A good reminder with the holiday giving season ahead.
SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT BEFORE YOU MAKE CONTRIBUTIONS:
As you open your pockets to do a good thing
and make yourself feel good,
please keep the following facts in mind:
----------------------------
The American Red Cross
President and CEO Marsha J. Evans'
salary for the year was $651,957 plus expenses
MARCH OF DIMES
It is called the March of Dimes because
only a dime for every 1 dollar is given to the needy.
The United Way
President Brian Gallagher
receives a $375,000 base salary along with numerous expense benefits.
UNICEF
CEO Caryl M. Stern receives
$1,200,000 per year (100k per month) plus all expenses including a ROLLS ROYCE.
Less than 5 cents of your donated dollar goes to the cause.
GOODWILL
CEO and owner Mark Curran profits $2.3 million a year.
Goodwill is a very catchy name for his business.
You donate to his business and the n he sells the items for PROFIT.
He pays nothing for his products and pays his workers minimum wage! Nice Guy..
$0.00 goes to help anyone! Stop giving to this man.
----------------------------
Instead, give it to ANY OF THE FOLLOWING
PUT YOUR MONEY
WHERE IT WILL
DO SOME GOOD:
The Salvation Army
Commissioner, Todd Bassett receives a small salary of only
$13,000 per year (plus housing) for managing this $2 billion dollar organization.
96 percent of donated dollars go to the cause.
The American Legion
National Commander receives a $0.00 zero salary.
Your donations go to help Veterans and the ir families and youth!
The Veterans of Foreign Wars
National Commander receives a $0.00 zero salary.
Your donations go to help Veterans and the ir families and youth!
The Disabled American Veterans
National Commander receives a $0.00 zero salary.
Your donations go to help Veterans and the ir families and youth!
The Military Order of Purple Hearts
National Commander receives a $0.00 zero salary.
Your donations go to help Veterans and the ir families and youth!
The Vietnam Veterans Association
National Commander receives a $0.00 zero salary.
Your donations go to help Veterans and the ir families and youth!
Make a Wish: For children's last wishes.
100% goes to funding trips or special wishes for a dying child.
St. Jude Research Hospital
100% goes towards funding and helping Children with Cancer who have no insurance and can
not afford to pay.
Rotary Foundation
100% of every dollar contributed goes to the Foundation. Polio Plus, humanitarian efforts etc
Ronald McDonald Houses
All monies go to running the houses for parents who have critical Children in the hospital.
100% goes to housing, and feeding the families.
Lions Club International
100% OF DONATIONS GO TO HELP THE BLIND, BUY HEARING AIDES, SUPPORT MEDICAL MISSIONS AROUND THE WORLD. THEIR LATEST UNDERTAKING
IS MEASLES VACCINATIONS (ONLY $1.00 PER SHOT).
I started playing poker as my only income late mid 2007. It was a no-brainer, after i figured out that i could make much more money playing poker, then i would in my old job as a shipping agent, where i would work day and night shifts and 50+hr/weeks. I have an autistic son, so being able to work at home was very important too, since it would be very stressful for my wife to take care of him alone. Things weren't always great, but over the years i have been able to buy an apartment, a car, my daughter's in her last year of high school and my son was going to a special school. Poker has also given me the freedom and money to visit my parents in germany, every year for the last 5 years. I wasn't making a great amount of money, with the best years probably averaging around 4000$ or 5000$/month and other years maybe 2500$ or 3000$/month, but it was much more then me and my family was used too. I have had several bad downswings over the years, but usually have been able to get out of them before things got to critical.
How did i get into this mess ?
I like this quote from Benjamin Franklin "Rather go to bed with out dinner than to rise in debt.", and that was my philosophy regarding debts. But when you get married and have wife and kids, you start getting softer and give in to to many things (big birthday parties, new kitchen, new furniture, trips etc.), even thought you know that they will catch up with you and give you trouble in the future. I'm easily persuaded, and it has given me trouble in the past, but i would just grind more and eventually get out of the problem. I started to get into a real bad habit regarding my money management outside of poker. Throughout the year i have basically been going back and forth from my normal level (100nl 6max) to regrinding at (50nl), and my cash game winning are basically (0)zero this year, so my only income came from vpp milestones, fpps and a little from sngs/mtt. I still made about 1500$/month on avg. this year, but that isn't enough to pay for monthly expenses, so i got into debt with credit cards and some personal debts (about 3k$). On my last downswing I couldn't turn things around and just kept moving down from 100nl to 50nl to 25nl about 10 days ago, and i just started playing 10nl today, mixed with 2.5$ 180s sngs.
I have had a lot of stress/lifetilt the last couple of months due to the monetary pressure i have put myself into, and my confidence level is on an all time low. I contacted somebody on LP regarding a stake, and we talked yesterday (sorry Matt, didn't contact you, but i still feel kind of bad caused i failed at that 200nl 10buy in shot beginning of the year that didn't worked out). We talked yesterday, but it didn't worked out. I totally understand him, and tbh, in his shoes i would have taken the same decision. He explained to me that a stake has to be beneficial for both sides, and given my current situation (and poker ability judging from my yearly results) i can see how it is not the case. i would have benefited more from the deal, since one of the reasons that i was looking for a stake, was because i have 29k vpps to go to cash a 2800$ milestone on stars and wanted to avoid the regrind from small stakes. But given my poor results lately this seems like a bad deal for a staker. I have the up most respect for him anyways, and he's one of the nicest guys on LP. I just didn't really looked at it from his perspective.
What's the plan ?
*paying back debts will just have to wait
*wife started working 2 days ago (last time was 1999)
*grind 10nl till 500$, 25$nl till 1000$, 50nl till 3000$
*not doing the same mistakes again
Hey guys! Haven't blogged in a while, but I wanted to write about some stuff, and this site just feels like the best place to do it for me. I know it's probably more appropriate on TL but I don't really post much there.
I went to MLG Dallas over the weekend since I have a bunch of friends living in Austin/Houston who were willing to drive up as well. I always thought it would be fun to go to an MLG, but this is the first time it worked out for everyone. We had 10 people in our crew, and 6 of us were competing. Some of the other guys are top masters (one's a GM on NA, Oobios), and I'm only like a top 20 masters player, but I figured it would be a fun experience. I also thought I probably had a decent chance winning a round or two seeing as there's a lot of fish that like to compete.
First awesome thing about MLG is that they had unlimited free Dr Pepper and Flipz white/milk chocolate covered pretzels. So basically expect to get diabetes.
If you ever decide to go to an MLG event for SC2, you definitely want to get the competitor pass as opposed to the spectator's pass if you enjoy watching pro matches. Aside from the fact that competing is just fun, you basically get to see like 10x as much content in first person view. It's also just pretty cool to have all the progamers walking around nearby, who are usually willing to talk to you given they aren't busy.
http://i.imgur.com/wy1Vk.jpg Pic with Taeja. I'm at the very right. Have more pics with different players, but I figured this is most relevant it IS LiquidPoker
I'll recap how my games went really quickly. First match was against a zerg who seemed to be around my skill level on ladder based on his previous seasons. First game was on Metropolis and I went Mvp style mech (1rax FE, 2fact blue flame hellion into Starport viking). He went for roach nydus allin which was basically instant gg. It was just bad scouting and inexperience from my part, esp since I was aware there was no third expo. After the game I looked at him and laughed a bit, saying I get owned by that build a lot. He laughed and said he's not really confident in his ZvT.
Second game was on Ohana and I went 1rax FE into a +1 timing with medivacs for the third. I did this mostly because I figured I would come out really far ahead if he did some sort of roach opening again. I'm not entirely sure how good it is against a roach/bane allin though. I put supply depots around my base just in case and managed to pick off an overlord that was just sitting in my main. I saw banelings morphing in front of my nat, so I put like 4 more bunkers down, but he never attacked. I just kinda a-moved him once I got medivacs and he couldn't hold it, but he got infestors into all my bases and killed a ton of SCVs. I just kept rallying units and killed him though. His mechanics seemed really off, because he had like 6 overlords sitting at what seemed to be a rally point near my nat. That seemed potentially game ending.
Third game was Cloud Kingdom and I figured I should be able to beat him in a more defensive macro game. He was really, really aggressive with things like counterattacking, but it seems like his mechanics weren't that good. I did a build I saw on Ganzi's stream tbut modified it a bit. Ganzi goes: rax, double cc, 3 more rax nat walloff, double refinery, double ebay and upgrades, then finally techs to medivacs. He just plays super aggro bio afterwards. I got the 3rax before the third CC though cause I figured he might try to do some fast ling attack, which he did. He couldn't really do anything cause of the rax walloff, and I think he cut a lot of drones/tech early on because I just a-moved him and won around 12:00 game time or so.
Random story. When I was in the bathroom sometime after my first match, some random younger guy did a double take, looked all nervous and was like "ooooh what game are you here for?" I said I was here for SC2, and he was like "did you win?" I was like uhhh I won a match. Then he asked me, "are you going to win the whole thing?", and I say definitely not. Then he said, "oh. You look like a pro." RACIST LOL
For my second match, I was playing Shew, a bit of a lower GM level protoss player who I think is somewhat known in the community. The cool thing about this match is that I was on station 2, which is separated from the players area and on an elevated stage. It also has your monitor mirrored above you on a TV screen for people to see. In any case, my game plan was to cheese both games.
Game 1 I went double reactor hellion with SCV pull around 8:00-8:30, which is probably the most gimmicky cheese you can do in TvP. I saw SelecT do it against some diamond player, but I tried it on ladder and have like an 80% winrate with it. I took out a top masters protoss out with it in a playhem daily once too, so I figured there was a high chance he would get blindsided and lose. Unfortunately he countered it perfectly by just sac-ing his nat, running his army to his main and FF-ing his ramp. There absolutely no transition from this so he just stalled until he got a big army and just killed me.
Game 2 I did this build: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=290571, which went perfectly (hellion drop got like 6+ probe kills) until I dropped the PDD too far from his nat and accidentally lost my raven a minute later. I ended up engaging too late and lost. Can't say I felt too bad because I'm definitely not nearly as good as he was, but I think I was in a strong winnable position for a bit.
I was done playing until the next day, but there was this booth where they were running a marine split contest every 3 hours. The top score would get various Sandisk SSD products. The map is "Marine Split Challenge MLG v1.3" if you want to play it.
I actually play a marine split trainer map a lot cause I find it really fun, so I was pretty pumped to give it a try. You get 3 minutes to get as far as possible, and once the timer runs out you go until you die. First thing I noticed is the sensitivity/DPI was REALLY high. I think it was probably set around 2k or so, whereas I usually play on 800. Anyway, there weren't that many people trying, and they allowed you to get back on list to try again if you wanted to beat your old score.
The second place guy's name was Daniel, who wasn't competing at MLG. He was a nice guy, and we talked a bit about the best strat. Unfortunately I had to leave to play my first round, and he kept playing and eventually got a 16. He won a 128gb SSD, and when I came back later and got a 15, I won one of these: http://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-Desktop...g-SSD-SDSSDRC-032G-G26/dp/B008U3038I. Sort of lame because it was the worst prize they gave out.
There was this really young kid (probably around 15-16) that came by and tried it out. In terms of actual marine splitting ability, he was absolutely INSANE. He didn't really know how the map worked and got a 12 on his first try, but he definitely could have done way better if he just tried a few more times. I was super impressed and told him GL at his games.
Funny thing is the next day, that was the kid I ended up playing and he knocked me out 2-0. While packing up my stuff, I told him gg and that he should go back and play the marine splitting thing cause I was positive he could just win a free SSD or something. When I went back to the booth later, and he had the high score of 18, which I can't even get now at my own computer.
Now what's REALLY lame is the guys at the booth told me they were going to have a contest where the top 2 scores of all the winners would go on the main stage and compete for a 480GB SSD, and I had the third best score. Oh well.
http://i.imgur.com/MhkFp.jpg
joLin from LP playing. He got the furthest and took out KeyDPotiguar, who won WCS Brazil.
There was a sense of relief after getting knocked out, because I could finally just relax and enjoy spectating the tournament. My girlfriend, Catherine, made me baneling and overlord plushies that we kept waving around when the camera was looking at our direction. I'm not sure if it got recorded, but if anyone has an MLG pass, check out Flash vs TheStC. There was a lag spike in the whole venue and the game went down for a while. During that pause, Clutch (the announcer) stood in the crowd and said some stuff. We totally video bombed him since the camera was directly in our line of sight.
MLG was really fun. I wish they ran an event in Chicago so I wouldn't have to take so many days off from my business, but the trip was well worth it. I don't know if it would work out attending the other events, but if they have it in Dallas again next year, I'll probably go again.
Same Sex Marriage + Sick Hip Hop Songby Svenman87, November 07
Glad to see a few more states advanced today.
I'm from Minnesota so we had a vote on changing the state constitution to say one man one woman. Right now it's about 52% No - 48% Yes which surprises me a bit, but then I think of all the hick towns and the deep seeded religion in this state and it's not to surprising.
Good hip hop song to go along with the subject, heard it on my way home today and was like damnnnnn that's sick.
i need to use powerpoint for a presentation for a class, on my computer i just have a trial version of Office 2010 which gives powerpoint viewer but not fully functional powerpoint i think? i browsed through cnet looking for a full standalone pp download but could not locate, it's possible i missed it on account of being retarded though.
anyone know where i can get this? im afraid of getting virus raped if i try pirate bay.
Was hoping to write this post about having a fight lined up for Nov 23rd in Iowa but things just didn't work out that way. With that out of the way now there really is no reason for me to wait til the 7th to head back to Cali, so putting in my 2weeks at work today and heading out around the 21-22nd of Nov to get a jump start on my training camp. Also been looking into some video equipment to do a video blog + interviews with coaches/teammates during camps, pre and post fights.
PS: If you're into kickboxing as well Glory 3: Rome Final 8 on nov 2nd was a solid show and well worth the download.
the last post i made was about finding a stake, i wasnt hopeing for to much as i felt going public like that would look desperate. I guess i was wrong? got tons of PMs from ppl (appriciate that, with extrathanks to dusty ( heart ) and his involvement in gathering people left and right to help me out.
But the first person sending me a PM just minutes after i posted was Smuft+crew. A couple of days later I ended up getting into a deal with a strong LP lineup of smuft/mig/nazgul and daut (with daut selling pieces to pinball/dusty aswell)
I got a really good longtermkindofadeal with alot of room to be longple and swing around on 2/4-5/10 in my standard fashion wich im very happy about.
There was some misscommunication between me and Ket regarding our previous stakedeal, wich u can all read some about in the last couple of comments in the last blog. But we worked it out pretty quickly and we felt like that was between me and ket and im glad ket is such a nice and easy person to deal with and its all good between us. It could have gotten really messy if ket wasnt ket.
Anyways, ive had a pretty rough year so far but im starting to feel the groove again and ill try to keep up posting some hands on LP and stay positive takeing it step by step this whole thing, and im sure its gonna work out just fine for me in the end.
Signed up for a meditationclass over 6 weeks that starts tomorrow, have been interested in that shit for a long time now and im looking forward to it alot, as i already do a fair bit of yoga (wich is an awesome way of working out imo, try it out and ull start sweating like a pig within 5 minutes).
Paid off my a debt to my father for 1618.
Paid off my rent for this month and next month.
Paid off a debt to my step mother for 916.
Kept a lil over 2k, going to chop mtt's with my dad and he will buy up to 70% in any 1k, or stake me with the same deal as the past if I want to freeroll it most likely as he'd always want to make more as well.
long grueling mtt - great learning experience - many pros came out, good strong field, happy to get what i got, going to grind another week of online cash before going to the live cash arena, maybe 2-3 more weeks online before casino. its no rush, but will be playing a lot of live days cg's and mtt's. just 1/2 (bring 300 - 2 150 bi's in a 1/2 game is fine for most 8 hour days, usually never have to rebuy in a 1/2 game)
So ya thats what happened whats going on it really sucks, 2nd was 28k and that woulda really fucking helped my life a ton and paid off a ton of debts..
oh well, close to busto, on the way to robusto i hope, been back on my own dime broke for a couple weeks, now im rollin again, just took me going to a good mtt.
waiting on finding a car thats decent as well which is a lil stressful in the cash situation but i've been here before, am invited to a ton of great games in buffalo salamanca and altoona, and know of all the mtt's going on within a 100 mile radius pretty much.
Just grind er away and hopefully be at my higher self, and best player that I can be come next wsop etc;
Why do so many anti-depressants have suicide as a side effect?
These are directly opposing results and was curious if there were any medical/psycho-neurology majorish people who could describe to me why the same mechanism that decreases depression can also lead to suicide
Live 1/2. The bane of my existanceby ynot, November 03
This game is suppose to be easy. I don't know why I have such a hard time beating it at my local casinos. I feel like I clearly have an advantage over almost anyone. There are times when I get put into a tough position and am not sure what to do but I feel like the game is supposed to be easier than this. The game formula to beat 1/2 seems simple enough:
1.) Value bet, value bet, value bet. This seems to be the key fundamental to the game. Most individuals who play do not know how to let go of sub par hands. They will call down with any draw and bet their whole stack on top pair top kicker. Seems easy enough, at 1/2, when you have the strong hands, value bet. You will get paid off.
2.) Don't bluff too often. Reason is simple, people at the table don't know when to let go of sub par hands making it very hard to bluff someone who doesn't know how to fold. If you against someone you think is capable of a fold in a certain position, then go ahead but more often then not, it's abc poker.
3.) Be in position! This is almost more important than value betting. In most cases at 1/2 you have extreme implied odds. People will stack off with marginal hands and will chase any bet amount to hit their gut shot, flush, or open ended straight. Best thing, be in position to these situations. When you have a nice hand, it's the perfect spot for a nice re-raise. Weaker players will give off a lot of information by basically, not doing anything. A lot of 1/2'ers like to check an awful lot leaving a lot of dead money in the pot. The game is just so much easier to make decisions in when you are in position.
4.) Don't slow play. You usually are not up against someone who can diagnose a hand properly and understand what a strong check-raise means. It's a pretty basic concept with 1/2. When you flop the nuts, or a strong hand. Value bet it. you will get called more often then not. (villain depending)
5.) Play ABC poker. There is no point in trying anything fancy or sneaky because the average villain won't even recognize it, making it feel a little pointless. Just be patient, wait for position and play to the villain. People at this game do not generally change their play style according to the type of table so just understand the type of villains and play accordingly.
These basic 5 ideas are very generic and don't hold a lot of substance but ask anyone on how they beat 1/2 and this will be in the ball park for what they say. I have been looking over forums here and there trying to see anyone else has brought a different concept to beating 1/2 and haven't found much. In fact, I have found more sources indicating the same beliefs as me. This was a comment by someone that hit home for me.
"there is a lot of good info in this thread and if u stick to most of the tips you ll be in good shape. imo there a couple of tips that have worked really well for me, get use to 2-5 hours of dead cards, don t lower ur playing style to match the other players. don t fall in love w/ tp tk when the bets and calls SCREAM flush/str8 draws, or 2 pair etc... play pos when the situation is +EV, don t let the reg s see u make the same 3xbb raise on the btn etc..... most importantly do not play the way the table is playing (loose, gambiling) just TAG it up and it will fattin up ur BR. but trust me when i say do not lower ur open/calling range because the 3 villians have been winning huge pots w/ weak holdings all night long. fwiw" -BlueBoy44 (pocketfives.com)
This statement was something that I have encountered an awful lot. There are times when I feel like opening up my range just to be able to play with the loose players post flop where I feel I could instill a bit of better play vs them. But I am often wrong in making this choice and haven't found it pay off as a right decision. Play tight, understand your going to be card dead for some time.
I would say the most frustrating this is finding a strong hand and having to let it go after being card dead for hours. Here is an example from the other day.
Hero (275$) Button with two red Kings.
2 limps in early position, 2 limps in late position from villains 1 and 2. Villain 1 new loose player at the table with about 600$ and Villain 2 with about 100$ on a downswing from losing most of his buy in to villain 1.
I do not allow limps and with villain 1 being quite the limp caller playing almost every hand I decided to raise a bit more than normal. My image if it even mattered, was fairly tight. I haven't gotten out of hand playing pretty safe folding a couple hands to villain one when I felt I was beat and with villain 1 showing to confirm my correct decision, I am playing so-so.
I bet 25$. A bit much but I was sure villain 1 would call. However, all four players call.. wtf.
Flop: 2,7,7 rainbow. Two checks from early position and villain 1 leads for 25$. Villain 2 instantly shoves his remaining stack. I wasn't sure what to make of this. Villain 1 has been leading into the initial raiser when he has strong hands and with a shove from the small stack the decision was to shove or call. I didn't feel like folding here. I have went a couple hours without even seeing a marginal hand and I am a newby and didn't want to let this one go. I should have flatted but I decided to min re-raise villain 2's shove. Two player in early position fold and villain 1 flats. Turn is Jc. Making the board a complete rainbow and villain 1 leads out with my remaining stack. I call to see villain show 6,7. Villain 2 had 10,10. River was blank and I lose.
Story of my life.
All in all I just wanted to share this and show some frustration. I need a higher level of discipline and really need to start playing by the examples I see the villains show me.
Anyways, this was my rant. I hope everyone is having a great day and since I don't feel like typing anymore and want to watch MLG Dallas. Have a good night! :DD
Not much poker results for october, played about 15k hands and broke even. havn't proof read this because i can't be fucked. I wrote this over a few hours and it's recollection of most memorable parts of the trip with some pics to go with it.
During the first half of 2012 i was grinding poker in a flat with silver on lp, with our lease ending in july i didn't really know what to do with my life after that. Around about the time my lease was ending my Dad, who is a bit of a mountaineer asked me if i wanted to come to Nepal with him on a 24 day trek. Given my apathetic nature i thought to myself: YOLO and it's only a month out of my life.
So after several training trips on New Zealand mountains, getting to know how to use ice axes and crampons and getting my fitness levels up, we depart for Kathmandu. Our objective is to trek around the Himalayas until we get to Mera peak. A technically easy mountain to climb but at a high altitude of 6400m, after that we would walk through more valleys and cross amphu lapcha, a 200m wall where we can walk up one side and belay down the other. More technically difficult than climbing mera peak, but at a lower altitude of 5800m. Then the rest of the trip would be an easy walk back down from the mountains.
We arrive in Kathmandu, a dusty, dirty city where there are seem to be no road rules. The infastructure of the entire city seemed pretty disorganized actually, with internet/electrical wires bundled up above ground, little supply of drinking water, one lane streets with people, bikes and cars trying to squeeze down all at the same time.
After getting to a hotel we meet up with the sherpa guide who will be coming with us on the trip, a funny 34 year old guy who's name is peme sherpa. He goes through our gear and checks we have everything needed to survive in the mountains.
The next day we fly to lukla(2800m). On the flight i look out of the window and it seems that in every flat part of the land there is a house built with farmland, over 80% of nepals population is in rural areas. lukla is a village in the mountains with the most dangerous airport in the world. The air strip is carved into the mountainside, with a 200m drop off the edge of it, and it's also only about 200m long with a stone wall at the end of it. Since the air strip is so short, it is angled upwards to slow the plane down when it lands. The airport is very busy, with planes leaving within seconds of another one arriving. It's the gateway to most of the trekking done in the Himalayas.
We also meet up with the rest of our sherpas that we travel with us. Now with us is peme , our guide, Dende our cook and kaji our porter.
in the sherpa heirachy you start off as a porter, carrying huge loads of 30kg+. Some of the porters we saw seemed like 13-14 year old girls, some were old women. Our porter kaji carried about 30kg, our cook carried about 10kg and our guide/leader who had climbed everest 3 times only carried about 7kg. The more prestige you have, the less you have to carry.
in the first several days of the trip we travel between 2500-3500m altitude, i don't feel the effects of altitude on me yet. We stay in tea houses with welcoming, warm hearted sherpas. learning sherpa language as well as nepali langauge. we walk across an array of valleys that are connected with trains of mule and yak hybrids. Smiling sherpa children run out of their houses to greet us 'namaste', pressing the palms of their hands together as we walk past.
After 4 days or so we see mera peak for the first time, but we don't go towards it yet. instead we cross the valley and take a detour. This detour will take us over a 4500m high pass, getting us used to thinner air and acclimatizing my body. once we cross the valley we are in a much more isolated, less touristy civilisation. I take what might be my last shower for the trip. We sit around the fireplace in the sherpa houses, it's high enough for me to feel the cold now. I start to wonder how/why people have come to live up here in such harsh places. In this part of the trip there was only a few foods we could eat, no fruit can grow in these places. We have dal bhat and potatoes. Dal bhat is rice with lentals, but apparently the lentals are so expensive that it's just 99% water.
Our first sighting of Mera peak. pics of porters drinking tea after a hard days work. One of the sherpa children living at 3600m. Our accodomodation with a 4500m high U shaped pass in the background.
Then we cross the 4500m pass, up from a town that is 3600m altitude. I start to notice it's harder to breath and walk. Our porter kaji starts to catch up with us and can almost keep up with us. he is used to the thin air, but i start to breath for every step i take.
The next day on the way down from the pass i start to feel pain in chest whenever i breath. it becomes worse and the sherpas carry my bag for me. I breath harder and harder and by the time we reach the town we are staying at i have to stop and it takes me 10 minutes to recover my breath. There are no doctors around so we wait to see if it gets better or worse before deciding if we should have a rest day or not. We have connected back onto the main track now and the villages are bigger with lots of other expeditions going towards mera peak.
over the next couple days it's an easy walk up the valley and i recover from my breathing problem. We decide it's best that i have a rest day at as high of an altitude as possible. The longer i stay at higher altitudes the easier it becomes to cope with it. And i don't have any altitude sickness at all so far.
We reach Khare(4900m). I'm taking 1 step per breath already and we havn't even reached the snowline yet. We use the rest day to explore the surrounding area and take pictures. I look at the west face of Mera peak, it's amazing. A huge square slab of rock, covered in glistening glaciers, rock and blue ice. And we see people, like tiny little ants walking down from the mountain. In khare we meet people who've attempted the summit. Some of them made it, some of them say it became too cold when people in their group stopped for a rest, so had to turn back. Based on this i start to formulate a strategy of how im going to get to the top. I decide im going to walk up very slowly without rests. peme decides we will walk from khare to mera la(base camp) for 1 night. Then to high camp. Then we will get up at 2am at high camp and attempt the summit in the night. Walking during the night is essential as the sun will burn your face off quickly in glacial snow at high altitudes. And it also allows us to avoid other expeditions, who will slow us down in the areas where rope is needed and risk us getting frost bite.
After our rest day we walk to mera la, i wake up to rescue choppers and get diarrhea during the morning. Unpleasant when your sharing the worst toilet ever with 50 other people. But fuck it, keep on going anyway. After spending a night at mera la we walk to high camp(5750m). High camp is a pretty shitty place, literally. There is little space for us to put our tent, it's freezing cold, the air dehydrates me quickly. Every step i take is exhausting. After ten steps my throat becomes dry. that night i wrap my water bottle in what little warm clothing im not wearing. Im wearing 4 layers on my legs, 5 top layers. 2 balaclavas + sleeping bag and sleeping bag liner. The sherpas serve me some tea and are wearing jandles. That night i go to sleep excited in anticipation of summit day. While im just lying there, breathing hard i think about how im going to summit next day. It took 3.5 hours to walk from mera la to high camp, and it was a short distance and only a 400m climb. By the end of the walk i was going at 2 breaths per step. With a 700m climb ahead of us, it will take me 6+ hours to reach the summit.
We wake up at 2am, my piss bottle, sunscreen are frozen. My water bottle is about 4/5 frozen.
high camp, sherpas chopping for water with an ice axe.
it takes us about 1 hour just to get ready, putting climbing boots on without gloves is the worst part. Then at 3:30am we leave, there are 4 of us linked together with rope. Peme, me, my dad, and Dende. As soon as we begin to walk im already exhausted. It's just so hard to breath while going uphill. for the first hour we have good pace though. I turn to look behind me and see a sea of maybe 20-30 headtorches wandering in darkness, and stars above me. The snow is hard but not icey, it sounds like polystyrine when we step on it. Our sherpa leads us up a hill in darkness, it seems endless. All i'm thinking is this: breath, breath and lift right leg. Breath, breath and lift left leg. Wiggle your toes or they'll go numb. Wiggle your fingers. Breath. BREATH, dont stop.
This goes on for about an hour and a half, until we get to the top of this steep ascent and have to jump across a crevasse. Whenever Peme stops i tell him 'lets go' in sherpa language. i don't want to stop, and for him it's easy. He is well aclimitzed, and extremely fit.
The sun slowly rises, and we get to the bottom of the peak. All we need to do is walk up a steep bit for another 50m, then there is an ice wall about 10m high. Im so exhausted, it takes me 3 breaths for every step to walk up this 50m climb. Once we get to the top of it i rest on my back and try to recover my breath for the next few minutes. But Peme immediately busts out his ice axes, dual weilding them he gets up the ice wall very quickly and fixes the rope from the summit. Then it's my turn, my arm has gone numb as i forgot to wiggle it. I use the front points of my crampons to get up the ice cliff as my arm and hand is merely used to hold onto the ascender. It takes a long time to get up to the top, and once i do i feel euphoric and in awe. The most epic music fills my head during this moment. It quickly washes off and we look around, taking pictures. we can see 5/6 of the worlds highest mountains from the summit. We are the first group on the summit for the day at 7:35am, followed by a swiss man and 2 danish men, which was a group of 5 when we met them in Khare. We quickly walk back down the mountain to high camp in an hour, now racing against the sun as our sunscreen is still frozen. After that euphoric feeling i feel a sense of pride for about 2-3 hours, we meet the other expeditions as we are walking down, all congratulating us. Once we reach high camp i collapse into my tent, having done the most physically exhausting thing in my life. I caugh hard for about 30minutes straight then pass out withouting eating any food.
I come to with Peme telling me it's the afternoon already and we need to get off the mountain, now i have a massive headache and im hungry. I've only had a bowl of cornflakes that day and it;s the only thing i had to eat that day until we got completely off the mountain and down into a valley at 4800m. We rest there for another day.
pics from the summit, everest, lohtze with its 3000m high vertical south face. My dad and me holding Peme's ice axes and Buddhist prayer flags, me climbing back down. After we climbed down to mera la, lower base camp.:
After our rest day we walk through a valley towards amphu lapcha: the last hard part of our trip before we have an easy walk past everest and lohtze's dramatic south face. ( a 3000m high wall of ice and rock, more impressive than anything in westeros tbh)
Unfortunately over the next day i lose my appetite, my breathing problem arises again and i have no energy. we still walk to a camp that's 1 day from amphu lapcha. I get diarrhea again during the night, shitting out what very little im eating, with peme and my dad telling me i have to eat to be able to walk tommoro. Skipping lunch and drinking half a bowl of soup for dinner. We meet a group that is planning to climb peak 41 and buruntse, they must be insane.
The next day i feel even worse. we walk towards amphu lapcha, very hungry and thirsty. It takes us hours, it hurts to breath and it's hard to breath. I must have strained some muscles i use to breath on mera peak quite badly. At some points i walk 30m on near flat ground, take a rest. Then walk another 30m and rest again. later on we see a constant stream of rescue choppers flying over our heads in the valley from buruntse.
walking through sand at 5000m, me feeling quite weak in this pic. Everest and Lohtze in the background as the rocky mountains. Baruntse as the snowy one to the right. http://i.imgur.com/cRzzg.jpg
After a painstaking 6 hours we reach the base camp of amphu lapcha at 5500m. I have had no food today apart from breakfast and don't want to eat, but i have to.
Dende gives me some noodle soup, smelling it makes me hyperventilate, it's unbearable. But i have to climb 300m tommoro so i can cross amphu lapcha.
Dad tells me if i don't eat it i will have to walk back to Khare, a 3 day walk and i know he's right. I begin to cry as i attempt to eat it. I manage to finish the whole thing after a while, and instantly start feeling stomach pain but still somehow manage to sleep. Then i wake up again in pain after a couple hours, my dad is worried and doesn't want to take any chances. Our sherpa has a satelite phone on him but the battery has run flat. They run off and try to find another group that has a satelite phone to call in a rescue chopper Dende gives me some hot water, i drink about a litre of it and then throw it all up, then i throw up all the food i've had that day, and keep throwing up until there is nothing left. I feel much better after that, but the rescue chopper has already been called in to pick me up in the morning. That night my dad gives me a diamox pill when we are in the tent. I eat it and both of us forgetting that im sick, throw up immediately and he gives me a bottle in the dark for me to vomit in. Only after putting my mouth on the bottle do i realise what it's used for.
FeelslikeBearGryllsman.
I stay awake that night for hours, very thirsty as we are at 50% oxygen of sea level. I have a water bottle beside me and it's maddening knowing that if i drink out of it i will vomit it. So i drink a few drops every hour and it goes down fine. In the morning I get flown back to Kathmandu in an awesomely daring helicopter ride, then change my clothes + have a shower for the first time in 2 weeks and begin my recovery.
The epic music in my head when i reached the summit of Mera
I HEAR A COCK he is cuckuckculg pretty annyoing but we killed all the dominating ones and kept a peaceful one but he is still annoying word of advise before getting chickens the howling doesnt just happen once in the mornging he continues at least 20 times and then a little later again like a little shit then again at 12.00 or something it is a miracle that i havent sought vengeance on this poor cock.
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