“IT is never too late to chase your dreams”, says Ayesha Ahmed Ismail, a grandmother from Riyadh. She certainly knows what she's talking about -- she has climbed up to the base Camp of Mount Everest in Nepal and Kala Pather mountain, guided by a Nepali sherpa last November and hoisted the Saudi flag there. When she came back to Kathmandu, the Saudi ambassador there welcomed and congratulated her. Pakistan-born Ayesha is a Saudi national and has been living in Riyadh since 1975 with her banker husband, Fahim Mohammed. This petite, soft spoken lady is really a dare devil. A few years ago when vacationing with her family in Scandinavia, she decided to climb Nuolja, the second highest mountain in Sweden, while the rest of her family was contented with the usual sightseeing tours. “Yes, climbing snow-covered Nuolja was hard,” she says, “but I believe in pushing myself to the limit. To get there I had to fly from Stockholm to Koruna, and then take a train to Abisko, look for a tourist station, find a guide and then take a chair lift to reach the foot of Mount Nuolja. Then I climbed 1168 meters in the snow,” she reminisces. “I believe I was the first Saudi person to have gone there, so I took our Saudi flag with me.” During her schooling in Pakistan, Ayesha was interested in sports and the outdoors but did not have the means to pursue her interests. After getting married, she came to Saudi Arabia and has visited 31 different countries with her family, since her husband is very fond of traveling. When her children were young, these trips used to be focused on her children's interests, but all this time she nurtured a wish to do something unusual and got her chance now that her children have grown up. Travel shows on TV led her into the world of adventure: she has experienced sky diving in Switzerland, paragliding, parasailing, white water surfing, cliff jumping from a height of 30 meters in Canada; climbing the Sydney Bridge, hiking down a 3089-meter trail in six hours from the Garnergrat mountain in Switzerland, canoeing in Canada, jet skiing in the open sea, bungee jumping and climbing stairs all the way to the top of the Eiffel tower. The spectacular scenes she has witnessed during her adventurous trips are worth every effort, she believes. She cherishes the sight of the midnight sun in Norway and watching the Aurora borealis (Northern lights) in Yellow Knife, Canada in freezing temperatures. “I am really thankful to my husband who extends every possible help to help me fulfill my dreams. In our family, we always keep a budget for traveling. I plan all my trips ahead of time to the smallest details: I collect the literature, consult the internet and make reservations so that things go smoothly. Was she ever scared? “Yes! Why not?,” she says. “When I tried jet skiing in Cyprus my instructor was with me, but I was really scared. I was reciting Surahs (chapters) from the Holy Qur'an loudly. While sky diving, it was very scary waiting for the parachute to open. While trekking in Nepal, when it was difficult to breathe due to scarcity of oxygen I used to wonder what if I die at night, all alone in these mountains,” she says. “I have had to abandon my adventure half way only once. I was in Philippines when I decided to scuba dive, but once in the water, I realized that I do not know how to swim and got panicky and came out of the water.” After this experience Ayesha not only took swimming classes at Manahil Center in Riyadh but later on got a certificate for swimming one mile within 92 minutes. Ayesha is very particular about exercising and going to the gym. She plays squash and tennis regularly -- she went all the way to Australia for her squash training. Through the internet she found a couple who managed a training camp for squash, in a small town north of Melbourne. “I managed to enroll in that camp and set off for Australia alone. I stayed in a small lodge within the premises of their house. It was a wonderful experience,” she recalls. She has many more dreams to follow: for now, she is planning a 1000-mile walk and hopes to find a sponsor who will share her sense of adventure.
