Everest North Side Expedition
Chinese SOHU Expedition

Dispatch Seven: Note: Below are several reports from the Chinese. It provides an insight into their climbers. We are not editing these much, except for some spelling. We hope you enjoy this rare look into the Chinese mountaineers.

4/19/2003: Sohu vice-president Li Shanyou

SOHU Special Interview Li Shanyou---Report on China SOHU Mountain Climbing Brigade

As the sponsor, SOHU company have their own distinct ideas in the Everest climbing action. Li Shanyou, the vice president of SOHU talked about the purpose of launching this climbing activity in the interview, saying that this climbing held many goods. First, it was memorial mankind ascent of Everest on the 50th anniversary. Second, it was the first time for China to organize such mountain climbing teams for amateurs, which best embodied a national comprehensive sport capacity.

"As SOHU company is the general sponsor, the main title of this action and holds the ownership of network trace live broadcast rights, in addition to the personally participation of Zhang Chaoyang, the CEO of SOHU, this Everest climbing action report. We therefore assigned more than 10 reporters on the spot as to the rear to report the situation directly and indirectly. About 19 people from respective departments, say, marketing, news, technology, etc, will attend to the report. This report mainly covers 2 aspects:

In the first aspect, after the mountaineers reached to the Everest, they would be more difficult to take a further step than they did at the foot of the mountain. Therefore, we should in the first time deliver to the rear the hardship, danger, and progress the mountaineers experienced and made. This Everest climbing action represents the spirit of dauntlessness, and striving which badly needed in today's SOHU development. We should combine this spirit with our enterprise culture. Besides, among the mountaineers in the front, there are 20 members from other countries. They are just like a small U.N, full of peace and love, helping each other. Going through the Iraq War, people feel another totally converse atmosphere. What's more, this climbing is not only a trial to our mind but also a test to our communication technology. It will be a great challenge to see whether out notebook computer can work normally, whether the messages in the front can be sent to the rear successfully and correctly. So this time, our cooperation with China Mobile and Motorola ensures of the unimpeded message delivery. Especially we are creatively thinking of sending short messages in color to the rear and to the whole customers everywhere in China on the top of the mountain. This is an unprecedented undertaking and a great beginning in human history. Also, it is the goal of our cooperators.

In the second aspect, not only do we report the mountain climbing, but we also hope that we could lead a trend of healthy mountain climbing through this activity. We will issue many related knowledge and tips about mountaineer as well as reporting the situation of the climbing action. Our aim is to propose a healthy sport and hope everyone has a happy life."

Of course, this activity benefits SOHU a lot. Li said "Everest climbing is a great undertaking in human history. If SOHU took part in the report, it can improve its self-image, which is not only the improvement of SOHU enterprise culture but that of SOHU company image. From another angler, the reporting is a trial to our reporting capability because people have never tried to report any news on such high mountain. If we could successfully report with advanced equipment on the high mountain, we can improve our reporting capability, which is helpful to our website construction."

SOHU company invested enormous resource into this mountain climbing action. Li refused to reveal the amount of the capital investment because it was a commercial secret but he said that SOHU had sent more than 30 people to participate in this report.

[They are setting up mobile (cell) phone for use on the mountain using short messages etc, for their team.]

4/20/2003: Zhang Chaoyang's team was forced to stayed in Chengdu due to the sandstorm in Lhasa

SOHU report: Previously afraid of being delayed by the "SARS" checking, today, China SOHU maintain climbing brigade got to the capital airport in advance.

Because of the SARS, there was few passenger at the airport. The brigade took the regular flight from Beijing to Chengdu at 9:30am and arrived at arrived in Chengdu at around 12:15am. Staying at Chengdu airport for a while, they went on their trip to Lhasa.

Unfortunately, 20mintutes before reaching to Lhasa airport, they were informed by the Lhasa airport that Lhasa was structed by sandstorm and the vision was rather poor at the airport. In order to protect all the passengers, the airplane had to return to Chengdu.

At 4:45pm, the airplane landed on Chengdu airport.

The brigade led by Zhang decided to stay in Chengdu for a night due to the poor weather and follow the arrangement of the airport. They might restart their flight to Lhasa next day morning.

4/20/2003: SOHU mountaineering team returned to the base camp because of the bad weather

Yesterday, China SOHU mountaineering team led by the captain Yongfeng Wang returned to the base camp. It was introduced by Yongfeng Wang that the weather on the mountains was very bad, so they couldn't continue to repair the road on north side.

SOHU mountaineering team left the base camp on April 11th to climb the mountain. After a short rest in the advance camp where the height is 6,500 meters, they continued to climb to the north side of the Everest on April 15th. They arrived the north side of the Everest where the height is 7,028 meters successfully, but the weather turned to bad, they couldn't carry through the plan of repairing the road and building the camp. SOHU team can only turned to the base camp to rest, they will climb to the advance camp again until the weather turns fine.

4/20/2003: Join forces with the CMA and CCTV report team

reported via multimedia message by SOHU/ The last part of members of SOHU mountain climbing team arrived in Lhasa at 12:15. We will mostly take charge of network report. It was very difficult for us to come to here, but we all felt excited. The members of China mountaineering Association and Tibet mountaineering Association gave us a dinner in the ethical fashion. Later, we go to a restaurant to meet the members of CCTV report team, we saw Mr. Zhao, director Sun, compere LiXiao Meng and so on. They came to Tibet two days ago, and they will stay here for adaptation in some days. We have trained in Peking together, so we were all very happy to meet here. I don't like eat beef and mutton before, but now I must try to adapt to it, otherwise, I will have no enough strength to climb the mountain and withstand the cold. Charles Zhang

4/21/2003: Charles Zhang's diary: I saw the Potala Palace!

Now, I send the multimedia message on the palace peak of Potala Palace. Full of my eyes is the beautiful scenery, blue sky, white cloud and the sheen of the golden palace. At here, I can see all the Lhasa. With the developing of modern culture, we often destroy the historical cultural relic. So when we enjoy our modern urbanism, we must remember the truth of value and aesthetics.

4/22/03: ChaoYang Zhang's diary: set out for the destination of XieGer

Reported via the multimedia messaging/ Members of China report team of multimedia messaging settled out from Rikaze to Xieger at ten o'clock this morning. The height of Rikaze is 3900 meters, and Xieger's height is 4300 meters, so today the members of report team will experience the biggest upgrade during their travel. Meanwhile, they will pass through the col of JiaCuola mountain which is 5200 meters high, it is very difficult for all the members. It was estimated that they will walk continuously for about five hours. There are seven cars in the troops, including China Mobile's twelve tons communication equipment truck. Between Rikaze and Xieger, there is no GPRS wireless signal, so the communication will be connected till China Mobile's base camp is set up.

Dispatches