By Les Tan
The Singapore Women’s Everest Team (from left to right): Joanne Soo, Esther Tan, Lee Li Hui, Jane Lee, Sim Yi Hui, Lee Peh Gee. (Photo courtesy of Singapore Women’s Everest Team)
Mt Everest, Wednesday May 20, 2009 – Lee Li Hui, 27, Esther Tan, 26, and Jane Lee, 25, made history when they became the first Singaporean women to summit Mt Everest.
Li Hui hit the summit at 3.45am, followed by Esther at 3.54am and Jane at 4.43am.
Mt Everest is the highest peak on earth at 8850m.
The second summit team are currently on the way from camp 2 to camp 3 and they plan to go for the summit on Friday, May 22nd.
The second team consists of Joanne Soo and Lee Peh Gee. The third member Sim Yihui experienced chest pains at the Khumbu Ice Fall and had to turn back. She is well and back at base camp.
For weeks, the AWARE saga saw two groups of women fighting each other in an ugly public spat, overshadowing the efforts of the women as they made their way up Mt Everest.
There is now a group of women everyone can support. For sports fans, doing is better than talking. Maybe they should run AWARE.
Congratulations to the girls. You’ve done the nation proud.
It is very heartening to follow the NATAS-SWET Everest journey over the years. I was with the Singapore Women’s Everest Team when we first formed in late 2004. We were 16 diverse women from across the Singapore society, bound by a common audacious dream – Everest. There were as many skeptics as there were supporters. Some simply wrote us off right from the start. It was a steep learning curve to cope with intensive training, fund-raising, and getting organized. We wrote countless of marketing letters, reworked the budgets, and tried many strategies, in between preparing for expeditions and a 5-day training week. The team selection eventually whittled to the current 6 members.
Jane, as the team leader, was the disciplinarian, making sure that everyone fulfilled the training plans and did our make-up sessions. She had high expectations of herself and usually surpassed them. Yihui was the ever cheerful climbing partner who gritted through pain with a smile. She once battled a nagging toothache and endured a painkiller jab on the go. No grimace, just her trademark toothy grin. Lihui was the live-wire, genuinely happy to be camping and melting snow in sub-zero temperatures. She acclimatizes very well and you could count on her to be one of the first digging toilet walls in the snow. Esther was a great mediator, supporting decisions and ensuring harmony within the camp. Between her and Lihui, our campsite would be filled with songs and laughter. Peh Gee epitomized a soldier’s persistence and determination. Her mental tenacity took her well beyond her comfort zone, silently plodding on and up. And lastly, Joanne. When trapped in a critical situation, her presence would be highly reassuring. A highly experienced mountaineer, she dedicated her whole life to the great outdoors and mountains.
The team truly blossomed over the years, awkward self-doubts replaced by mature self-confidence. There were huge sacrifices that each of them made – finances, relationships, families, work. It had been a roller-coaster 5 years of trials and tribulations, both at personal and team levels. Every climber knows that one does not conquer a mountain, it simply allows you to be in her embrace. The team had the chance and seized it successfully with grit and courage. It is a privilege to witness this historic journey with the girls (as they are affectionately called). My heartiest congratulations to all of them.
(The ST Forum print version: http://www.straitstimes.com/ST%2BForum/Story/STIStory_379981.html)
It shows that Singapore’s women are comparable to the best from other nations. No mean feat from a little island nation!
way to go! fabulous feat!