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sixteenth century by a group of similarly disgruntled Muslims, finally settling down beneath the shadow of Everest in the remote Solu and Khumbu Valleys of Nepal. Immigrants continued to flow out of the mountains from the north, driven from Tibet by famine, disease, war, the usual—all of whom gradually assimilated into the Sherpa community, creating even more clans, each with its own unique culture and, oftentimes, dialect. * Nepal’s most recent census in 2011 actually considers Sherpa to be a self-reported ethnicity. That is to say, any Nepali can claim to be one. The same census also notes there are approximately 102 different ethnicities within Nepal that speak about ninety-two different languages among them, not including the myriad different dialects of each language.
    According to the 2011 survey, there are approximately 150,000 self-proclaimed Sherpas in Nepal who, even at this generous estimate, make up less than 1 percent of the country’s total population. And despite the common use of the term
sherpa
to describe nearly everyone working as a porter or guide in the Himalaya, very few of them actually serve as porters or guides, unless, of course, they live near Everest. The desire of foreigners to come and climb the tallest mountain in the world, and their seemingly inexhaustible willingness to spend a lot of money while doing it, has become a reliable cornerstone of the Solu-Khumbu Sherpas’ economy—the other being potatoes, † which are not nearly as lucrative, or deadly.
    Since foreigners first started climbing in Nepal in the late nineteenth century, over 174 climbing sherpas have died while working inthe country’s mountains. At least as many sherpas have been permanently disabled by rockfalls, frostbite, and altitude-related illnesses like stroke and edema while on the job. According to a July 2013 article in
Outside
magazine, “A sherpa working above Base Camp on Everest is nearly ten times more likely to die than a commercial fisherman—the profession the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention rates as the most dangerous nonmilitary job in the United States—and more than three and a half times as likely to perish than an infantryman during the first four years of the Iraq war.”
    The Khumbu climbing boom, as it were, started over 100 miles to the east in Darjeeling, India, in the late 1800s, when Sherpas began migrating there to look for jobs. The first British mountaineering expeditions headed to Mount Everest in the early twentieth century—traveling through northeast India and Tibet, because Nepal was closed to foreigners until 1949—hired Sherpas to carry their things. It was to become an enduring standard for every future climbing expedition in the Himalaya. Even today.
    Originally tasked with toting the enormous amount of supplies needed—or that was thought to be needed—for the early military siege–style expeditions, which tended to measure their equipment in tons rather than pounds or kilograms, let alone ounces, the Sherpas quickly proved themselves exceedingly practical, strong, and apparently more than willing to suffer horribly for what the Europeans considered a small amount of money. They carried eighty-plus-pound loads up to 18,000 feet, without complaint. They slept outside in subfreezing temperatures under boulders. Some of the women brought their babies while working, carrying loads for the foreign climbers. Their employers commended them for being “cheerful,” regardless.
    After a failed attempt on Everest in 1922, the British climbing legend George Mallory, who would later lose his life on the upper slopes of Mount Everest, reported to a joint meeting of the Royal Geographical Society and the Alpine Club that the greatestlesson learned from the expedition that year was that the Sherpas “far exceeded their expectations.” They carried loads to 25,500 feet, he reported. Some three days in a row. Seven Sherpas also died in an avalanche on the North Col to learn