Pole Pole: When going slow is the only way to get there
“Pole pole.” In Swahili the phrase means “slowly,” and it is the de facto chant when trying to summit Mt. Kilimanjaro. The guides and porters called it out and I echoed it back to signal I heard their instruction. I kept repeating in my head like a mantra to remind myself.
When spoken, the words exit the mouth through relaxed lips: “polay-polay” is how it is pronounced. I repeated it again and my tongue did a soft dance on the roof of my mouth. The words easily exhaled before I sucked in my next breath.
Before taking on this challenge, I learned “pole pole” was something I would hear often. All the how-to articles I’d read and all the people I’d talked to about reaching the highest peak in Africa mentioned “pole pole.” I pictured it as a stroll, like when you are walking down the sidewalk with a promising first date, slowing down to enjoy every moment. This version of slow, however, made even the most romantic walk seem like a 500-meter dash.
Step, pause for one...two...three... Step, pause…
Even though we only covered a few yards every minute, my mouth gaped open to accommodate the steady panting. As summit day approached and I climbed higher, granite-carved determination and party-crasher enervation battled it out in my mind and body. I'd dedicated the last six months of my life to making sure I got up this mountain: going to the gym five days a week, hiking long-distance trails on the weekend, hustling my Airbnb to pay for it. At 16,000 feet, David, the other climber on the trip, declared, "Altitude is no joke." Eventually, we'd be at 19,341. Altitude was sneaky too. It killed my appetite, which robbed me of calories I desperately needed and it strangely let passivity, apathy and indifference creep in and reduce my emotional reactions to equal that of someone who just underwent a lobotomy.
“Pole pole.”
The slow and steady ascent up Mt. Kilimanjaro is a blind test of acclimatization. High altitude affects everyone differently and you can’t train for it. I found out I’m allergic to the altitude meds most people take. So meditation sessions, where I visualized myself on top of the mountain with rich, thick oxygen filling my red blood cells, became part of my buildup. From training so intensely to being mindful and channeling positive energy, I hoped I had done enough to encourage the finicky-oxygeney part of my body to cooperate and adjust when I needed it to. If it did, I could summit. If it didn’t, despite all my pre-trip efforts and money spent, I would have to admit defeat and go back down — or else face a potentially fatal consequence. Mild altitude sickness — dizziness, headache, muscle aches, nausea — is basically a hangover without the night of fun beforehand. Take Advil; you’ll be fine. Moderate altitude sickness is all of those symptoms, plus lack of coordination. You need to descend a thousand feet or so in that case. Severe altitude sickness happens when fluid starts to build up on your brain or in your lungs. You become disoriented, feel like you’re suffocating, develop a foaming cough that won’t quit. The whites of your eyes might even turn blue. This stage can kill you if you don’t come down from the mountain and get to a hospital pronto. I spent many a pre-trip night lying awake imagining myself in the best-case scenario —up on top of that mountain, fist raised, “Hell yeah! Boom, I did it!” — while simultaneously being terrified I would become a below-the-fold headline about a climber who succumbed to altitude sickness.
This trip was canceled once already. I had planned to do it in 2020 for my 44th birthday, but when the pandemic hit it became impossible. January 2, 2021, I paid the deposit to climb in September later that year. The first vaccine dose in the United States had been given only two weeks earlier. Nobody had an idea of what nine months from then would be like or if this trip would even be possible.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have all had to blindly embark on the unknown, take on new challenges daily, and deal with stresses completely unfathomable prior to 2020. From relearning how to buy groceries to marking life milestones via Zoom, working our way through this chaos has been force majeure.
“Pole pole.”
The morning of summit day the guides roused us at half past two. I suited up in two pairs of socks, two pairs of Smartwool long underwear, a pair of hiking pants, a pair of ski pants, three Smartwool long-sleeve shirts, a T-shirt, a down jacket, two pairs of gloves, gators, a fleece headband, an alpaca wool hat, a balaclava, and a helmet adorned with a headlamp. Temperatures were in the teens, but luckily I had slept in most of that outfit, making getting dressed somewhat quicker and as warm as possible. I fed myself some breakfast I didn’t even want. We set out in darkness to make it up and over the Western Breach, the most dangerous section on Mt. Kilimanjaro, before the sun rose and warmed up the glacial ice that held things together, which, when loosened, could cause a crushing rockslide.
This was the hardest day. And the “pole pole-est” so far. It also had the potential to be the most rewarding. After safely scrambling over the stacked rocks of the Western Breach, we arrived at Crater Camp, the highest camp on Mt. Kilimanjaro, to rest a moment and eat lunch. The main feature here is one of the remaining glacier fragments from the ice cap that once crowned Kilimanjaro, the Furtwängler Glacier.
Scientists predict the glaciers on Kilimanjaro will disappear. I removed one glove and placed my bare hand on the blue-tinged icey wall. Slowly I walked along the side of the glacier, pausing often to rest and study the stalagmite-type formations made by the receding ice. A PVC pipe used to mark and measure the fade velocity clung to a patch of the outlying cold white steeples. This glacier has been here for centuries, but in mere decades it will be gone.
A moderate need to warm up and rest prodded me towards the mess tent for lunch. The logical side of my brain told me it was probably important to refuel. Once I sat down, I just wanted to take a nap. Through the doorway of the tent, I kept my eye on the glacier while I tried to eat. A slow fork-to-food, rest, fork-to-mouth, chew, chew, chew, rest again process fed me. Warm noodle soup and spaghetti were there to carb-load me up but I could only take down a few swallows, plus four cubes of pineapple.
“Do you want to rest a little while?” asked Hosea, one of the head guides.
Magnificent, I thought. I nodded slightly and my eyes closed. I folded my arms across my chest and slid down in the chair. I am going to nap and rest and just sleep right here and not even move.
“Okay, we will leave in fifteen minutes,” Hosea said.
When he woke me after what felt like only two minutes, I groggily made moves to leave for the summit. David had left earlier with the other head guide, so it was just Hosea and myself. We zigzagged up the steep vertical mountainside for an hour or so, gaining a mere 475 feet. Then, the last half hour we spent walking through an ice field.
Hosea, a positive cheerleader to my weary yet determined self, had given me the nickname “Dada” a few days earlier in the trip. In Swahili it means sister. “You’re almost there, Dada Amanda.” he encouraged as I babystepped my way across ice and scree to the signpost marking the summit.
Hell yeah! Boom, I did it: 19,341 feet! After seven slow days of trekking, one month of focused meditation, three months of targeted training, six months of general training, and over a year of anticipation, it happened. I wanted to make something really hard happen and I did.
When things are difficult, I grow frustrated, or I get overwhelmed and feel like I can’t catch my breath, I remind myself, “pole pole.” Going slow is okay, keep trying hard, make meaningful steps.
You’ll get there.
