Sir Edmund Hillary, 1919 - 2008

"Because it is there"
George Mallory (1886-1924), answer to the question 'Why do you want to climb Mt. Everest?

* Hillary announcing to his climbing companions that he and Tenzing had reached Everest's summit:

"We knocked the bastard off."

* On life's inner challenges:

"It is not the mountains that we conquer, but ourselves."

* On the motivation for climbing mountains:

"Nobody climbs mountains for scientific reasons. Science is used to raise money for the expeditions, but you really climb for the hell of it."

* On what is attainable by Everyman:

"You don't have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things -- to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals."



"..My dreams were almost all adventurous dreams. I was not lonely, but I didn't really have many friends, and I used to go on long walks. I was a very keen walker and, as I walked along the roads and tracks around this countryside area, I'd be dreaming. My mind would be miles away and I would be slashing villains with swords and capturing beautiful maidens and doing all sorts of heroic things, just purely in my dreams. I used to love to walk for hours and hours and my mind would be far away in all sorts of heroic efforts..."

* On the changes fame brings:

"I used to walk down Broadway, Papakura, in my tattered overalls and the seat out of my pants. Now, I thought 'That's gone forever. I'll have to buy a new pair of overalls now'."

"The highest of the world's mountains, it seems, has to make but a single gesture of magnificence to be the lord of all, vast in unchallenged and isolated supremacy."
George Mallory, 1924



"I have climbed my mountain ,but I must still live my life"
Tenzing Norgay

* On his reasons for establishing his humanitarian project, the Himalayan Trust, to assist the impoverished in Nepal:

"It is impossible not to see that they lack all the things that we regard as essential in life. They don't have schools and they don't have any medical care or anything of this nature. And I suddenly decided that instead of just talking about it - why didn't I try and do something about it."

Om Mani Padme Hum