By Regina Johnson/Sapan News
One man’s journey to climbing mountains symbolizes his struggles and the slow and painful, but inspiring process of rebuilding his life as he finds a way to live with loss and honour his late father in a meaningful way.
As a self described ‘adventurer’ rather than the IT expert he is by profession, Dimantha Dilan Thenuwara’s decision to climb Mount Ama Dablam in the Himalayas is an example of how you can rebuild yourself mentally and physically after a tragedy.
Next week, Thenuwara from Sri Lanka starts his adventure in Nepal. He is driven not only by the need to challenge himself and inspire others, but also to uphold the idea of regional peace.
“I come from nothing,” he told Sapan News over a Zoom call last week. “If I can do this, anyone can.”
Thenuwara is among the hundreds of individuals who have endorsed the Founding Charter of the Southasia Peace Action Network, known as Sapan, a regional and diasporic peace initiative. His humanitarian interests align with Sapan’s values, promoting peace, cooperation, and empathy in Southasia and beyond.
If he succeeds in the climb,Thenuwara will become the first Sri Lankan IT professional to summit Ama Dablam. There, he plans to hoist the Sri Lankan and Nepali flags, as well as a flag bearing the Sapan logo, and his company logo. In the process, he is also planting seeds of regional peace and understanding.
“Nepal is not just about mountains,” Thenuwara told Sapan News. “It is also about people.”
In that spirit, he said he would wear traditional Nepal clothing to underscore the importance of the people-to-people connections. He also gratefully acknowledges the invaluable help he has already received from the Sherpa community, particularly Ngaa Tenji Sherpa, Miles (Dawa) Sherpa and Summit Force.
He doesn’t consider mountain climbing his profession or climbs simply for personal interest. Rather, “it serves as the core of my existence and the purpose I live for,” he said in a statement.
That purpose is to combine his love of mountain climbing adventures with his interest in humanitarian projects and cross-cultural dialogue.
He put this sentiment into action in 2023, when he helped coordinate a visit to Sri Lanka by Pakistani art students learning about his homeland’s culture and heritage.
What pushed him to these new heights? Twenty years ago, Thenuwara’s father died in the deadly tsunami that hit South and Southeast Asia, killing about 230,000 people across several countries in the region. Sri Lanka had over 40,000 casualties.
Without the rock that was his father, Thenuwara had to learn to reach within himself for strength and overcome hurdles through sheer perseverance.
As if surviving a tsunami, working to regain his physical strength, and putting himself through university wasn’t hard enough, he made plans to climb Ama Dablam or the “Matterhorn of the Himalayas,” a 22,349 ft (6,812 m) mountain in Nepal.
He’s no amateur, he’s climbed before. But never in the kind of conditions he is headed for now.
In March 2022, Thenuwara embarked on a two-day trek along the ‘lost trail’ through Sri Lanka’s Sinharaja tropical rainforest to climb Adam’s Peak, which stands at 7,359 ft (2,243 m). He succeeded, but he also injured his knee, and it took him nearly a year to recover. While he was still undergoing physiotherapy, a friend showed him a picture of K2 in Pakistan and asked if he could climb it.
Challenge accepted. If he is successful, Thenuwara will become the first Sri Lankan to climb K2. Besides physical training, he has started learning Urdu in preparation, which stood him in good stead for his trip there in 2023 to mark 75 years of diplomatic relations between Pakistan and Sri Lanka, which he wrote about for Sapan News.
Located in the Karakoram mountain range in Pakistan, K2, also known as the Savage Mountain, is the second-highest mountain in the world at over 28,251 ft (8,611 m).
“It’s a savage mountain that tries to kill you,” said American climber George Bell, after a 1953 expedition.
When Thenuwara began making his plans, putting his own savings into the Ama Dablam project, he wasn’t sure if his employer, the Dr. Sulaiman Al Habib Medical Group, would give him leave to undertake the expedition. They not only happily did so but also made a financial contribution which he gratefully accepted though he hadn’t asked for it.
The division he works for, Cloud Solutions, has his back on social media with the hashtag #ClouderOnThePeak.
Thenuwara has been doing martial arts and meditation for years to strengthen his body and mind. For his climb to Ama Dablam, he began training earlier this year. He starts at around 4 a.m. to walk 15 km or so, wearing a 10 kg weight jacket, then hits the gym for an hour’s weight-training session before heading to the office.
In Nepal he will need to acclimatise himself to colder temperatures and high altitudes before attempting the Ama Dablam adventure.
Dimantha’s Nepal itinerary
- Fly from Colombo to Kathmandu, Nepal: 10 April
- Preparation Days: 10-11 April
- Drive to Ramechap and fly to Lukla, start trek to Phakding: 12 April
- Mountaineering journey to summit Ama Dablam: 13 April – 9 May
- Back in Kathmandu: 10 May
- Kathmandu: 11- 17 May
- Fly from Kathmandu to Colombo: 18 May
Follow Dimantha’s journey on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/dimantha_thenuwara/ and at https://www.instagram.com/cloudsolutions.lk/
To contact Dimantha, email dimantha.dilan@gmail.com with a cc to southasiapeaceactionnetwork@gmail.com.
Regina Johnson is the Sapan News coordinating editor. She has extensively reported on America’s energy policy at S&P Global, Washington, D.C. She has also covered the financial advisory market and written human interest stories about parenting, education, and women in business. Her stories were published in LATINA Style Magazine, Advisors Magazine, Inkstick Media, and Thrive Magazine
– A Sapan News syndicated feature (sapannews.com)