Between the months of April and October in the year 2019, Purja climbed Nepal's Annapurna, Dhaulagiri, Kanchenjunga, Everest, Lhotse, Makalu and Manaslu; Pakistan's Nanga Parbat, Gasherbrum I and II, K2 and Broad Peak; and Tibet's Cho Oyu and Shishapangma. Purja managed to do it without any funding and the fact that he was beating the record of Korean mountaineer Kim Chang-ho who completed this feat over the course of seven years, six months and 10 days in 2013. Purja eventually beat his record by completing this task in six months and six days.
Nimsdai Purja was born in July 1983 to a Gorkha soldier and his wife from a farming background in a small village of Nepal¡¯s Myadgi district. Purja, maintains that his family had meagre means and he grew up without any comforts and luxuries. Purja, joined the Brigade Of Gorkhas in 2003 and was also accepted into the Royal Navy¡¯s Special Boat Service (SBS) in 2009 and became the first Gorkha to join the elite British unit.?
Each peak is placed at 8,000 meters above sea-level, where oxygen deprivation is a dangerous phenomenon to encounter. Purja, set out to do the unthinkable mission even as most of the mountaineers label this severely oxygen deprived altitude as the ¡®death zone¡¯. He became a professional mountaineer and climber only in 2019, but he proudly says that owing to his military background, he is in the top 1 percent in the world when it comes to physical fitness. He says that being in the UK Special Forces, especially being at sea all the times, tests ones physical fitness and endurance.?
As seen in the documentary, Purja talks about certain ¡®politics¡¯ which threw a spanner in his plans while conquering a certain peak. He hadn¡¯t been approved by the country¡¯s government to climb the peak. But it was not just politics, Purja faced resistance from his family as well. His brother didn¡¯t speak with him, his mother as seen in the documentary was worried for him. But his wife Suchi stood by him and supported him.?
We see how in one scene an avalanche throws him 100 metre downwards. A man, his team finds dies in his arms. Purja, being the true military man that he is says that he never left any man behind even in his days of being a soldier.?
But it is not all work and no fun for Purja and his team. They climbed Kanchenjunga in just one day of being hungover. He keeps mentioning how his film ¡¯14 Peaks¡¯ would inspire many people from Nepal, especially the climbing community. Purja has used bottled oxygen in all his feats.?
One of the only people who truly believe in Purja was Reinhold Messner (Italy); the first person to climb all 8,000 m mountains. He achieved this trailblazing feat in 1986 without using any supplementary oxygen. To date, only 19 others have done the same. Reinhold is widely considered the greatest climber of all time.
However, Purja and Reinhold aren¡¯t the only record holders. Mingma Gyabu "David" Sherpa became the youngest person to climb all 8,000 m mountains, aged 30 years 166 days.
14 Peaks is a documentary of a man who with minimum means set out to do the impossible. He conquered not just the mountains peaks but also fear. An inspirational tale of an ordinary man who set out to do the extraordinary feat of fighting over nature and weather conditions. At a time when people would have given up halfway, Purja ensured he climbed till the end and helped out other fellow climbers.