange dreams... I didn't wake up until the early morning. That netizen has a new message: You have to be in awe, it is not you who conquered Haba, but Haba let you pass... Sincerely, Xue Ji. 10/05/2010