SUNDAR SHRESTHA

The Himalmedia flag flew high atop Chomolungma on 25 May. Himal Khabarpatrika reporter Shailee Basnet managed to scale the world's highest peak together with the nine other women of the First Inclusive Women's Sagarmatha Expedition. FIWSE, started out as the brainchild of team leader Sushmita Maskey, and included women from various regions, from the lowland Tarais to the high mountains, various ethnicities including Newar, Chettri, Bahun, Danuwar, Gurung and Sherpas, and backgrounds from a model to journalist.

Before the attempt, the closest Shailee had come to mountains was writing about them, but after meeting Sushmita Maskey on a reporting assignment, Shailee knew that she had to join the women on their quest for the highest peak.

A reporter on youth culture, mountaineering and city living, Shailee is now the first female Nepali reporter to scale Chomolungma in a season mired by controversy over the government's closure of the peak under pressure from China.

According to her parents, Shailee hadn't even told them about the attempt, instead saying that she was accompanying the group on a reporting assignment. It was only after all the publicity that Shailee actually sat them down and told them the truth. "Come back the same way you went up," was all they told her. Putting her budding reporter's career on hold, Shailee joined the expedition and underwent a gruelling 10 months training program, including a training ascent of Yala peak, to prepare herself for the climb.

All ten member s of FIWSE have managed to scale Chomolungma. The other nine are Sushmita Maskey, Usha Bista, Ashakumari Singh Chaudhari, Nimdolma Sherpa, Maya Gurung, Pemadikki Sherpa, Pujan Acharya, Nawang Phutti Sherpa and Chunnu Shrestha.