We hold our role models in high esteem. And expect them to be the ultimate in all sorts of virtues in every sphere of life. For example, a good singer who becomes famous by singing, is also expected to be an exemplary husband, a philanthropist etc. That is, we create a picture of a perfect human being and expect him or her to live up to it.
Reality is often far from it.
I heard the name of Reinhold Messner first during my rock climbing camp at Susunia Hills from a man who we all called Sadhu-da. He told us about a book called Everest An Impossible Victory which was written by Messner's co-climber Peter Habler. The book is on their climb of Everest without supplemental oxygen. That was the first of its kind ascent of Everest.
I came back and found the book in National Library. Read it a bit. They did not allow us to take the book home as it was not in print (that used to be the rule and by this rule almost all books were not available for home borrowing).
I also read somewhere, not sure if it was in the same book or somewhere else, that Peter Habler was quite disgusted with the book that Messner wrote after his return. It seemed as if Messner alone climbed the mountain, while the two of them did it as a team actually. This was perhaps the reason why he wrote the book. I think both of them are from Tirol and they have never climbed together after this. In fact Messner did not climb with anyone after this.
As I grew up Messner started climbing all the 8000 meter peaks one after the other without oxygen support and solo. This is a heroic thing to do. Really heroic. I became a fan, obviously. The whole world became his fan. Some called him a heavily commercialised climber. But so what? He owns an island and a museum etc. He obviously became rich by just climbing mountains and writing books about them. He became a global celebrity. A Maradona or Pele of climbing. I even bought a rather expensive book by him (which mysteriously disappeared) when Amazon came to India.
Last night this Messner, came down heavily in my esteem and I lost all respect for him.
His instagram account had a post of a small video clip that showed someone camping (obviously him but he was not seen in it) in the middle of a vast open field in Ethiopia. Hundreds of Zebras are seen grazing, a local boy is seen chopping vegetables, a dining table with a table cloth on top is laid out with two chairs, there is a very luxurious tent (more expensive than many Indian SUVs) and an SUV (possibly a Land Cruiser) on the side. The caption says something like I am a nomad. I want to travel to every country and learn from the locals blah blah blah.
I made a comment there. I couldn't help it actually, "nomad with an SUV and a dining table with chairs?" And put three surprised emojis. This one post left me quite disillusioned about him. He seemed so fake. How can you claim to be a nomad when you are travelling with an SUV? Has he read Dervla Murphy and how she travelled? He is a great mountaineer all right but it stops there. He is nothing else. Just a publicity hungry fake hero who will do anything to stay in public memory.
After this incident, I told my friend Suvomoy about it over whatsapp and he wanted to see the post and asked for a link. Just out of curiosity. For the life of me I could not find it. I scrolled down in my insta feed and it was not there. I searched up and down with the name Reinhold Messner. A few fake accounts came up. I could not even find the account. I realised I was perhaps blocked off.
I used my other id to search for it. You can have some six insta accounts. And it was there in all its glory. My comment is deleted. Clap clap clap.
You might say Messner does not manage his account and it must be the work of a junior executive in his agency that is entrusted with running the account. I am sure he plays an active role in its running and whoever manages it knows that the client wouldn't like such a comment under his post. The client wants to remain a hero in the eyes of his followers.
Did Messner want to get projected as a nomad? Or was it the brainwave of his account executive? I don't know. I don't care really. You are responsible for your account.
