Who is the greatest sports person in the history of the world across all domains of physical endurance and achievement? Most of you may not have even heard his name. He is Nirmal “Nims” Purja, the fastest man to climb all fourteen 8000 meter Himalayan peaks - in just six months.
Reinholdt Meissner, first to climb all fourteen 8000ers took 17 years to do it. The fastest it has ever been done was 7 years. But Nims Purja did it in an incredible 6 months. He summitted Everest, Lhotse (4th highest) and Makalu (5th highest) in a total of just 48 hours. Total.
Climbing Kanchenjunga in a single day from base camp to summit while hungover 🤯
Nirmal wasn’t satisfied with breaking six world records on this mind bending and physically near impossible feat. He wanted to go further. And he did. He then set the world record for the fastest Big Five (tallest peaks of all continents). He did all in less than two months.
In January 2021, Nirmal went on to summit K2, where many a great mountaineer have perished in the best of weather conditions, a second time. Without supplementary oxygen. And in peak winter, when temperatures drop to -80 degrees. climbing.com/people/nirmal-…
In a mountaineering career of just nine years, Nirmal now holds ten world records, most of which will probably never be broken. His team member and now business partner Mingma Sherpa became the youngest to summit all fourteen 8000m peaks, at age 30.
Catch his stunning biography on Netflix, 14 Peaks. Trailer is on YouTube.
Nirmal jokingly called himself the “Usain Bolt of the eight thousanders”. But Usain Bolt only needed to sprint for ten seconds on smooth ground (he’s an amazing athlete too). Nirmal’s playground is the “death zone” above 8000m, where oxygen is not enough for life to exist.
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Siddhivinayak temple trust has come out with an app for online booking of darshan in Covid times. If you want to visit, prior online booking is mandatory. Of course like all govt controlled temples, there’s a scam going on in online darshan too. Read this thread. 1/n
This Sunday, I went to Siddhivinayak temple with some relatives. When we reached there, a man standing outside one of the flower shops approached us and said that darshan was only possible with prior online booking. But he could get us in immediately, for a fee of course. 2/n
Not believing him, I downloaded the app and logged in after creating my new ID. But it showed all slots full. The man said he could get all ten of us in through the app (maximum 2 per phone are allowed) but he would charge 300 per person. Here’s where it gets interesting. 3/n
Cows are vital for farm economy due to gobar which enriches the soil and gaumutra, which acts as both fertiliser and antiseptic. Organic farming depends heavily on cowdung. But that’s not all: entrepreneurs across the world are making furniture and other products from cowdung.
Standard policy of the state govt and BMC is to do audit, detect serious lapses, promise funds to rectify them, and then do absolutely nothing further till next audit. This is only the latest, several have already been done earlier with similar results. Short thread follows.
Audit from April 2021 - same story. It will cost 150 crores to rectify, money is no problem etc etc. and then nothing done. m.timesofindia.com/city/mumbai/fi…
Fire audit from Jan to March 2021 - again the same story. Lapses, we will rectify and take action etc.
Nothing done. hindustantimes.com/cities/mumbai-…
CoWin is a top class portal for vaccination. Have seen it functioning from both ends: as a person availing vaccination for self and family, and from the perspective of our hospital being a vaccination centre. But some aspects of the portal make it even more special.
Short thread.
The portal has a special provision for people with disabilities. They don’t need to submit any document at all, only enter their unique disability registration number and that’s it. Contrary to popular belief, you can get vaccinated without aadhar.
If your certificate has errors, you can apply online for corrections. If you’re travelling you can add your passport details in your certificate. If you accidentally got two first dose certificates, you can get them merged. And of course you can easily download your certificate.
While Uwe Hahn has been a great athlete and coach, he cannot be given credit for Neeraj Chopra’s Olympic performance as Neeraj had stopped training with him since 2019. The rightful credit goes to Bartonietz who has been with him all the way. hindustantimes.com/sports/olympic…
Also Hohn had quit as coach of the Indian Olympic team before #Olympics2020 due to differences with the sports authorities on remuneration terms, and joined Australia as women’s team coach.
But more importantly, his wards Shivpal Singh and others were also unhappy with him.
Shivpal Singh was upset that Hohn made radical changes to their throwing style but more upset with his behaviour on overseas trips. He also alleged that Hohn coached players from other countries on the side, a serious conflict of interest. tribuneindia.com/news/sports/ho…
Just finished reading the 163-page Task Force Report. Did not want to post my opinion without reading it, and my considered view after reading it is that Delhi ka raja is the most pathetic scumbag ever to occupy the Delhi CM chair. Just one image should explain why.
This table sums up the reason for the dispute. Data given by Delhi govt added upto 1140MT, even though Delhi govt itself calculated it as 391-568MT. There was obviously some major mistake, as excess demand came from just four hospitals: Singhal, Aruna Asaf Ali, Liferay and ESIC.
This is the justification given by Delhi govt - that GOI calculation was an underestimate as it took only 50% of non-ICU beds as oxygen beds. I would probably agree with this point. But the supply was actually done as per the Delhi govt's estimate and not the GOI's.