Fifteen

Issue date: 2/26/09 Section: News

The MIT Sloan Leadership Trek Team reach the summit of 19,341 feet

Having fun at 15,000 ft as the sun sets over high camp

After five long days, we had finally reached our high camp at 15,000 feet. Only 4,500 more feet to go and the MIT Sloan Leadership Club's Kilimanjaro Trek, over a year in the making, would finally be complete.

Our journey to the summit would begin at midnight and we would ascend in the dark for six hours. We were ready. Having run out of most of the good food by now, we ate a meal most of us would like to forget. We refilled our water. We visited the "bathroom", a hole in the ground on the edge of a sheer drop-off (we decided that visiting this particular toilet after dark was not advisable) and we went to bed at 5 pm, hoping for just a few hours of sleep before the big night. Unfortunately, sleep escaped most of us as our minds retraced our trip thus far. There was the day that Calvin Cheung MBA '10 almost got eaten on safari, the time that Barath Sankaran MBA '09 jumped off a rock and came extremely close to falling off a cliff, and finally, the long walk that led Steve Sullivan MBA'09 and our tour guide, to discuss and dissect every single South Park episode ever made. That evening was so windy, the tent blew back and forth for hours.Tired from both the week and the lack of sleep, I had only one thing to say when they came to wake us, "It's too windy tonight…let's wait until tomorrow."

Luckily, I went to Africa with the best possible team I could have imagined and my tent mate on that particular night wasn't about to let me stay behind. In less than five minutes, I managed to put on long underwear, three pairs of pants, two long-sleeve shirts, a fleece, a down jacket, a windbreaker, two layers of socks, gloves, mittens with hand warmers in them, a bank robber mask revealing only my eyes, capped off by a hat over that. With headlamps to light the way, we began walking over rocks and sand, stopping only occasionally for water (which eventually froze). My theory is that the guides make you walk at night because if you actually, see how far away the peak was, even after hours of waking, you would probably want to give up. Time passed…slowly. Luckily (well, that's really a matter of taste) our porters connected an iPod to a speaker and we had Michael Jackson and other various '80s hits to keep us going.

When the sun finally came out, a beautiful, pink light brightened our way and we took our final steps past the towering glaciers of bright blue ice to the summit. Knowing that on average, less than 90% of people who attempt Kili succeed had some of us concerned that we would not all see the peak. Amazingly, not only did we all make it, we made it as a team. We had ascended 4,500 feet one after another, like a line of ants. Without a doubt, this required some personal sacrifice- some people going slower than they could have and others pushing their physical limits to keep up. The fact that everyone put the success of the team at the forefront of their goals makes the accomplishment and the experience all the better. It also makes Calvin Cheung MBA '10, Cal Lankton LFM '10, Kelsey McCarthy MBA '10, Liz Olson MBA '10, Barath Sankaran MBA '09, Daniel Schweizer LFM '10, Emily Smith LFM '10, Steven Sullivan MBA '09 some of the most considerate, dependable, funny and inspiring people I have ever met or been privileged to spend time with.

This is the second year in a row that Sloanies have tackled this amazing mountain. Who's next?

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