Lhakpa Sherpa’s colleagues at US supermarket Whole Foods had no idea she had a double life as a serial record-breaker. To them, their hard-working colleague, who was born to yak farmers in the Nepalese Himalayas in 1973, was just another mum trying to make ends meet in West Hartford, Connecticut. But Lhakpa was harbouring a secret: she had a once-in-a-generation skill for mountain climbing and had reached the summit of Mount Everest ten times, the most of any woman in the world.
‘I didn’t want to talk about my life. I didn’t want to say, “I summit Everest”,’ Lhakpa tells Metro.co.
uk when asked why she concealed her extraordinary talent. ‘You know I’m just a normal woman, a normal person working. I’m not educated.
I need to do everything I can: washing dishes and cleaning houses.’ It was a feat she achieved against all odds. When Lhakpa was growing up in Nepal, girls were banned from having an education and she did not go to school.
She is still illiterate. Her generation of women were paired off in arranged marriages and expected to stay at home, but Lhakpa did not want that life. Growing up in the foothills of the Nepalese mountains, she dreamed one day of reaching the summit.
‘I felt stuck,’ she says in upcoming Netflix documentary, Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa about her inspiring achievements. ‘I was a wild girl. I was a nature girl.
’ By 2000, Lhakpa had defied cultural expectations and was working for an Everest expedition tour group. The same year, she became the first Nepali woman to climb to the top and survive. Not long after in Kathmandu, she met fellow climber George Dijmarescu, a Romanian construction worker based in the US, who she went on to marry.
They climbed Everest together five times between 2001 and 2006. After moving to Dijmarescu’s home in Connecticut, they became parents to daughters, Sunny, 22, and Shiny, 17. Lhakpa has a son Nima, born in the 90s, from a previous relationship.
However, Dijmarescu became violent and abusive toward Lhakpa. In the documentary, she recalls him punching her so hard while at an Everest base camp she was knocked unconscious. Journalist Michael Kodas, who was writing a piece for the local paper on the climb, witnessed the horrific attack and said he heard Dijmarescu drag his wife and say ‘get this garbage out of here.
’ Lhakpa says she wanted to die after being knocked out. She recalls floating above her mother’s house and travelling to the after-life while she was unconscious but pulled back to return to earth for her children. The domestic violence did not stop at home.
Sunny and Shiny both remember their dad grabbing their mum’s hair and smashing her head on the table when they were both children. ‘I’m scared all the time he is my monster,’ Lhakpa recalls, recognising that her life was in danger. ‘He did so wrong in my life.
That’s it one day he will kill me.’ After another beating, she moved to a women’s shelter with Sunny and Shiny and began rebuilding her life and started work at Whole Foods and as a house cleaner. Dijmarescu and Lhakpa later divorced and he died of cancer in 2020.
Now, she says she ‘still has love for him in my heart’ that will ‘never go away’ as he is her children’s father. ‘I never dwell on the negatives I focus on the positives. I never share my negative things with people.
Even when very very bad things happen, I still smile,’ she tells us. Throughout all of her trauma and adversity, Lhakpha has continued to climb, describing nature as her ‘healer’. ‘Climbing Everest is not easy, it’s very difficult, very life-threatening,’ she explains.
‘But I trust them, I trust the mountain. I love that mountain. It heals me.
I work hard here in the United States and it’s the mountains that make me cool down.’ But does she ever feel fear? ‘Sometimes I feel like, “Any step I can die,” I’m thinking about it. It’s a very scary moment hiking,’ she admits, but the pay-off is worth it.
Lhakpa says at the top of Everest she feels ‘power’. ‘I never been in school so I feel like I finished my master degree in the mountains. Mountains are my puzzle, mountains are my book,’ I’m in long-term Mountain High School.
At the top, I feel so great, because my body looks like an athlete’s,’ she says. For Lhakpa, climbing Mount Everest for the 10th time aged 48 in 2022 was more than breaking her own record and reconnecting with her first true love. She reached the summit with the ambition of ‘changing my life.
’ She explains: ‘I’m a single mom. I know my children need a car. They need to go to college.
We live in a small apartment. My children always say to me, “Go to the mountain more” as I spend all my time talking about it and I want to write a book. I’ve had a documentary made about me.
It gives me hope and good opportunity.’ More Trending Little-known Netflix series has viewers 'hooked' and 'staying up all night' to watch ‘I sold over 70,000,000 records in the 90s – but I was only being paid $35 a day’ BBC heart -throb now top 3 contender to be the next James Bond Channel 4 star shocks fans with transformation who say 'you look so different' Two years later, Lhakpa says she’s still living in her ‘small apartment’ but no longer works at Whole Foods. Thanks to the Netflix documentary, she has been able to travel the world to places including London and Chicago, having never been on holiday abroad.
She also has broader ambitions to found a women’s hiking club and climb the highest peaks in all 50 US states. But, most of all, she wants to empower women. As her daughter Shiny explains: ‘She wants to inspire women.
She’s had the same message since she was young, since she was my sister’s age, but she just wants to give people the confidence to follow their dreams and just empower women in general. She’s always had that message.’ What I Own: I purchased my £592,750 East London two-bed flat at the age of 22 We built our posh shed office using stuff from the skip and saved £23,000 You can buy this seven-bed home for £80k — but you'll be the only person for miles around Property experts reveal what the Leasehold Reform Bill means for homeowners We bought our £298,000 Nottingham new-build using a little-known loophole Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa is coming to Netflix on Wednesday (July 31).
Domestic abuse helpline If you are in immediate danger call 999. If you cannot talk, dial 55 and the operator will respond. For emotional support, you can contact the National Domestic Abuse Helpline on 0808 2000 247.
Alternatively, for practical and emotional support, please contact Women’s Aid Live Chat 10am – 6pm seven days a week. You can also reach the National Centre for Domestic Violence on 0800 270 9070 or text NCDV to 60777. For free and confidential advice and support for women in London affected by abuse, you can call Solace on 0808 802 5565 or email advice@solacewomensaid.
org. Male victims of domestic abuse can call 01823 334244 to speak to ManKind , an initiative available for male victims of domestic abuse and domestic violence across the UK as well as their friends, family, neighbours, work colleagues and employers. Alternatively, the Men's Advice Line can be reached at 0808 8010327, or emailed at info@mensadviceline.
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