Another solo ascent, this time to the summit of Parinacota (volcano) in the Andes mountains of Chile, which stands at 6,380 meters. Mehri Jafari, a mountaineer and former climbing instructor, shares her experience of this ascent, the world of mountains, and the journey of a climber in an interview with Radio Farda. A decade ago, she had solo climbed the 7,010-meter peak of Khan Tengri in the Pamir mountains, becoming the first Iranian woman to achieve this feat. Mehri Jafari is also a poet with two published poetry collections, adding another dimension to her perspective on life. She currently resides in England.
In her ascent report from the Andes, she mentioned references to Latin American literature and magical realism, something that had inspired her dreams of these mountains for years. Did she see any signs of that mental world during this journey? Essentially, that was a brief part of a detailed report I had written about this program, referring to the idea of ascent and that it was part of my past dreams. Yes, the world of authors like Isabel Allende, particularly the magical realism of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's 'One Hundred Years of Solitude,' or even further afield, the narrative world of 'Like Water for Chocolate' by Laura Esquivel, was with me at every moment of this journey, not to abstractly reveal the surrounding realities, but simply because I lost my alignment with the external reality and what was happening outside my mind, and in a way, I became fluidly narrative, creating that real yet magical world myself. In such a flow, confusion and fluidity give way to the previous certainties of the mind, which happened to me at every moment of this journey. In climbing, we prevent the mind from imagining in any form and direct it towards the body. What happens in serious ascents is that the body confronts the serious reality of death, and the mind's activity is directed towards finding ways to escape death. A more concrete example might be the relationship between humans and the earth on the mountain 'Parinacota.' The magical atmosphere around Lake 'Chungara' had human footprints everywhere, even the winding dirt roads around the lake, which seemed to have been traversed by many vehicles, wide and flat, branching off into other dirt roads, yet I saw no human presence over three days. There was no tangible evidence of any human being. It seemed as if humans had peacefully agreed to leave that world to the other inhabitants of the mountain and the lake. The footprints were strange to me, small and large shoes alongside the hooves and broad claws of birds.
How did you capture the image of that llama? The llamas were very tame, appearing like those abandoned dirt roads without vehicles. Surely one day a master would arrive with plans for them, but where I stood, it seemed they had a more equal relationship with humans. Neither serious fear nor serious surprise; a gaze full of pause from one creature to another with curiosity and a bit of doubt and fear. It stood there for a long time, staring at me, long enough for me to turn on my phone and take a picture of it to remember that moment. What drives you to move? What force and motivation makes a climber endure so much and even risk their life? Perhaps every climber has their own definition of this inner incident that creates the desire to ascend alongside danger and risk. But for me, this event, which accompanies an uncontrollable desire, stems from a source: the overwhelming smallness of the objective world in contrast to my mental world. Sometimes the world becomes so small that you can't even breathe; it becomes suffocating such that if you don't quickly move towards a serious challenge to escape what has constructed your physical and cement-like world, you will die in a humiliating state, under torture and captivity. When you continuously reach a freer space, this need is not so painfully intense, but when you get caught up in the daily grind and work, you see the cage becoming tighter and tighter, your world becoming smaller and more miserable, and it's time to escape from everything, and most importantly, from your small self.
I don't know how accurate this analogy is. I want to make a comparison between those pilgrims who traveled centuries ago to understand the truth, walking on foot to the desert and mountains. It was a journey of the horizons and the souls. This solitude, unity with nature, and enduring the hardships of the path transformed the pilgrim into another human being. What about the climber? Someone who endures the hardships and dangers of the path alone for days and nights, what experience should they reach? Honestly, you don't find an opportunity for contemplation and insight in perilous ascents; in spiritual contemplation, one can keep the body in a stationary state and engage the mind, controlling mental images and thinking. But in ascent, we prevent the mind from imagining in any form and direct it towards the body. What happens in serious ascents is that the body confronts the serious reality of death, and the mind's activity is directed towards finding ways to escape death. There is no contemplation; at least for me, such mental journeys and insights in the struggle between life and death during perilous moments of mountaineering have not occurred; but sometimes that layer of nihilism comes to you in a deadly moment, making you say, 'So what!' In any case, perhaps the only part of serious mountaineering that can be shared with those engaged in contemplation is the approach to nature and getting closer to a part of your existence that connects to eternity. But we may pursue such a journey in two different ways.
So, during the ascent, do you completely empty your mind of other issues? Then the necessity of mountaineering and ascent must be a continuous mental exercise, right? I see a very small distance between death and liberation. Sometimes I equate the two, especially when the surrounding world becomes smaller and more suffocating. For me, liberation becomes internal when I have made a serious movement and given my spirit such exercise that when I return home, my conditions are no longer the same. In ordinary mountaineering programs, like any other journey, the mind becomes engaged with new issues outside of habits and daily predictions, and automatically distances itself from matters that had constituted serious issues in life until then, at least for a while. In such conditions, perhaps the connection between the past, present, and future is somehow severed, as the present time is no longer a continuation of the past. But in serious ascents, this happens differently. In the conditions of a serious ascent, the challenge for survival takes such priority that many of the mental images related to the past and future are completely severed, and you are left with yourself and the self that needs to survive; to reach such conditions, the mind automatically trains itself, practicing resilience in the face of danger and risk, which in my ordinary life has personally transformed into resistance and endurance against daily problems. Perhaps it is as a result of those mental exercises that you can discover your weaknesses and stand against them, whether this weakness is in financial and emotional matters or in dealing with issues that you would not have coped with if you had enough power. Perhaps those around such a person find them a bit rebellious and defiant because they have the power to confront the existing order in their environment; but what is important is that no one will deny that they are faced with a reliable force that has the power of resistance and endurance. How do you cope with the silence of the mountains at night and in the heights and solitude? Isn't it frightening? No, not at all; just sometimes the rustling sounds create the doubt that animals are lurking around with the smell of food, making you peek out of the tent out of curiosity. We had even encountered wolf packs in areas around Tehran that moved alongside us, and we camped at night in the same ridge that was their passage, but we never felt fear, neither I nor the fellow climbers I know. In general, a natural harmony is created in the mountains that fosters trust.
I see a very small distance between death and liberation. Sometimes I equate the two, especially when the surrounding world becomes smaller and more suffocating. For me, liberation becomes internal when I have made a serious movement and given my spirit such exercise that when I return home, my conditions are no longer the same. In ordinary mountaineering programs, like any other journey, the mind becomes engaged with new issues outside of habits and daily predictions, and automatically distances itself from matters that had constituted serious issues in life until then, at least for a while. In such conditions, perhaps the connection between the past, present, and future is somehow severed, as the present time is no longer a continuation of the past. But in serious ascents, this happens differently. In the conditions of a serious ascent, the challenge for survival takes such priority that many of the mental images related to the past and future are completely severed, and you are left with yourself and the self that needs to survive.