WASFIA NAZREEN: MOUNTAINEER TRAILBLAZER

First from her country (Bangladesh) to climb highest peak on all 7 continents, plus the ultimate challenge, K2. From a remarkable life as an adventurer and humanitarian, she shares stories of her climbs, trauma and healing, self discovery and forgiveness, and her close friendship with the Dalai Lama.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
She comes from the land below sea level, but she
is most at home and most alive enveloped by Earth's
highest mountains. She is the only person from Bangladesh to
scale the highest peak on all seven continents. Her achievements
as a climber, adventurer, explorer, activist, educator are literally redefining

(00:30):
what is possible and inspiring millions wherever girls have been
discouraged from dreaming big. My guest is Wasphia Nazarene. She'll
share with us her stories of trauma and healing, of
self discovery and forgiveness, and the wonder of being mentored
and befriended by His holiness, the Dalai Lama. Of course,

(00:52):
was Sphia also describes her epic climbs, what it took
for her just to get near the base camps of
Everest and k Two, her dear friends who lost their
lives pursuing their passion, and her survivors guilt. Her descriptions
are chilling and graphic. She opens a window to how
thrilling and punishing reaching the rooftop of the world can be. Auaspia.

(01:18):
You seem to be from our prior conversation, thriving, inspired, doing, fulfilling,
things busy, but your epic transformation to get to this
place from a place of surviving, not thriving, from weathering
and enduring is just incredible on so many fronts and

(01:41):
will cover some of those. But thank you for being here.
I plan to learn from you and learn about you
even more, and I think our people listening will as well.
So thanks in advance. Thank you so much for having
me Chris. It's an honor. I could geek out on
mountains forever. We will not do that. Don't worry, folks.
There's so much more to this woman's life. But you

(02:02):
mentioned you're now chronicling your climb of K two and
the seven Summits are what you're known for Denali, Kilimanjaro,
Albrosu Congagua, Vincent Carson's Pyramid, and the mountain of many names, Jamomma,
Samatha Everest. But K two is considered by many want
Spy as the ultimate achievement in mountaineering, and you just

(02:24):
did that within the last year, and you said you're
still just kind of processing that achievement. So how you
mentally prepared, how you met the crux of that climb,
and how you process it since it's all just really
interesting to me. Thank you. M K two or locally
known as Choguri, literally implying king of Mountains. It's in

(02:47):
the Balti language of the local people who lives in
Gildibaltistan in Pakistan, is, as you know, the dream of
all mountaineers. And I first laid my eyes on it,
or not literally but just thinking of going there ten
or eleven years ago when I summited Everest. But even
at that time, I knew that there was a lot

(03:08):
that I need to learn in order for me to
get to K two. And just to put into perspective
for listeners who may not know much about the mountain
till today, more people have been to space then stood
on the summit of K two. And before I arrived,
which was this past summer June twenty twenty two, there

(03:30):
were literally eighteen eighteen women since nineteen fifty four who
had summitted the mountain. And of course within that small
number there's two lists because if you die on the
way down the mountain, then your summit isn't counted. And
out of those eighteen, several had died perish. So just
to just to elaborate on how small that number is,

(03:53):
whereas Everest, for example, you know there's over I mean
close to five thousand summits now and it's about to
start another season. So yeah, it's been a dream of
a long time. But I had to prep, train, research,
you know, all that has been in motion for over
a decade. But there's an added logistical drama. Those who

(04:17):
may not know what is now Bangladesh used to be
East Pakistan and what is now Pakistan was West Pakistan.
So the Bangladesh liberation movement that happened was against the
Pakistan what is now Pakistan, and we gained liber liberation
just in my dad's or my parents' generation. So fifty
fifty one years ago inside nineteen seventy one, I guess

(04:39):
fifty two now. So no Bangladeshi was ever you know,
allowed a mountaineering permit for K two and it was
Bangladish just fifty years and so logistically, you know, in
my past as an activist, I've also lived in India.
No Indian is allowed in the terr ritory. So for

(05:01):
me to cross those red tapes was a whole nother
ballgame and another K two to climb. And so the
build up to get to K two was longer than
actually climbing the mountain, which is two months long. So
when I got and even when I got obtained the visa,
which was literally the week that I was supposed to
fly to k two, I was told that at any point,

(05:24):
even after you enter Islam, but even after you entered
the territory, anyone and everyone could have a right to
turn you back if you so I knew I was
being watched the whole time, and true to their words,
as soon as I landed in Islam, but it was
all over the Pakistani news that you know, and I
had no press released nothing at that time. People just knew.

(05:45):
But it was opposite to what everyone had told me.
It was very positive. Pakistanis were celebrating that their Bengali
sister had returned. And you know, whether it was the
locals in Islam, but locals in Skardo, army officers, intelligence officers,
media people, everyone was just like rooting for me, and
that just changed the whole game. To get back to

(06:08):
your question, it was the dream of not just me,
but like I would say, one hundred and seventy million
people of Bangladesh. And I'm still processing it. As I
was telling you, we're currently making a feature doc on it.
So we were very fortunate to film the entire trip.
So the lifelong dream of getting there, all the political hassle,

(06:29):
all the mental preparation, where despite what you've done, I
would imagine when it's K two, you are dealing with
some doubts, right, some fear or some trepidation just because
of the technical challenge of this and the fact that
so if you have succeeded, so as you're progressing and
you're getting closer and this becomes more and more real,
how it did that mental training, that preparation come into

(06:52):
it when you were facing those things and the obstacles
right in front of you. I have a lot of
spiritual you know, people that i'd see guidance from, and
my route guru can see young Rimpuchet who resides in Nepal.
I had gone to him in twenty nineteen and talked
about this and came back because there were several teams

(07:14):
that I was planning on going with and I wanted
to feel one hundred percent. And then after then the
pandemic happens, so everything canceled. So in twenty twenty one,
I had just recovered from not dying in COVID. And
it was during that COVID period and I'm not going
to get into the details of it. I almost died
and in that split a few minutes of you know,

(07:36):
when I came back from actually seeing light and I
was in hospital, and I was like, this is the
time I'm going to recover because I'm going to go
to K two because that's that's that those visuals of
the charac Roum just kept appearing and that was a
huge strength or inspiration that helped me recover from COVID.

(07:56):
But then I went back to my spiritual teacher and
I put three cards of three different teams and this,
you know, my teacher doesn't know these people in person,
even though they're they may be famous climbers. So he
went into there's a process is called divination, so they
seek guidance to tell the answer or see into the future.

(08:19):
And he put his hand on the team that I
actually ended up climbing with, and he said, if there's
any any team that you're going to go to the
summit with, it's this team. But then he opened his
eyes and he looked back and he said that everything
that you think of K two is not going to
apply for you. And then he went on to give

(08:40):
me this he's like. And then the second time I went,
he opened his eyes and he said, you need to
go climb K two this year, Like this is it
and trust me, Like I have a lot of mentors,
good people or friends who support me, but no one
has ever in their right hand told me go climb
K two, you know. And so getting that approval kind

(09:02):
of that seal of confidence from my teacher, who has
in the past guided me through some of the roughest
time of my life, was like, Okay, I gotta do
it now. And then you know how the sponsor came
about within like a forty minutes meeting, how everything set
into place. So throughout that journey that I was taking
the trick in the climb, whenever you know, any kind

(09:25):
of negative incident happened, I would constantly like be in
touch with my teacher and who was guiding me to
the whole throughout the whole thing, Who's like, don't worry
about it, because it's going to be different. And so
one of the things that he was implying is there
there was a myth that Katwo is known to kill women.
So it's a statistically speaking, more women have died because

(09:48):
all because a very high percentage of the group that
climbs K two has been fed on the mail. So
you have this amazing personal experience all that's kind into it,
but you're also sharing it with six other women, which
you know collectively is incredibly powerful. Given given the history
you just talked about, there must have been an astounding
sort of you know, stand around it. It's very small summit,

(10:10):
but stand around at least close to each other, close
to the same time, five other including me. So it
was the highest ever women's group that went up to
K two on the same day. So that was super
you know, very proud, and there was no toxic femininity,
like we all supported each other and we were like

(10:31):
even though we climbed with our own shepherd partners, there
was that moral boost and support in order to minimize
the risk on K two. So just from base camp
to advanced base camp and camp on camp two, it's
super dangerous because of the rock falls, and so in
order to minimize that, what the strategy was to go

(10:51):
acclimatize in broad peak and listeners who may not know
about the acclimatization process. It's like you don't just climb
an eight thousand meter peak at one go. You have
to go up to a certain height, let's say Camp
one above six thousand meter sleep low. So then there
are several rotations that happens, and that's how we acclimatize

(11:12):
to higher altitude. And then once you enter dead zone,
which is above eight thousand, two hundred meters approximately above
twenty six thousand feet, which is which I'm sure you
know about, Chris. This is where human bodies don't function.
We don't We stop producing cells, and the brain loses

(11:34):
cells at a rate that it's irreplaceable. So there's even
a saying that high altitude mountaineers get dumb and dumber,
so that you're supposed to, but it's true. Like it's
it's just it's so taxing to the body. In base
camp alone, it's fifty percent oxygen level than sea level.
To live in base camp for almost two and a
half months, you know, in and out, and then onwards

(11:57):
going up and down, it's just so taxing to the body.
By the time I had summited K two and we
came down in two days, I had lost nineteen pounds
and The only only other sport I can compare this
too is I guess would be the F one races,
you know, where Lewis Hamilton loses some I don't know
how much they lose, but this is I don't I

(12:19):
can't think of any other sport where it's this level
of work on the body level, you know, like physical, mental, psychological,
physiological level, and not to forget you know, the dead
bodies and the things that you see up there. And

(12:39):
we talked about this, I think earlier is like till
at least December, I was waking up with nightmares of
bodies and everywhere. And in K two there's a lot
of broken bodies, like shoe with the leg coming out, hands,
and so when you see these things on the daily,
and not just see it, but also on the race,

(13:00):
there's constant updates of oh, yeah, so and so fell
in the river and was just washed away. So and
so got hit, and so you're constantly getting these updates
of injuries accidents, not just in K two but also
on broad Peaks. So both of those expeditions go simultaneously,
and so mentally to have that daily maintenance of not

(13:22):
being in a negative place because everything that we plan.
You know, we do our super best, but also know
that none of it would actually go according to plan,
And so you have to have that positive mindset that
every morning when we wake up, or not necessarily morning,
but we'd sometimes wake up at midnight and go for
the rotation at two. You know, you have to be adaptable.

(13:46):
You can't you just because Katwo's going to give you
a reason to give up every moment. And the game
is to not never give up. Yeah, back off if
if there needs to be better decisions to be made,
but never give up, and just have keep on using
that positive mentality and keep on fighting. These mountains are
holy places to the indigenous cultures. There are places of worship.

(14:08):
They're also graveyards. As you point out, whether it's K
two Everest or many other Himallean mountains, you are constantly reminded,
aren't you, of the dangers and the mortality and the
brevity of existence. When you see people who are trying
to reach their dreams and they're still in their climbing
suits frozen. It's it's something I guess you would never

(14:30):
get numb too. Yeah, it's super surreal and so flash
or just if we go back to my Everest climb,
which was twenty twelve. I was barely twenty nine. I
had a very young mind, and you know, I knew
I was going to see dead bodies. I had seen
dead bodies before that on the mountains, but to the

(14:50):
level that had happened, and at that time it was
the second most deadliest season from I guess after ninety
ninety eight, one disaster that had happened. And just on
the Summit Push alone, I cross seven dead bodies, out
of which five where people I had known and met

(15:11):
up within base Camp and had t You know, base
Camp is a place right now in modern time, I
would say Base Camp is kind of like the Himalayan
version of Burning Man. But back then, you know there's
all kinds of shit show happening there. But with going
back to twenty twelve, you know, it's it's a village.

(15:31):
It's literally like a small town that gets built over
the moving chunk of glacier. You can't say it's moving
because you can't see it, but it's actually moving. So
you become that becomes your family, and so people that
you get so close with and you have to cross
their dead bodies and keep on going, and the first
thing that always comes to my head is like, oh,

(15:52):
I could be next, because you never know what's going
to happen in Dead Zone. So I lived with survivor's
guilt for a long time, also because I've lost friends
on the mountain. But I don't know if you would
call the survivor's guilt, but you know, because I was
not necessarily involved with their death, but I made it,

(16:13):
you know, I made it to the top and I
came back alive, and so that is I am part
of the group that survived to tell the story. So
in a way, it is survivor's guilt, but also you know,
it's these people chose on their free will to go
up there, and like before I went, it was my

(16:35):
personal choice that you know, I made a will, especially
before Everest, that if I'm if I die on Dead Zone,
don't risk anyone to go up there because I'm in heaven.
I'm choosing this out of my own consciousness. And yeah,
it's something that I'm still I guess finding peace with. Internally,

(16:57):
I still have visuals of crossing dead bodies and leaving
them there. I also asked Guaspia about her experiences during
the massive earthquake that shook Nepal in twenty fifteen, killing
almost three thousand people, leveling whole villages and sending a
deadly avalanche into every space camp. There's a big story

(17:18):
too that I lost my best friend in that and
my climbing partner, Dan Fredingberg, and his body was the
first one to be found in that earthquake. But that's
actually where my survivor's guilds started. I didn't know that
till many years later. But I was on a flight
to get to Nepal and the route was that because
from those who may not know from Mong addition, Nepal

(17:39):
is literally a one hour flight, it's the shortest place,
the shortest flight from our country to go anywhere else.
And so I was on route to go to Nepal
meet Dan, who was already in base camp with several
of our other friends. And so I usually take the
helly from Katmand airport to you know, directly into Kumbhu.
And on the car ride to the airport, one of

(18:03):
my other spiritual teacher came up. But he called me.
He never calls, you know, and he said, get get
get off that flight. He didn't I didn't tell him anything.
He knew it. He said, get off that flight. I said, holiness,
what are you talking about? Because I had so much
at stake. I had all these things organized at average
base camp and I wasn't going to climb. I already

(18:24):
had climbed in twenty twelve. But my best friend and
several of my other every other season I would go
back to base camp anyway, because all my it was
kind of like our convergence, our own burning band, like
every year we would just unite there. And anyway, long
story short, he got very angry, come up and never

(18:44):
gets you know, these teachers, it takes a lot for
them to get angry. And he said come and see
me right now. And he hung up, and I said,
come and see you what it like? And so I
sent a text to Dan. That was my last text
to him. Is hey, long story like Carpa just called
me and need to go. I'll be back in two days.

(19:06):
I'll figure it out. And what it was his way
of pulling me out of that earthquake. And first thing
I knew. You know, there was just so much going
on because the networks had stopped when the earthquake happens,
so it was very hard to get information. And Dan
was in the base camp and you know it just

(19:27):
the avalanche took him and smashed his head against the rock.
And so the next time I saw Dan was in
literally like powder form. It he was cremated by that time.
And but it took me two years to get back
to average base cam. I had a whole ritual I
put like a short in which is the memorial to

(19:47):
up to go to base camp, and I took some
of those ashes back and we did a whole pooja
ceremonum with it. But yeah, so we I stayed for
months in Nepal doing all the post earthquake, you know,
recovery help. When I remember there were three hundred and
sixty plus aftershocks and we would just hold hands outside outdoors,

(20:12):
lived under tarps. And this is the power of you know,
people from the humanis, whether it's Tibet or Nepal. You know,
everyone was helping out like it doesn't it didn't matter
if you were rich, poor, what class, what cast you
came from. Everyone came out and was just holding hands,
helping each other like across anything. And so yeah, it

(20:34):
was a very powerful time. But it's also it was
a lot of grief that we had to process that
that year alone. Well, there's been so many forms of
trauma in your life that there really there's no GPS
navigation system, there's no roadmap for you to get from
Bangladesh to what you've ascended to and achieved. There's no
role models, as you pointed out for this, because you

(20:56):
you are a pioneer in that way. We'll backtrack at it.
But what does it say to people from your country,
to girls anywhere that you have achieved, but you have
achieved when none of those things were present before you
started your path, for especially people from my country, Like
very few people have actually seen a mountain. You know,

(21:17):
we're Bilow Sea level. Bangladesh is known as the country
of rivers. We're criss crossed by rivers but fed by
the Himalayas, right, isn't that part of it? But all
these rivers are actually coming from the Himalayas, you know.
And like I said, we're at one hour away. There's
only a teeny bit of India that separates us. But
by a car it would be less than an hour drive.

(21:38):
But we don't know if it will. If there was
a bridge that was over so spiritually too, like we've
always been connected, whether through Buddhism or so the geographically,
like our sustenance, our main rivers, they come from Himalaia,
so we've had that connection. I guess the people themselves

(22:02):
would be the best to answer this question, but I
didn't realize the facts till Let's just say, when I
climbed Everest, I was twenty nine years old. By the
time I came down to just the base camp, it
took us two days, and I remember my at that time.
I didn't have a smartphone. I had those pre smartphone sets,

(22:25):
but my satellite phone was just like buzzing with you know,
everything had happened. It had already because I made a
call from the summit and at six twenty six, same
And so the way it changed people's perspective on women's power,
I would say, and just that patriarchal shift that oh,
if she can do it, then anyone can. Because I

(22:48):
way before climbing Everest, I was already on the grassroots level,
somewhat known because it to my community because of my
activism and writing and you know, standing up with different causes,
and so I had some visibility and people knew where
I came from. You know what my that I was
an abandoned child. I was. You know, I had a
hard life to begin with, the education wise and just

(23:11):
career wise. I do want to talk about that. But
Bangladesh is a place where for centuries girls were discouraged
from dreaming big, discouraged from bettering themselves, married off early.
I mean, that's what's so dramatic and so stunning about
about your path is that you might have been one
of the least likely people to get get where you

(23:32):
got right. Yet I mean, in my life, I've been
told all the things that I couldn't do, instead of
telling me, you know, inspiring a little girl, that all
the things I was able to do. So it's always
like what you cannot do right. You cannot dress a
certain way, you cannot walk a certain way. I was
told I couldn't play even or as a kid. I

(23:55):
was told I couldn't ride a cycle because I would
I would lose my virginity. I couldn't play badminton because
you know, you have to keep your scarf on your
covered the front side. All these rules, right, and so
in the beginning, though people didn't believe me when I
when I started the campaign of climbing the seven Summits,
and I've had many people, actually even educated people come

(24:19):
come and say, you know, when you started it, none
of you, none of us believed you, but you proved
us all wrong. And so that coming from senior, whether
it's my dad's generation or my grandpa's generation two across
the board. And then when I came back, I will
never forget when I got back to the Bangladesh airport,
there were the amount of people that were in the airport,

(24:41):
and not just like Papa Ruzzi and like media, just
like people from my village, from my grandfather's village. This
is one of the most conservative parts of Bangladesh, and
i've in the past I was kicked out from the
village because of the activism stuff that I was doing.
They were I brought shape to the family apparently, and
so now all these people were back. They were literally

(25:05):
made that journey from my village to Bangladesh capital Dhaka
in buses with you know, like all the fanfare maskets
and things like that. They brought to Pajero cars for
me to get get with their like as if I
was going to leave my brother and go with them,
like all of this stuff was happening, and then over
the next few months or even within that week about

(25:26):
everything from marriage proposal to Bangla cinema offers to modeling
offers to brand endorsement. Like it was just a time
in my life where externally there was a lot happening.
From six in the morning to midnight, I was back
to back to back in like reception shows all of that.
But internally, I'll go into that I was going through
a really rough time because there was just so much

(25:50):
to process from a journey twenty nine thousand feet up,
you know, and then back to sea level, and externally
you had to deal with like your entire family coming
back to your life, fighting over who who's going to
take credit. And also at that time, I had to
really sit with myself because fame is great, exposure is great,

(26:13):
but it's also another distraction to your path. And I
could either choose to get you know, totally ride that
wave and forget about my campaign that was, you know, happening,
and I had, but I had to really focus and
I actually took a flight out to Nepal within two
months because I couldn't sleep like I would again wake

(26:35):
up with a lot of trauma from the mountain and
things that I realized that I had to leave that
whole scene too in order to process. If I may
just add, one of the chapters in my which I'm
riding now, is called Avalanche la Llaby. So I, like
I said, you know, when you sleep in, whether it
was on K two or ever, you're sleeping in base

(26:57):
camp on a moving chunk of glacier, right and Everest,
those who's been to base camp, the base camp is
surrounded by all these seven thousand and eight thousand meter peaks,
and so when you're on the glacier, you're constantly hearing
from left to right, like whether it's small rocks falling
to big avalanches. So like I could make a whole

(27:18):
soundtrack of it. And so that was what I heard
before going to sleep every night. And so when I
had gone back to Bangladesh, I had had developed insomnia
for a while, and the next season I went back
to Everest just to get some sleep. And you know,
officially speaking, you're not allowed to stay in base camp

(27:39):
if you don't have a permit to climb. But because
I know shape of people, and you know some of
the authorities, they let me sleep, and so I would
just sleep there for weeks while people were climbing to
the top. So it's just to say, like that mother's embrace,
it's it's Miolang Sangma who decides. The goddess who's known
to reside on the summit of ever. The mountain is

(28:01):
known as Chumuluma, and the goddess who resides in her
is Nio Langsangma. She's one of the five long living
along life giving deities in the Tibetan pantheon, and actually
four of her other sisters are in the other mountains.
I won't get into that, but Nio Langsangma is known
to give you abundance, long life and like anything you

(28:24):
wish for if you go abide by her. And I
had so many powerful encounters with that, which is going
to take more stories, but just to say that that connection,
I feel like it still exists and I was really
I did everything in my powers and knowledge to express
my surrender to her and go through all that process

(28:45):
of humbling myself, and I feel like she's given it,
given that glory to me, and she's known to give
that glory to people who goes by guy by her rules,
so to speak, absolutly know that. Sorry, go ahead, now
when you when you got back from from Everest and
you're trying to process and absorb that, um, the question came, okay,

(29:09):
you've summited at Everest. Now what about the ultimate summit? When?
When are you gonna get married? When are you gonna
gonna be embrace a conventional life. That's all well and good, weasya,
but now you need to do you know, the Bengali thing,
and you need to take a husband and have a
conventional life. And obviously that wasn't a path that that
you embraced. No. I actually thought that after Everest I

(29:30):
would get a lot of people to support me. And
so instead CEOs of companies and of course these are
educated people. They looked straight into my ends, like you've
already climbed Everest. What's the point of climbing any other mountain.
You've reached the highest mountain. And I was like, so
they don't actually get the beauty of you know, climbing,
or why we do what we do. So to them,
it's like, oh, you've reached World Cup, You've made You've

(29:53):
gotten that trophy, forget about climbing for the just now
focus on your real summit. They call it the real summit,
you know, the marriage, make some babies. And then even
after I finished seven summits, there were more emails that
I got, Oh time for your eighth summit, you know,
because every summit somehow, like after kid, you've gotten marriage proposals. Again,
it's like part of my culture. I've always you know,

(30:17):
find a lot of joy in explaining is like everything
that is marriage related. It doesn't matter if you're going
to get divorced the next day. Just just get your
things together, you know, like settle down. One of the
stories are not one, but one of the you know
encounters is like from average people, right, like people who

(30:40):
let's say a rickshaw puller. You've seen those rickshas right thing. Yeah,
so these people they don't necessarily like they're not aware
of news and stuff. So when I would walk in
the street, I've had people from rickshaw pullers to people
who's come all the way from the northern part of
the country just like on a two day journey with
their two little girls all the way to my office

(31:02):
address that was advertised and just like saying, oh, if
you can do it. Please bless my daughter so she
can also do it. Like I almost became like a oh,
bless my daughter, like like as if I was like
a peer or like a spiritual person that if I
blessed her and so. But this very you know, conservative
looking father when he's wanting to for his girls to

(31:25):
change and climb a mountain, I mean not that I
want everyone to go out and climb. I'm just saying
that that patriarchal shift is what I think where my
um I would say, the success stories are so like
a rick Sha Puller When I remember he was like,
you're the one who got up there, right, And I
was like, got up where? Because I've gotten up many places,

(31:46):
you know. But he didn't even know what the mountain
was called. You know, he just knows I'm the one
who went, and so he's like, I'll give you a
free ride, you know, Like I don't want to free ride.
I'll bet you. I bet you. You're too modest to
fully appreciate what you just said, what you related that
sent you and centuries of doctrine and cultural practice. You
changed it. By just what you did, you change this

(32:07):
man's thinking and other people's thinking about what is possible,
what's appropriate, what's acceptable just because of what you did.
So you're probably not in a place to admit that,
but it's pretty well documented, must be, so you have
to you have to receive it. Thank you. Honestly, I
was just I just didn't want to be if anything
like mountains gave me freedom, and I followed that path

(32:29):
to freedom, and by going on my journey, it just
happened to have inspired other people. And yeah, I don't. Yeah,
I think that one of the folks that inspired you
was one of the most inspirational figures in history, isn't
win us the Dalai Lama someone that you consider a
mentor and a friend, which puts you in in precious company,

(32:53):
I would think, And it wasn't. It's a Dalai Lama
that that initially pointed you towards the mountains, who saw
something in you and his wisdom this is going to
be a place for you and not a bad lead
to follow to get there. Yes, actually everything I could
talk for days on his holiness and couldn't we refer
to him as Kundun And there's actually a movie by

(33:16):
Martin Scorccy on that. So yeah, I mean there's a
lot of stories. But when I first met him in
my early twenties, I was barely twenty one, twenty two,
and it was a time in my life where you know,
I had lost my parents, My parents abandoned me. I
grew up with an aunt, and you know, like just
getting up to graduating college was really hard struggle, and

(33:39):
so I had nobody to look up to, not a
mother or father, brother, like nobody. And then fast forward
to you know, in college, I got a grant to
go to Da Damsela. And I'm not gonna go into
the whole story because I know that's longer than this
podcast will allow. But the first time I actually met him,
it was a call from his holiness office at seven

(34:02):
thirty in the morning, and I thought it was a
prank call from a friend of mine who was asking that, oh, Nazarene.
You had. First of all, no one calls me Nazerene
other than you know, official people, So half of my
mind was like, couldn't be my friend's banking. It sounds
kind of familiar, like a you know, fishier from his
Holiness's office. And the call came saying, oh, yeah, we

(34:22):
Holiness heard about what you're doing here and would like
to meet you if you're up for it. Do you
think you're up for it? And that's when I was like,
this is a joke, because I was like, of course,
I'm up for it. And then he gave me the
time to see him half an hour later, and it's
like eight in the morning and I had I was
like on the top of the hill where I was
in Dadamsella, and so I had to get ready and

(34:44):
I just so it was a very unprepared meeting, you know,
I was. It was a shock of the first meeting
I ever had with him. And so yeah, long story short.
In from our first meeting onwards, Holiness basically told me
that in his own words, that I won't do justice too.
But the gist of it was that there's a reason

(35:06):
that you're here at this age. It's not because of
accident or anything. It's everything is related to karma. And
he looked into my eyes and I was I remember,
I was shaking, and I was very nervous, and I
was like I couldn't believe that this person that you know,

(35:27):
and of course, always knowing that Tibetans themselves are not
you know, able to see their own leaders. So I'm
very privileged to get this meaning. But he looked at
my eyes he said, you're my old friend. You know
you're here for a reason. And then he did this
zap on my third eye and you know, he's super
strong and when he does that, not like necessarily physically,

(35:49):
but it's super powerful. And he said never never doubt
doubt to your own powers. And and I didn't understand
what he meant. So that was the first one. And
then you know we ended up. You know, he never

(36:10):
had a friend from Bangladesh, So I guess I got
lucky by default being a Bangladesh on your temple but
on your forehead between your eyes and tells you never
doubt your own powers. Yeah wow. So and I think
you know, And throughout many meetings, has always told me
always question everything, you know, even myself, like if I

(36:30):
tell you, just don't believe it, like question so um.
And then I was thick in the free to Bed
movement and he would call me and he should be
like when I would meet him, he's like, this is
not your fight. You're supposed to lead the women of Bangladesh.
And I always you know, in my early twenties, I
was really hot, rebel, like you wouldn't recognize me, seriously, Chris,

(36:51):
if you met me in twenties. I was doing all
this crazy stuff or walking into China, you know, like
military everywhere, with a flag in my backpack. And so
he was trying to keep me safe and he said,
you know, I thought he was trying to keep me safe,
but he actually saw what I was going to do.
And you know, at that time, I was climbing only
like five thousand and six thousand meter peaks which are

(37:13):
all over the Nepal and him Alayan range. And so
this the part that you were talking about, it actually
came through a different conversation where he told me he
made me reflect on my memories with my parents because
I needed to get forgiveness from them, and I had

(37:36):
no memories with my mother that was happy. And when
I told that to him, he said, she carried you
for nine months, didn't she? And you know at that
time I was super angry because I wasn't well. She
walked out on you when you're twelve or thirteen years
old to escape a marriage with no warning, and you
have said that she was not just your mother or

(37:57):
your nurture or she was your teacher in many thing
she was. She was everything to you and one day
she's gone and you don't see her for years after that. Yeah.
And another additional thing is that I actually helped her
in that affair and who she ended up, you know,
fleeing with. But she could have just had that conversation

(38:18):
with me and left and not to leave, you know, um,
And then I didn't see her till you know, I
found her when I was twenty seven. So anyway, so
when she when he asked me that, I was like, okay,
I was trying to visualize myself in her womb and
find forgiveness. And then the second line of that was like,
but your real mother is really this this mother Earth. No,

(38:39):
you find freedom in the mountains, you know. And so
he never, you know, holiness is not known to impose
anything on you. He would never say, oh, you should
be doing this, or he just puts these thoughts and
seeds and then you go on your own journey to
find And then that gave me confidence in the mountains.

(38:59):
But then whichever mountain I've ever climbed, even though if
they were outside the Himalays, I've always went for with
his blessing holiness is. In fact, you know, he's given
me several amulets offered specific mountains, especially for Everest. Throughout
that time, he sent me with several protection cords and
a special prayer to the goddess. And I was, you know,

(39:24):
I was like, what do I bring from the mountain
for his Holiness? So I carried some ice from the summit,
put it in a bottle, and by the time it
went from the summit of Everest to cut Mundu, to Bangad,
to Delhi to Dharamsala, I put it in a nice
like what do you call them, like like a nice
container to hold it. It was thinking by the time

(39:46):
it was in daram Sala and I was like, I
remember walking into that line to get give it to him.
I was like, in my mind, I was like, whatever
you do, Holiness, don't drink this, okay, Like in my mind,
I was just saying that. And then when when his
secretary kind of just told him in his ears, he
saw that and he started prostrating to the water, and

(40:08):
that's when I that was a moment when I realized
what me along Sama means. So I was holding this
and I was trying to prostraute too, because there's the
Dalla Lama and all this, you know, m Dalla the
llamas and helpers came out, and then he does this
offering to the sky. And then the first thing he
does is puts it in them out and I'm like,
oh my god, I hope nothing happens to him, because

(40:30):
now I'm going to be marked as a Chinese spike.
But nothing happened. And then he, you know, he did
this nice walk and then offered it to the altar.
And then the other thing I had done was like
on the Tibets, so those who may not know, the
border of Tibet and Nepal kind of goes right over

(40:51):
the summit, and I was not allowed. I would got
banned from Tibet another whole story back in two thousand
and seven, and I was told that I was never
allowed to step back into Tibet. And so on the
summit I went, me and Nima, who I was climbing
with Nima Goverment Shepa. We rappled one hundred meters down
just so I could officially say inside Tibet, you know.

(41:12):
And I took the picture of the Dalai Lama from
the cover book of So I was basically kicked out
in two thousand and seven because I had this meditation
book called The Art of Happiness with the Lama's cover
on it. So I told that cover and I took
it to the Tibet side and I took a picture
with it, saying that, you know, I did step back
into Tibet. I felt better doing that than the summit itself,

(41:35):
because I don't think anyone has a right to tell
me whose thoughts I can subscribe to. So I gave
a picture of that to Dalai Lama, along with the
three sixty View of Tibet, his homeline that he hadn't
ever you know, seen in the last sixty years. He
got super quiet, and I don't think I've ever seen
him this emotional looking back at Tibet pictures. But then

(42:00):
and the official pictures were supposed to happen, you know,
he chose that picture of me holding a picture of
him inside Tibet, and there's actually a picture of him
holding a picture of me holding a picture of him
on top of Tibet. And he was like, because he's
really a calm rebel, you know, like's if anything, he's
like the disruptor what he's achieved in this life and

(42:21):
so but he's just very gentle one on the outside.
But any tricks that I've learned as an active as
it's all from his holding and dal Alama, who who's
very skillful at it, to be able to move him
in that way by showing him a picture of you
on the top must be No one has more facets

(42:41):
to their climb of Mount Everest and and maybe a
closer connection to the mount other than maybe the sharpers
who grew up in the shadow of it than you.
That is, that's incredible. You mentioned a couple of things
that I do want to circle back on with your indulgence.
You talked earlier about COVID nineteen. Here you are, your

(43:03):
lungs have been tested to the ultimate degree, some of
the strongest lungs in the world. COVID is downplayed by
millions of people. If they didn't lose someone to the disease,
if they didn't get it themselves, if they're symptoms are mild,
they tend to not really understand. You were deeply affected
by it, as you said, you had a near death

(43:25):
experience suffering from it. And then I want you to
also talk about how that experience helped you process and
heal some of the earlier trauma that you've been carrying
around for a long time. When COVID hit, yeah, I
almost died, but then the recovery after that was eighteen
months in between, which I was not able to travel

(43:49):
anywhere outside US. But my father also died during that time,
and you know, I've had not the healthiest relationship with
him growing up, and so from the time that I
had COVID, my father was calling me on a daily basis,
So we kind of had our closure and forgiveness in

(44:10):
that whole time that I was recovering, and the whole
incident made me and thank god I was in LA
because I had the resources which I didn't necessarily have
in Manadican Nepal. It's like, you know, all the therapy
work that I had done in my adult life, it
was from the time that my mother had left from
the age of twelve onwards, but I had never addressed

(44:33):
the little girl who was actually being raised by a
very narcissist personality and what had happened to that little child.
And so during that time of recovering physically, I also
had my teachers. In my teacher's word, it was like
clearing twenty years of karma. I did so much deep work.

(44:54):
It's like when I look back at just two years ago,
I was in a totally different form I would say incarnation.
I call it the BC era before COVID era. Um,
so it's a it is a different incarnation that I
feel right now and I think and now, you know,
you can't stop me from watching TV. I actually enjoy

(45:16):
it so much and I've I really feel like I've
been on the other side. So going back to key
to doing this big climb with those lungs, which was
you know, I've been to smaller mountains five thousand and
six thousand meters, and I've been to every space camp
after that. But K two was a full circle spiritually
speaking and physically speaking to you talk about, you know,

(45:40):
doing the work and dealing with the trauma for people
who maybe experienced trauma of their own, maybe not quite
as dramatic, maybe not over a period of amount of time,
and they don't have COVID to use as a as
a reset button to get there. What is the message
want sphere for people to get through a dark place

(46:01):
when they really don't see a path forward. They just
feel what they're feeling in the moment, and they feel
like those feelings will be permanent. One of the things
that really helped me is like reflecting on impermanence of
all things. Nothing that we feel is permanent. It's just

(46:23):
it's it's it's a temporary feeling. And you know, I
just want everyone to know that it doesn't matter. And
as clicie as it sounds like, it doesn't matter what
circumstance you're stuck in right now, and it may seem
like the end of the world, but this is not it.
You know, just to keep the faith that the reason

(46:44):
why it's happening is there's a greater lesson out of
it and you're going to come out much more stronger
than ever before. And I truly believe that we are
only given what we can handle. So like just within
my own family, what my brother and I went through
was completely different, but I was given a specific I

(47:04):
was giving a specific lesson to learn, so to speak,
only I could have learned from my existence. And so
when we you know, it's easy to compare with other
people and think that it's only happening to us, but
It's important to also remember that we are powerful beyond
our measure and like we don't know what our mind
and body is actually able to achieve, and so never

(47:27):
give up, never give up hope, and really reflect on
impermanence of all things. Well, the power of your example,
your achievement, the power of your deeds and words together
is incredible and it has proven to be for many millions.
What is the current focus of your activism? You've done

(47:51):
so much, whether it's a climate change for girls in
your country and elsewhere, but what is the folk Because
I'm the up going for where where do you intend
to try to make the biggest impact? Okay, So, like
you know, when I was doing seven summons, there was
no role models, especially no person that looked like me,

(48:15):
a brown woman. So put into perspective in the exploration family,
I am like the lowest of the hierarchy because if
I miss, it's ruled by like white male said, it's
a very intimidating field to be in. And I feel
like I have an obligation and duty to tell my stories,
not only my stories, but also highlights stories of other

(48:38):
women in general, but also the diversity of it all.
And you know this, like in ever in general, in
the Himalayan industry, it's there's kind of been a culture
of Oh, when I say culture, I mean because it's
dominated by a Western audience or climbers. There's been a

(48:58):
culture of it's our way and the it's or no way.
You know, it's our ways the high highway. But in
that process there was there's been decades of discrimination, decades
of like imagine, like I introduced you to a friend
of mine, la Parita Sherpa. Nobody nobody knows about la

(49:18):
Parita Sherp, but like he or very few people like
imagine what la Parita Sherpa and his younger brother Kamiapa,
who's the twenty six Everest Summit holders, just out of
his many other achievements, if any white person would have
achieved half of what they have, they would be plastered
all over. So I feel like those stories need to

(49:39):
be told. So right now I am working on storytelling
of all format, whether that comes through books, films, TV shows,
podcasts like this. I think it's really important to tell
our stories and our way how it happened. And yeah,
so I don't necessarily think like go it as a

(50:00):
legacy per se but that's where my work is. But
I also have a little foundation where you know, we
kind of we kind of stopped during the pandemic, but
we're restarting to you know, increase the carbon not carbon footprint, sorry,
but increase the women's you know, um, because a lot

(50:22):
of times a woman from especially from Asia wouldn't even
dare to get there because they haven't gotten the resources.
Like I started with borrowed gears. In my own career,
you know, I had slept in day to bank loans
and personal loans to make ends meet. I was bankrupted
for several months till I started paying things off. But

(50:45):
I don't want anyone to have that kind of struggle
to attempt a mountain. And so we're creating these scholarships
through the programs Bioso Foundation, where I hope that in
at least in the next couple of years, we'll be
able to send more women and grow, not necessarily to
high altitude mountains, but really learn the games of the outdoors,
because I think there needs to be Mother Earth should

(51:07):
be free for exploration for everyone, anyone and everyone, and
it shouldn't be an elite sport for only a privileged
one group, you're told. That's what you've told girls, that
a mountain need not be eight thousand meters of rock
and ice. A mountain can be anything. It can do.
It can be obviously a wonderful metaphor for climbing and sending,
achieving and standing somewhere that people told you couldn't stand.

(51:31):
So yeah, and that message is received. You believe that
the people you talk to, the young girls understand that
whatever their mountain is, they can get there. Oh absolutely,
And actually not just for the girl. So when you
educate and a girl, you educate a whole village for sure.
Like for example, some of the girls that did the
two year program to my foundation, they are now leaders

(51:53):
in their own village. And because you know they've gotten
the seal of approval, they have now that power to
command and whether it's about educating their village about how
to take measures for climate crisis like in all their fields,
it's so they so in my culture especial especially, our
decisions are always taken by others. So just to have

(52:17):
that courage to take your own decision is a huge
mountain for many girls to climb. So mountains is just
an analogy, right, So it's a metaphor, so and it's
a great metaphor for anyone facing any obstacles. So I
try to use that metaphor to translate to the public
that if I can physically do it, you can climb
the mountain, whatever mountain you're climbing right now, on the daily,

(52:40):
you're able to climb climate. And I feel like for
girls to like, alongside girls and women, we also need
to educate the boys and men and you know, have them.
I don't believe in feminism that completely excludes males as
different species altogether. I think it needs to be a

(53:02):
combined effort. So we try to and in fact, in
our foundation, there's a lot of request from youth in general,
like of all genders that APPU like APPU means older system,
like please start something for the men, like what did
we do? Like we want to be part of it.
So I'm just you know, at this point where I'm
trying to restructure the foundation where it can be more
inclusive to everyone. But I can only do what I can,

(53:27):
so we'll see where it goes in the next five years.
But I just to answer your question, I think it's
working through different generations, old and the young so um
and we need that your path continues as all of
our paths continue. You've been on top of the world,
You've achieved all these things. What form will adventure take

(53:50):
for you next? What inspires you? What? What challenges you? What?
What is there to do that people have said last
for you? You've done, but you can't do this next thing?
What inspires you that way? Oh? Yeah, I don't think
of it that way. The problem with falling in love
with the humanize is like, once you fall in love

(54:10):
with the humanize, there's just nowhere else you're going to
find peace. And yeah, I love Los Angeles and I
love the crew here, but every day that I exist
here or any any other city, I'm visualizing the next mountain,
you know. And yes, on a physical level, it is
a high, but it's also mentally, like I said, it

(54:31):
really transforms you, right. And so after K two to
be Frank, I was actually supposed to be on an
eight thousand major this season and I backed off. And
it was a huge decision for me because it's you know,
if you ask me now, why you do want to
go climb Manapurna, I would be like, yeah, Chris, that's
what I want to do. So I'm really holding myself
back because I think one of the mistakes, or not mistakes,

(54:54):
one of the things I would have liked to redo
with my seven summits that I didn't tell the stories
right then and there and as it happened because I
was just dealing with so much. So with Kay two,
I really want to do justice to Kat and process this,
and I was we were discussing this before the recording.
It's like I'm currently making as we're making the future Dog,

(55:14):
I'm also process. It's like therapy because I'm going through
the entire thing in a deeper level that I've never done,
and I want to want this chapter to be finished
before just getting distracted and going in that back to
back to back mode that I used to Pecy Well
the Himla or Timeless and they're actually still growing incrementally

(55:36):
every year, so that also is a good metaphor. I
wish you continued adventures and your example continues to be
a tremendous speaking for lots of people, and also I
have a lot of fun to speak to, So thank
you for sharing your stories and your wisdom. Thank you
so much for having me Chris I really really appreciate it.

(55:59):
I want to tell you this, Wopha's deep knowledge of
Nepal and very generous spirit have been an enormous help
to me as I have planned my own return to
the Kumboo Everest region this spring, twenty five years after
my brother Drew and I had a life changing trip there,
trekking and climbing some smaller mountains around Everest and visiting

(56:19):
base Camp. I cannot wait to get back there next month.
I appreciate the Wapa puts the spotlight on some of
the true heroes of the Himalayas, the local Cherpa people
who guide and protect climbers and who summited the big
peaks more than anyone. We were only able to cover
a portion of her incredible life in this episode. I

(56:39):
hope you'll visit Waspia nasreen dot com. Her website has
her writings, photography, and a link to a short film
Wasphia that is stunningly beautiful. Check that out. She's also
active on Instagram at Wasphia and Nazareen, and keep an
eye out. She's got some very exciting projects in the works.
As always, thanks to my co executive producer Jennifer Dempster

(57:01):
and the folks at Octagon. I'll talk to you soon
for more of season six of Fowler. Who You Got