Carry-on baggage

I would like to ask for a Sherpa for Christmas. There’s really only two times of the year you can make a big gift request. New Years’, not a gift holiday. Thanksgiving, food holiday. There’s really only Birthday and Christmas, and my birthday is already recently passed. So I need a Sherpa for Christmas.

The Sherpa are a lovely people living on Mt Everest, in Nepal. For generations they’ve been famous for carting white people’s stuff up the side of Everest. (Which is a terrible name because no one would go to that mountain to rest, ever--unless they were Sherpa, of course.) The Sherpa are renowned for their acclimation to the extreme altitude at which they live, which makes them more able to schlep for sea-level dwelling white folks as they conquer nature’s tallest heights. Tenzing Norgay was of course the first famous Sherpa. Supposedly his descendants still carry baggage for expeditioners. Or I could be conflating my National Geographic knowledge and making things up.

The point of that ramble is that Sherpas are a culture, a society, not a race or a trade. “Sherpa” is not the act of carrying. I remember this story from somewhere about a mountain expedition. White guy turns to descendant of Tenzing Norgay, “So, how long have you been a Sherpa?” The noble descendant doesn’t hesitate at all, “Why, all my life sir.” The white guy is amazed that this little dude has been carrying tents and freeze-dried protein and oxygen canisters since his birth. The joke’s on the white guy. The kid was born into Sherpa society, who just happen to be a group of prodigious carriers.

And so, I need a Sherpa for Christmas. This weekend my friend and I went to a private garden show. It was a big deal. They only open their 7 acre garden one day a year, and this was it. But cripes! I must have ten of twenty toy vintage cameras that I adore to shoot with. And wouldn’t this be a fun expedition for the Polaroid Land camera I’ve never used? All week I agonized over which cameras would make the trip with me. First I pulled out all the functional cameras and put them on the computer desk so I could look at them and Matthew would have no place to work. Then I had to get into qualifications by ease of use, rare film requirements, and portability. How many cameras could I carry at once?

I finally narrowed it down, omitting the Land camera, sadly. The final six turned out to be my dad’s SLR which still had some film in it, my digital shooter for all-purpose photography, my Holga (never leave home without a Holga), the ’65 Brownie Hawkeye that is broken in such a way that it takes beautiful pictures, my generic twin-lens reflex that I can’t think of the name that takes pictures with a surreal clarity considering its ancient technology, and the four lens toy called “Lomo.” The barest minimum I could come up with.

It did prove to be a hassle. I wore two cameras around my neck and had the Lomo in my pocket, but everything else had to be juggled around between the backpack. It challenged my carrying ability.

Now imagine the same trip with my own Sherpa. “Tenzing the Fourth, will you please hand me the Land camera?”

“But of course.”

“Thank you Tenzing the Fourth. Oh, and Tenzing the Fourth, will you please re-load the Holga. There’s 120 Portra film in that pocket. Make sure that you don’t accidentally repair the broken bit inside the Holga. That actually helps make the film look better. And here’s a little piece of cardboard to wedge the film cylinder in tight.”

“I see Mrs. Wy. Thank you.”

“Oh, thank you Tenzing the Fourth!”

How much better my life would be. Now imagine I’m walking to the train station from work. “Tenzing the Fourth?”

“Yes, Mrs. Wy?”

“I need my train pass and I’d like my iPod please.”

“Of course.”

“Thank you Tenzing the Fourth.”

Perfect! My Own Sherpa could be the best thing that’s ever happened to streamline my activities. But, there’s a major downside. Do the Sherpa people, once outside their region, still want to carry things for white people? I’d guess not, but I don’t know. Maybe you can take the Sherpa off Mt Everest, but you can’t take Mt Everest out of the Sherpa.