Behind the Curtain of High Mountains

Never give up, don't lose hope, test your limits – this is the credo of Dina Štěrbová, who was the first woman in the world to climb the eight-thousand-metre Himalayan Cho Oju in 1984. At that time, women with ice axes and crampons on eight-thousanders were a rarity. She fought her way up to the highest peaks during the normalisation era. There was no support from the mountaineering association, men did not take women on expeditions. She earned money by knocking down chimneys and by making sleeping bags.

In 2005, Dina went to Pakistan's Bal­tistan, which had been hit by a catastrophic earthquake, and with her climbing colleague Vítězslav Dokoupil, she founded a small NGO. They helped to repair bridges at 3,500 m, build a road, an irrigation canal and a water supply to one of the most remote villages. After two years of effort, they built a small Czech hospital there. Their project has saved many lives in 17 years of activity. Dina is aware that the market mechanism has entered the highlands and has also had negative consequences. Yet Dina, like most religions, believes that saving one person is equal to saving the whole world. It is written in the Bible and the Koran. We will also accompany the eighty-one-year-old mountaineer on her farewell to the mountains and on her humanitarian mission to Pakistan.