By STEPHEN REGENOLD
A subterranean stream gurgles in the glacial ice beneath my feet. An avalanche crashes, ice pillars tumbling down, in the Khumbu Icefall above. Welcome to Base Camp at Mount Everest, a tent city at 17,500 feet and home to more than 1,200 seasonal residents clad in down jackets and mountain boots. There are climbers and guides, Sherpas and cooks, porters, doctors, and at least one world-famous photographer/cinematographer who this week will erect a huge tent featuring hung prints for what he is calling “the highest photo show on the planet.”
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Expedition Hanesbrands, which arrived here on April 10, makes up just a handful of the high-altitude populous. So far, our encampment — a dozen tents staked in the middle of Base Camp — includes a giant geodesic dome, a cook tent, a dining room, a communication tent with computers, satellite modems and solar-power plug-ins, and a handful of personal tents to serve as sleeping quarters.
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This morning, after an elaborate Puja ceremony with a Sherpa lama (priest), a 20-foot wooden pole was hoisted up from Expedition Hanesbrands’ stone chorten. The Buddhist monument, a physical and spiritual anchor in the camp, is streamed with prayer flags, hundreds of yellow, red, blue, and green squares flapping and sending out prayers in wind that whips down Everest’s face. “To me, the Puja marks the official start of the expedition,” said Jamie Clarke, lead climber. “We feel like we’re now allowed to go onto the mountain above.”
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The lama is a busy man. His chanting, rice throwing, cymbal beating, and blessing of the climbers well be a ceremony heard throughout Base Camp this week. In all, there are some 300 foreign climbers on Mount Everest this season. At least that many Sherpa climbers and guides will accompany the Canadians, Americans, Indians, Koreans, Argentinean, and other aspirants of the 29,035-foot peak in the sky.
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