[00:02.93]READING
[00:04.18]REACHING OUT ACROSS THE OCEAN
[00:06.09]Trade and curiosity have often formed the foundation for mankind’s greatest endeavor.
[00:10.32]To people of early civilizations, the world map was a great puzzle.
[00:13.79]Marco Polo’s stories inspired Christopher Columbus and other European explorers to search fro sea routes to the distant, wealthy Asian lands.
[00:20.22]However, long before that brave merchants were the real explorers of the Western Ocean.
[00:24.06]It is well known that Africa had contacts with India and the Red Sea civilizations from the earliest times.
[00:29.34]Silk from China found its way over land along the Silk Road to India, the Middle East and Rome, in exchange for spices and glass.
[00:35.50]Silk was also traded along the coasts of the Indian Ocean.
[00:38.24]Ceylon, with its central position, was the place where Chinese merchants met with Arab merchants and heard about the westernmost lands.
[00:44.20]Thus, people of the Han Dynasty knew about Africa and had books with descriptions of the kingdoms on the African coast and the Rd Sea.
[00:50.08]In 97 AD Gan Ying, a Chinese ambassador, went to the East Roman Empire over land and returned to Luoyany with a present from an African king-rhinoceros horns.
[00:58.59]Over the next few hundred years, the Swahili kingdoms and the islands off the African coast developed into the word’s trading centre for ivory, spices, rhinoceros horns, shells, animal skins and sugar.
[01:07.60]They were traded to merchants from the Arabic countries, Egypt Greece, Rome, India, Ceylon and China.
[01:12.80]The Arabic contacts to the African coast let to the next meting between black people and a Chinese.
[01:17.56]In the year 751, the Chinese traveler Du Huan was taken prisoner by the Arabic army.
[01:21.42]He escaped, and after a long journey wandering through Arabic countries, he returned to the motherland by boat in 762.
[01:26.80]There he wrote his Record of My Travels, which gives information on Central Asian, Arabic and African countries.
[01:31.98]In the eleventh century, the Africans made several voyages to the court of the Song Dynasty.
[01:33.23]It was a major development that the Africans were reaching out to China.
[01:36.03]The earliest Asian cultural relic found in Africa also dates from this period.
[01:39.71]A small bronze stature of a lion was found in the Swahili town of Shanga.
[01:43.50]Nothing similar has ever been found in East Africa.
[01:46.06]The contacts between China and Africa over the centuries led to the awareness of each other’s existence, but still no accurate maps of the countries around the Indian Ocean existed.
[01:53.84]By the beginning of the fifteenth century the time was ripe for a grand meeting.
[01:57.55]In East Africa the coastal towns were reaching the height of their power.
[02:00.79]In the east, China prospered under a new dynasty.
[02:03.30]The Ming government had a large navy and the will to use it.
[02:06.01]In the years between 1405 and 1433, seven large treasure fleets sailed westwards on voyages of trade and exploration.
[02:12.88]Under the command of Zheng He , the fleets set sail from the South China Sea across the Indian Ocean the mouth of the Red Sea,
[02:18.40]and then traveled further south, discovering the eastern coast of Africa.
[02:21.37]Zheng He renewed relations with the kingdoms of the East African coast.
[02:24.74]One African king sent the Ming emperor a royal present: two giraffes.
[02:28.51]The wonderful gift and the contact with the black court so excited China’s curiosity about Africa that Zhen He sent a message to the king and to other African states,
[02:35.77]inviting them to send ambassadors and open embassies in the new Ming capital, Beijing.
[02:36.02]The response of the African rules was very generous.
[02:36.09]They sent the emperor zebras, giraffes, shells, elephant ivory and rhinoceros-horn medicine.
[02:40.74]In return, the Ming court sent gold, spices, silk, and various other present
[02:44.84]The exchange of goods had symbolic meaning far more important than the value of the goods themselves.
[02:49.02]By trading with the fleet the African kings were showing their friendship to the emperor of China.
[02:52.60]The fleet made several expeditions before the exploration was stopped, probably economic reasons.
[02:57.51]For a short time, China had ruled the seas.
[02:59.47]After 1433, the Ming court believed that its greatest challenges and opportunities were at home.
[03:04.10]INTEGRATING SKILLS
[03:07.33]Reading
[03:08.01]GOING HIGH: THE PIONEERS OF THE THIRD POLE
[03:11.25]By the middle of the 1920s the farthest corners of the earth had already been explored: the continents and the oceans had been mapped,
[03:17.44]the North and South Poles had been reached, and the origins of the world’s major rivers had been discovered.
[03:21.91]All that was left to be conquered was the “third pole”, the highest mountain on earth, Mount Qomolangma.
[03:27.08]Some suggested it could not be accomplished.
[03:29.46]At that time, going to Mount Qomolangma was like going to the moon.
[03:32.65]Climbing at such high altitudes requires great skill and is not without risk.
[03:36.83]Apart from the cold, thin air and low oxygen levels can cause mountain sickness, which can kill.
[03:41.50]Some people can never go above 4,000 metres because their body is unable to adjust to these extreme conditions.
[03:46.78]Above about 5,200 metres, in the “death zone”, humans can only survive for couple of days, even with extra oxygen.
[03:53.96]The Tibetans have lived in the Himalayas for centuries and have adjusted to the conditions at such a great height.
[03:58.82]To them, the mountains were sacred, and they would not climb them for that reason.
[04:02.53]When Westerners came to climb Mount Qomolangma, the Sherpas, who live in Tibet, northern India and Nepal,acted as guides.
[04:08.70]From the first British Qomolangma expedititon in 1921, Sherpa strength, skill, honesty and dedication have made them ideal companions on the mountain.
[04:16.30]Every Qomolangma expedition since them has relied on Sherpa support.
[04:20.63]One of the first foreign expeditions to climb Mount Qomolangma arrived in Tibet in 1921.
[04:24.97]They had no idea what they were up against.
[04:27.50]Two British expeditions made the attempt in 1992 and 1924, but failed to reach the top.
[04:32.73]The local Tibetans and Sherpas laughed the strange bottles containing what the referred to as “English air”.
[04:37.43]In 1924 two British men were lost.
[04:40.33]When their oxygen ran out, they had no chance of surviving.
[04:43.36]After World War II, technological advances in clothing and equipment had been made,
[04:47.25]and more was known about the mountain itself, which by now had been flown over several times by aircraft.
[04:51.67]The New Zealander Edmund Hillary and the Sherpa Tenzing Norgay,
[04:55.40]as members of British team, were the first to make it to the summit to Mount Qomolangma.
[04:59.06]They reached the top on May 29, 1953.
[05:02.40]In later years the question arose who was the first to reach the top.
[05:05.98]Wherever he was asked, Sherpa Tenzing Norgay’s answer was, “We climbed as a team, period.”
[05:10.71]Like winning in the Olympic Games, climbing a mountain such as Mount Qomolangma is a great personal achievement.
[05:15.78]Climbing the mountain is still one of man’s greatest challenges.
[05:18.42]After 1953 several hundred people have succeeded in climbing the mountain,
[05:22.26]some to be the first of their nation and many in attempts to climb the mountain over different slopes.
[05:26.25]The Chinese made their first successful attempt in 1960.
[05:29.57]On May 25 of that year, Gongbu, Wang Fuzhou and Qu Yinhua reached the summit of Mount Qomolangma.
[05:35.34]As it was dark and they were unable to take photos to prove that they had reached the top,
[05:39.24]they left iron container with the national flag and a portrait of Chairman Mao Zedong.
[05:43.05]At the age of 25, Qu Yinhua was the youngest ever to have reached the summit
[05:44.33]On their return, they were praised as national heroes.
[05:47.31]On May 27, 1975, another Chinese team climbed Mount Qomolangma from its northern side.
[05:52.40]Over the past 40 years, 29 other Chinese people have climbed Mount Qomolangma successfully |