Afghan greyhounds, Ankara cats

The old Sherpa thinks: When they’re in their European rooms, releasing the barely perceptible vapours from their glasses of brandy, when they’re brushing their Afghan greyhounds, when they’re petting their Ankara cats… That’s when we stop being Sherpas and start being ‘porters’. Porters!

He pauses in order to give himself room to savour his resentment, to position the sound of the word in his inner ear. That’s what they call us when we’re not around: ‘Porters’. He goes further: Beasts of burden. As necessary and at the same time as interchangeable as pitons, as harnesses, as rope.