Interviewer: So Jack, how many years have you been climbing for now?
Jack: Well I have been climbing as far back as I remember now.
Interviewer: And how long is that?
Jack: I’m afraid I can’t remember.
Interviewer: We could ask your sherpa here, Tinsing
Jack: Oh, yes ok, Tinsing, how long have I been climbing now?
Tinsing: 45 years sir
Interviewer: And in that time how many expeditions have you been on?
Jack: Tinsing?
Tinsing: 358 sir?
Interviewer: And of those climbs how many would you say have been unsuccessful?
Tinsing: Around 358 sir
Interviewer: 358 that’s a very high number isn’t it?
Jack: Yes but a lot of people underestimate the difficulties faced by climbers like myself, the heat, lack of oxygen, bad weather, incompetence.
Tinsing: And Mr Jackson suffers from vertigo.
Interviewer: Vertigo, that must be a nuisance for a climber
Jack: Oh yes, vertigo would be a terrible thing for a climber to suffer from, I quite agree
Tinsing: Mr Johnson is a very forgetful man, every week we go on an expedition, Mr Johnson puts his foot on the mountain and starts climbing, we get half way up when he gets vertigo and comes down.
Interviewer: That must be very frustrating . Tinsing: Oh yes, sometimes he gets to the bottom and forgets he has vertigo and turns straight round and starts climbing again. We spent a week trying to get him off the Matahorn
Interviewer: Nevertheless you have had a glittering career have you not?
Jack: Oh yes quite, I’ve been to every country in the world; climbed parts of almost every mountain going.
Interviewer: Would you pick out any highlights?
Jack: Tinsing any ideas?
Tinsing: Oh yes sir, I remember the year we didn’t climb Everest, then the summer that we didn’t do K2, and of course you could never forget the year we didn’t make it up Ben Nevis.
Interviewer: Mr Jack Johnson and Mr Tinsing thank you very much, marvellous quite a marvellous story.
