Weekend Post - 8 June 2008

Everest climber scales new peaks by talking the walk

Barbara Hollands EAST LONDON CORRESPONDENT

AS A little girl growing up in a home with views of the Uitenhage hills, Deshun Deysel would dream of exploring them.
Her grandfather‘s tales of high adventure in these hills sparked a desire in Deysel, 38, to become a mountaineer and conquer the world‘s highest peaks.

“I thought the hills were mountains and would sit with my binoculars trying to see what was happening there,” laughs the irrepressible adventurer, who is now working her way through the Seven Summit project that entails climbing the highest mountains in the world.
Not only does Deysel spend much of her time leading expeditions, she is also an internationally sought-after motivational speaker and television producer.
Her first opportunity to pit herself against a mountain came in 1996 once she‘d left for Johannesburg and become a teacher.   Deysel was chosen as a member of the first South African Everest expedition team and became the first black South African woman to climb it.   However, although she reached advanced base camp level, Cathy O‘Dowd, a more experienced climber, was chosen to go for the summit.  Back home, headlines accused Deysel of sulking and when photographer Bruce Herrod died on the mountain, the entire expedition became the object of damning media stories.
“It was annoying because I was not even a climber and I would also have chosen Cathy O‘Dowd over myself. The loss of Bruce Herrod was a big shock, but people do die on mountains. It was all blown out of proportion.”
Undaunted, she decided to share her Everest stories with pupils, starting her motivational speaking career. “I didn‘t even know you could make a living out of talking! But now I have given talks in Germany, UK, US, Canada and African countries. There are so many similarities between climbing mountains and life – resilience, passion, tenacity, accepting things that are out of our control.”

She offers three talks - leadership talks for the business sector, her own story, and a talk tailored especially for women, called Mountains and Manicures.
“I am often the only woman on an expedition and have learnt that men are wired differently. They focus on the summit and don‘t express pain and elation. Also they don‘t have to menstruate every month, which stops me from acclimatising well. But I refuse to act like a man so that I can be seen as a good team leader. Women can be successful by doing things their way.”

Although Deysel has yet to summit Everest – a second bid in 2003 was aborted due to bad weather – she is determined to make it to the top on her 40th birthday in 2010.

In the meantime, she is preparing to lead an expedition up Argentina‘s Mount Aconcagua in December.