Edmund Hillary: The Man Who Conquered Mt. Everest

Youth and personal struggles

Sir Edmund Hillary was born in Auckland, New Zealand on 20th July 1919. Being naturally curious and intelligent he finished primary school two years early. Although his parents were proud of him, to Edmund his scholarly achievements turned into one of his biggest problems. In high school he was smaller than his peers and very shy, which often made him the object of his classmate’s pranks. His grades went down. He did not have many friends to hang out with and, therefore, took refuge in his books and daydreams about life full of adventures.

Edmund slowly regained his confidence as he learned boxing. At the age of 16 during a school trip to Mount Ruapehu, he got interested in mountain climbing. And even  though he was gangly and uncoordinated, he had something many of his contemporaries lacked – physical strength, unbendable will and surprising mental endurance.

From beekeeper to professional mountain climber

In 1939, at the age of 20, Hillary 1939 completed his first major climb, reaching the summit of Mount Ollivier, in the Southern Alps. After graduating from The University of Auckland, where he studied mathematics and science he became a beekeeper with his brother Rex. This was not his dream job, but it allowed him to climb mountains in winter, while working during the summer time.

World War II

This existence did not last long as the World War II started. At first Hillary applied to join the air force, but some days later withdrew the application, because as he said later “I was harassed by religious conscience”. Although, in 1943, following conscription on the outbreak of war in the Pacific, Hillary joined the Royal New Zealand Air Force and trained to be a navigator. He spent his free time climbing whenever he had the opportunity.

In 1945 he was sent to Fiji and to the Solomon Islands where he was badly burnt in a boat accident, after which he was repatriated to New Zealand.

He spent the next few years climbing in the Southern Alps and in 1949 traveled to Europe to conquer the Austrian and Swiss Alps.

“Knocking off” Mount Everest

In 1951 Hillary joined a New Zealand expedition heading for the Himalayas, where he got the reputation as a skilled climber. Over time he climbed 11 different peaks of over 20,000 feet in the Himalayas – each bringing him a little closer to the dream of his life – Mount Everest – the highest mountain in the world.

The opportunity presented itself in 1953 when Hillary was invited to join an expedition to the top of Mount Everest and he accepted right away. In May, the expedition reached the South Peak. Here most of the climbers were forced to turn back by exhaustion due to the high altitude. The only two people who were able to make the final assault on the summit were Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, a native Nepalese climber.

At 11:30 a.m. of May 29, 1953, Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit, 29,028 feet above sea level, and the highest spot on earth!

From mountain climber to a knight

“We’ve knocked the bastard off!” were the first words Sir Edmund Hillary said to a fellow climber in announcing his achievement at being the first man to successfully climb Mt Everest. By coincidence, the conquest of Everest was announced to the British public on the eve of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Edmund Hillary returned to Britain with the other climbers and on 6th June 1953 was knighted by the Queen!

Hillary spent very little time enjoying his popularity and new title and two years later led the New Zealand section of the Trans-Antarctic expedition.

In 1958 he participated in the first mechanized expedition to the South Pole.

Humanitarian work and personal example of humility

After his famous achievements, Sir Edmund, spent decades pouring energy and resources from his own fundraising efforts into Nepal through the Himalayan Trust he founded in 1962, building hospitals, health clinics, airfields and 17 schools.

During his life time Sir Edmund Hillary published several books: “The Ascent of Everest” in 1953, “Nothing Venture, Nothing Win” in 1975 and “From the Ocean to the Sky” in 1979 (an account of his 1977 expedition on the Ganges river from its mouth to its source in the Himalayas).

Sir Edmund’s life was darkened by the loss of his wife and daughter in a plane crash in 1975. He continued to occupy himself with environmental causes and humanitarian work on the behalf of the Nepalese people for the rest of his life.

From 1985 to 1988 he served as New Zealand’s high commissioner to India, Nepal, and Bangladesh. Over the years numerous other honours were bestowed on him, including member of the Order of New Zealand in 1987 and the Order of the Garter in 1995.

Sir Edward Hillary died of heart failure, on 11 January 2008, at the age of 88.

In spite of world fame and numerous rewards he always described himself as “an average New Zealander with modest abilities”.

Later in life when asked by a reporters “What was the most difficult part of your adventure?”, Hillary replied “Strong motivation is the most important factor in getting you to the top.” I wonder if he was referring solely to the Mt. Everest…

Sir Edward Hillary Quotes:

“It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.”

“You don’t have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things – to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated.”

“People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.”

Mother Teresa: The Tiny Woman With A Big Heart

Early years and inner calling

Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, known to most of us as Mother Teresa, was born on August 27th, 1910 in Skopje, Kosovo (now the Republic of Macedonia). Very little is known about her younger years, except that her father died when Agnes was only 8 years old, and her mother had to assume responsibility for the whole family.

When she was 18, she started to think of becoming a nun and soon left her parental home and travelled to India to join the Sisters of Loreto as a missionary. She never saw her mother or her sister again.

In 1929, after training in Dublin, she began her novitiate in Darjeeling, where two years later she took her first religious vows as a nun, choosing the name of Teresa (after  Terese of Lisieux). This was the day, when one chapter of her life closed and another one began.

A life of a nun

Shortly after taking her vows Sister Teresa was sent to St. Mary’s High School for girls in a district of Calcutta, where she taught history and geography for 15 years. However, the protective environment of the school for the daughters of the wealthy could not hide the sufferings and poverty of the ordinary people of Calcutta. Sister Teresa’s heart ached every time she glimpsed outside the convent walls, and saw that no one was doing anything for the people dying on the streets from hunger and disease.

The calling within a calling

On 10th September 1946, while travelling from Calcutta to Darjeeling for the annual retreat, Teresa experienced what she later described as “the call within the call”. She was to leave the Loreto and “follow Christ into the slums to serve him among the poorest of the poor.”

The same year she did the unthinkable – she asked to be released formally from living within the convent of the Sisters of Loreto to serve God in a different way.  In 1948 she received permission from Pius XII to leave her community and become an independent nun.

She took a nursing course in Patna, adopted Indian citizenship and left the comfort and safety of the convent to follow her calling. As to clothing, she replaced her habit with a simple white cotton sari decorated with a blue border.

Beginning of missionary work.

The first six months, as Mother Teresa, later recalled, were fraught with hardship and struggle. Since she had left the convent, she had no income and was at first forced to beg for food and supplies.  But this experience only brought her closer to the poor people and strengthened her decision to serve them and lessen their sufferings.

She started small – teaching children of the slums how to read and write. She had no proper equipment or proper school room, so she made use of what was available – writing with sticks in the dirt. Gradually, she also started to visit the ill and poor in their families, gaining their trust and admiration. Very often she felt exhausted by the end of the day, but she never omitted her prayers, finding in them strength, inspiration and support to continue her mission.

A Movement Begins…

In less than a year news about Teresa’s work spread across the city and soon inspired by her example, many people came to volunteer their services, offer food, clothing, medical supplies or money.

On October 7th, 1950, Mother Teresa received official permission from the Holy See to start her own order, “The Missionaries of Charity”, whose primary task was to love and care for those people nobody else was prepared to look after. Nourished by Mother Teresa’s faith, compassion and enthusiasm more and more homes for the dying, treatment centers, hospitals, centers and refuges for orphans, for alcoholics, and for homeless people opened all over India.

In 1963 the Indian government awarded Mother Teresa the title Padmashri (“Lord of the Lotus”) for her services to the people of India. In 1964, on his trip to India, Pope Paul VI gave her his ceremonial limousine, which she immediately raffled to help finance her leper colony.

A year later she requested from Pope Paul VI an expansion of her order into other countries, and it was granted. It did not take long for The Missionaries of Charity to open homes all over the world.

Acknowledgement of Mother Teresa’s efforts

Mother Teresa’s work did not go unnoticed. She not only aroused considerable attention throughout the world, but also received a number of awards and distinctions: including a Peace Prize from the Pope John XXIII in 1971, the Nehru Prize for her promotion of international peace and understanding in 1972, and the Balzan Prize for promoting peace and brotherhood among the nations in 1979.

But one of the most notorious rewards has been the Nobel Prize “for work undertaken in the struggle to overcome poverty and distress, which also constitute a threat to peace.” Mother Teresa refused the conventional ceremonial banquet given to laureates, and asked that the $6,000 funds be given to the poor in Calcutta.

During the award ceremony, one of the journalists asked her, “What can we do to promote world peace?”

Her answer was simple: “Go home and love your family.”

Struggles and criticism

While she has been praised by many individuals, governments and organizations, she has also faced a diverse range of criticism. In one of the articles published by the German magazine Stern, she was accused of not focusing donated money on alleviating poverty or improving the conditions of her hospices, but on opening new convents and increasing missionary work.

Some of the objections also included baptisms of the dying, her strong anti-abortion and anti-divorce stance, and a belief in the spiritual goodness of poverty. She was also criticized for accepting donations from people involved in corruption and fraud.

Her response to all the accusations was simple, “No matter who says what, you should accept it with a smile and do your own work.”

Mother Teresa, herself, never found it necessary to attack the economic or political structures that were responsible for not providing adequate welfare and medical conditions for the terribly poor people she was serving. For her, the primary rule was a constant love, no matter where she was and who was in front of her.

Declining health and death

During the last two decades of her life Mother Teresa suffered two heart attacks, but nothing could dissuade her from fulfilling her mission of serving the poor, depending only on God for all of her needs. She traveled to assist the hungry in Ethiopia, radiation victims in Chernobyl, and earthquake victims in Armenia.

In April 1996, Mother Teresa fell and broke her collar bone. In August she suffered from malaria and failure of the left heart ventricle. She had heart surgery, but it was clear that her health was declining every day.  She spent her final weeks in Calcutta receiving visitors and instructing her Sisters.

Mother Teresa died on 5th September, 1997, only 9 days after celebrating her 87th Birthday.  Her body was buried in the Mother House of the Missionaries of Charity and her tomb quickly became a place of pilgrimage for people of all faiths, cultures and backgrounds.

In October 2003 Mother Teresa was formally beatified by Pope John Paul II and is now known as Blessed Teresa of Calcutta.

Mother Teresa’s Inheritance

Someone once said that “You can inherit an organization, you can inherit money or world fame, but you can never inherit love and compassion”. This is what made Mother Teresa’s work so different from many non-profit organizations around the world.

After her death she left to the world an inheritance of 610 missions in 123 countries, including hospices and homes for people with HIV/AIDS, leprosy and tuberculosis, children’s and family counseling programs, orphanages, and schools.

While for so many people she has been a “mother to the poor,” and a symbol of compassion to the world, in her own eyes she was only “God’s pencil—a tiny bit of pencil with which he writes what he likes.”

Mother Teresa’s Quotes

“Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies. “

“Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be the living expression of God’s kindness: kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in your smile.”

“Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person. “

“It is not the magnitude of our actions but the amount of love that is put into them that matters.”

“Even the rich are hungry for love, for being cared for, for being wanted, for having someone to call their own.”

“Everytime you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.”

“God doesn’t require us to succeed; he only requires that you try. “

“I know God will not give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish that He didn’t trust me so much.”

“If you judge people, you have no time to love them.”

“We cannot do great things on this Earth, only small things with great love.”

Alexander Graham Bell: The Man Who Made Phone Calls Possible

A Boy Who Wanted a Middle Name

Alexander Graham Bell was born on March 3rd, 1847, in Edinburgh, Scotland. His father, Alexander Melville Bell, was an expert on the mechanics of the voice and on elocution (the art of public speaking). He dedicated his life to teaching deaf people to speak by using his “Visible speech” method (showing illustrations of speaking positions of the tongue and lips when making a sound). Bell’s mother Eliza was an accomplished pianist and painter, who passed on to her son a passion for music and art.

When Alexander was 10 years old he decided that he wanted to have a middle name like his two brothers, Melville James and Edward Charles. For his 11th birthday, after some negotiating, Bell’s father finally gave in and allowed him to adopt the middle name “Graham”. However, to his family members the newly-fledged Alexander Graham still remained “Aleck”.

When Bell was only 12 his mother’s hearing started to deteriorate rapidly and to include her in family conversations, Bell not only learned a manual finger language, but also developed a technique of speaking in clear, modulated tones directly onto his mother’s forehead. Later his experience and interest for acoustics would prove to be very valuable not only in his career, but also his personal life.

Family Tragedy and a New Start

After graduating from University College London, England, Bell became his father’s assistant, helping deaf people learn how to talk.

When Bell was only 23 years old, both of his brothers died of tuberculosis within the span of four months and Bell himself was battling with the disease. In 1870 his parents, not wanting to lose their last son, convinced Bell to move with them to Canada, where he quickly recovered his health.

In 1871 Bell went to Boston, Massachusetts, to teach at the Sarah Fuller’s School for the Deaf, the first such school in the world. He also tutored private students, including Helen Keller, who would later dedicate her autobiography to him.

In 1873 Alexander Graham Bell became a professor at Boston University. Around this time he me 15-year old Mabel Hubbard who had been deaf from birth, and who 5 years later became his wife.

Invention of the Telephone

From 1873 Bell worked on numerous inventions, including an electric speaking telegraph (the telephone), but he did not have the equipment, nor mechanical knowledge needed to continue his experiments.

The problem was resolved when in 1874, Bell met Thomas A. Watson – an experienced designer and mechanic, who agreed to make parts and who built models of Bell’s inventions. Together they built a telegraph that could send several messages at once over one wire as well as a telephonic-telegraphic receiver.

Both Bell and Watson knew that they had to work quickly as other scientists were also focusing on making a device able to transmit a human voice.

On February 14th, 1876 Bell applied for a patent on his telephone, beating Elisha Gray by several hours. Less than a month later one of the most valuable patents ever was issued, opening a new age in communications technology and allowing Bell to continue his work.

It is said that on March 10th, 1876 Bell accidentally knocked over battery acid that was being used as a transmitting liquid. Reacting to the spilled acid, Bell shouted “Mr. Watson, come here. I want you!”

Watson, working in the next room, heard Bell’s voice through the wire and quickly went to answer it. Ironically this became the first phrase ever transmitted over the telephone.

Western Union’s Biggest Mistake

In 1876 Bell and his partners, offered to sell the telephone patent to Western Union – the titan in the field of telegraphy for $100,000. The president of Western Union declined, considering the telephone to be nothing but a toy. Two years later, he told colleagues that if he could get the patent for $25 million he would consider it a bargain. Unfortunately for him by then, the Bell Company no longer wanted to sell the patent.

Trying to make up for their mistake Western Union Telegraph Company hired two prominent inventors – Thomas A. Edison and Elisha Gray to develop their own telephone technology. Looking to protect its rights Bell Telephone Company (which would eventually become AT&T) sued Western Union and won.

In 1877 the first telephone was installed in a private home. The same year, while on his honeymoon in Europe, Bell showed his invention to Queen Victoria of England who then wanted lines to connect her castles.

In 1878, US president Rutherford B. Hayes ordered telephones installed in the White House and less than 30 years later nearly all of the United State had telephone service.

Immunity to Wealth and Dedication to Science

Bell was in his late thirties when he became one of the wealthiest and most influential people of his time. However, money and public acknowledgement did little to change Bell’s interests and lifestyle. Tired of his constant appearances in court due to legal battles, Bell resigned from the company and concentrated his efforts on making new inventions.

During his lifetime Bell received 18 patents that ranged from photophones to aerial vehicles to selenium cells, invented the gramophone, the audiometer (which helped to detect minor hearing problems) and built the first metal detector. He also anticipated modern concerns with fuel shortages and industrial pollution, finding alternative fuels and doing extensive research on how to separate salt  from seawater.

Eager to share his love for science and the natural world, Bell lent considerable financial support to such magazines as Science and National Geographic.

Upon Bell’s death on August 2nd, 1922, the nation’s phones stilled their ringing for a silent minute in tribute to the man whose yearning to communicate made them possible.

Alexander Graham Bell’s Quotes:

“A man, as a general rule, owes very little to what he is born with – a man is what he makes of himself.”

“Before anything else, preparation is the key to success.”

“What this power is, I cannot say. All I know is that it exists…and it becomes available only when you are in that state of mind in which you know exactly what you want…and are fully determined not to quit until you get it.”

“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.”

“Sometimes we stare so long at a door that is closing that we see too late the one that

J.K. Rowling: The Woman of a “Magic” Success

Joanne Rowling was born on July 31st in 1965 in Chipping Sodury, near Bristol, England. As a little girl she loved writing fantasy stories and then telling them to her little sister Di.

When Jo was nine her parents, both Londoners, turned their longtime country-living dream into reality and the whole family moved to the Gloucestershire village of Tutshill, close to the border of Wales. The girl loved the freedom and simplicity of the countryside. The only problem with her new life was her school. The building was old and outdated and the stern, unfriendly teachers scared the girl. However, with time Rowling made new friends and embraced writing as a hobby.

University Years and the Worst Secretary Ever

After graduating from Wyedean Comprehensive School in 1983, Rowling left home to study at the University of Exeter, on the south coast of England. What she really wanted was to study English; her parents, however insisted that she study something “more useful”. As a result a compromise was found that in retrospect satisfied nobody and Joanne went to study French.
The benefit of majoring in French and Classics was the possibility of spending a year in Paris as part of the program.

After getting her BA, Rowling took various jobs in London. One of them was a bilingual secretary position at Amnesty International, where she made two major observations: first, that she could use a computer to type her stories during quiet times; second, that she was “the worst secretary ever “. Instead of taking notes at meetings she was actually writing down story ideas for her books.

The birth of Harry Potter.

The idea of writing, what was destined to become the world’s most popular book, came to Rowling quite unexpectedly. Stuck on a train trip from Manchester to London for four hours she dreamed up a story of a young boy attending a wizardry school, named Harry Potter. Characters and situations came flooding into her head and as it often happens, Rowling did not have a pen to write all these ideas down. As soon as she had reached her Clapham Junction flat, she rushed to her typing machine to write, afraid of forgetting even the smallest detail of the story. She had never been so excited about writing a book.

Life’s ups and downs.

In December 1990 Rowling’s mother died after her ten-year battle with multiple sclerosis. The whole family was devastated by her death. It profoundly affected Rowling’s writing too, as she introduced much more detail about Harry’s loss of his parents.

In need of change Rowling left her job and moved to Portugal to teach English as a foreign language. There she met and married a television journalist Jorge Arantes. On 27 July 1993 their daughter Jessica was born. Unfortunately, only four months later the couple separated and Rowling moved to Edinburgh, Scotland to be close to her sister.

This period of life was not easy for her. She got a job as a French teacher, working during the day, taking care of an active toddler in the evening and writing her book during her daughter’s nap time. At this time she saw herself as “the biggest failure” she knew, but this experience was liberating:

” Failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything than what I was, and began to direct all my energy to finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one area where I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realized, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter, and a big idea.”

Overnight success and a new name.

In 1995 she finished her book named “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” and sent off her typed manuscript to several publishers. Most of them showed no interest. Only seven months later a small publisher, Bloomsbury agreed to take the book on. Later Rowling was asked to use two initials, rather than her full name when signing the book, as publishers were worried that boys might not want to read a book written by a woman. Joanne did not have a middle name, so she chose Kathleen as her second name in memory of her grandmother.

Within a few weeks of publication book sales took off and Rowling was able to start writing full time. After the book’s success in UK, an American company “Scholastic” offered to pay £100,000 for the rights to publish it in United States. In 1998, Warner Bros secured the film rights for the books, giving a seven figure sum.

On the 21st December 2006, J.K.Rowling finished her sixths and final book of the Harry Potter Series – “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”. The book was released in July 2007, becoming one of the fastest selling books of all time and Rowling’s earnings surpassed those of the Queen of England.

Plans for the future.

J.K.Rowling currently lives in Scotland, on the banks of the river Tay, with her second husband Neil Murray and their 3 children: two daughters and a son. Even though the Harry Potter series is actually finished, J.K. Rowling continues to write and soon we might be seeing her new book.

J.K. Rowling Quotes:

• Anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve.
• It is our choices… that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. 
• If you want to see the true measure of a man, watch how he treats his inferiors, not his equals. 
• Death is just life’s next big adventure.