Blog
Here you’ll find our blog posts, listed by main category. To receive posts by email as they appear, sign up for updates on the homepage!
The Musa Masala Dental Camp, 2024
Almost six months ago, we held our third annual Free Dental Camp at the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital. The growth of these events has been so inspiring. We started out with one dentist. At this camp, we had six!
Not only is this so much better for the community, allowing for more patients to be seen with a much more time-friendly exam period, but it shows the love the Nepal dental community has for being involved in a project like this. It is not easy to leave your practice, take a 10-12 hour jeep ride to a remote hospital and treat a solid line of patients who are not familiar with dentistry for four to five days. We are so grateful and overjoyed with the results of this event.
Musa Masala Advanced Lead Climbing Competition
What a day! We really hope all the climbers had as much fun as we did at our Advanced Lead Competition at Kathmandu Sport Climbing Center on November 23rd.
Our goal with these competitions is simple: provide an opportunity for climbers to come together to test themselves and have a good time.
So many people helped to bring this competition together, let’s start with the organizers, Lakpa Sherpa and Wongchhu Peak Promotion. Our special thanks go out to Ang Diku Sherpa, who, with all her duties coordinating a full trekking season, put the entire program together and got everyone to the same place on the same page. Sangita Rai and Rajat Maharjan worked tirelessly to bring it all together.
Presenting Luckme Tamang, the 2024 Charlie Noxon Scholarship Recipient
2025 is here, so fast! Where did that last year go??? Well, we have an announcement to make about 2024, so let’s spin back the hand of time for a moment before we take off into 2025.
Each year, Musa Masala presents scholarships for students we feel represent the ideas and mission of our organization. Now we would like to present the recipient of the Charlie Noxon Scholarship for 2024, Luckme Tamang.
Tribute to Lhola, an Unforgettable Companion
LhoLa, the dog that started it all, our model for independence and excitement, has left us. First we send our biggest hugs and thoughts for such a huge loss to Dr. Luanne Freer, who was with LhoLa for over 15 years. We also send our best to Wes Johnson, Luanne’s partner, who has been by her side. We want to mention all of the friends and family who had the good fortune to spend time with LhoLa.
What's New with Musa: Fall, 2024
We are excited to announce our partnership with the Himalayan Rescue Association Nepal, a renowned nonprofit organization founded in 1973. This collaboration will allow for a more seamless fundraising in the United States and bringing more education to mountain travelers. See our post about this new page for Musa Masala here.
The Himalayan Rescue Association and Musa Masala: Coming Together for Mountain Health and Safety
Musa Masala and the Himalayan Rescue Association (HRA) have gone into an agreement for fundraising and education! We got together at the Wilderness Medical (WMS) summer conference in Snowbird, Utah to celebrate our new partnership.
We actually got started at the HRA’s medical tent at Mount Everest, Everest ER, in 2016, during a WMS trek to Everest Base Camp in support of the clinic. Our co-founder, Dr. Tatiana Havryliuk, was one of the three doctors working for the spring climbing season. As we were sort of helping put up the tent, we talked about ways to help raise money to build the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital. That project became our book, Musa Masala: Mountain Girl of the Himalaya, and led us to where we are today.
Celebrating the Open Lead Climbing Competition at Kathmandu Sport Climbing Center, 2024
Musa Masala is so proud to have been a part of the March 9th Open Lead Climbing Championship at Kathmandu Sport Climbing Center. We co-sponsored the event with our friends at Wongchhu Peak Promotion. We did this for a very simple reason: to allow indoor climbers in Nepal to compete and challenge each other to grow the sport and community. This great group is wonderful at inspiring one another and we believe in supporting their dream of being able to one day represent Nepal internationally.
Musa Invites Climbers to Hattiban!
Following the Musa Masala Lead Climbing Competition at the Kathmandu Sport Climbing Center (KSCC - our post on the competition is coming soon!!), Musa Masala and Wongchhu Peak Promotion welcomed all the competitors and anyone from KSCC who wanted to come for a day of rock climbing at Hattiban, a local crag an hour outside of Kathmandu. Wongchhu Peak Promotion rented a bus and we picked most everyone up in front of the Nepali Ghar Hotel. We wrangled more along the way and some came later via scooter.
Helping Others, Fundraising to Create Opportunity for Nepal's Up-and-Coming Climbers
This is one of my favorite posts to put up. The reason? It’s simple. Good people doing good things to help good people. I couldn't have been more happy that Jocelyne Sze and Omar Saif agreed to tell us about their fundraiser to bring five climbers over from Nepal for a 10-day climbing training trip to Singapore.
We will let everyone tell their story, but just to take a second, all of us at Musa Masala would like to thank Jocelyne and Omar for making such a huge effort that brought so much joy and inspiration to not just the climbers, but everyone involved. We would like to thank everyone who donated, all the climbing gyms in Singapore and the families and friends who made this happen. To the climbers, Bikash, Swastika, Prena, Ronak, Sajan and Tenzin, we thank you for participating in this post and we hope your time in Singapore will always stay with you and inspire you with your climbing while giving back and helping others on the way. Jam Jam!!
Lead Climbing: The 2023 Musa Masala Indoor Competition
On November 6th, Musa Masala sponsored our second year of climbing indoor competitions in Kathmandu, Nepal at Crimpanzee Adventure Hub. Building off last year’s beginner top rope style event, we offered an intermediate level lead climbing event. Our goal is to encourage the growth of indoor climbing in Nepal while working with the existing climbing gyms to provide challenging competitions that will grow the sport, allowing for better climbers to be able to climb internationally to represent Nepal.
3 Awesome Holiday Gifts + Discounts
We're thrilled to share that the 2nd Musa Masala Indoor Climbing Competition was held at Crimpanzee Adventure Hub in Kathmandu, Nepal on November 6th. This was the only major competition for climbers in Nepal, it was a huge success!
Learn more about it in this story from The Himalayan Times. Stay tuned for a behind-the-scenes blogpost – The Times got the scoop before we could spill the beans...
The Musa Masala Intermediate Lead Climbing Competition 2023!
The Musa Masala team, along with our co-sponsor, Wongchhu Peak Promotion, is back with our second climbing event! Our goal is to make competing at an international level a real choice for young Nepali climbers. We consider providing fun and challenging competitions a key part of the recipe for success.
Nirvana Gears will again supply each climber with an awesome shirt-and-shorts climbing outfit.
Come join us at the amazing Crimpanzee Climbing Hub in Kathmandu, Nepal, on November 6th for a day of fun, food, climbing and friendship. We want to see you there. Jam Jam!!
Painting Party at the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital
In May of 2022 the Musa team gathered together for the first time since the pandemic outbreak at the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital. Here is a video that does a great job of showing the challenges the team faced and the amazing friendships that were formed when this group was brought together.
We send our greatest thanks to the staff of the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital who welcomed us and adapted to our presence while treating a steady stream of patients every day.
The Musa Masala Healthcare Profession Scholarship Program
Here it is. We are behind in providing all of this information about our program, but now you have it! In concert with the Himalayan Yokpu Foundation, Musa Masala provides funds for two students each year at this time, for a complete degree program in healthcare.
The Musa Masala Dental Camp, 2023
We are privileged to have Dr. Anumesh Dahal give us his firsthand account of the second Musa Masala Dental Camp, held at the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital Tapting at the end of April, 2023. We are so grateful for the team he put together to bring the only oral health organization to the area. We are thankful to Dr. Gyaltsen Gurungand the staff at the WSMH for working with us to make this possible.
We also thank our friends, Jason Tartalone at Sergeant Rescue and Pem Dorjee Sherpa of Imperial Expeditions, who helped put up the funding for this camp. Without the donations, we simply could not do this. Jason donated the funds raised during their Spring 2022 Everest Base Camp Trek to help us. Sergeant Rescue is based in Pennsylvania and provides classes in SAR, EMS and wilderness medicine. Pem Dorjee Sherpa is a friend of Musa Masala and a board member of the Himalayan Yokpu Foundation.
Supporting Nepali Climber, Panchamaya Tamang
Musa Masala is starting the new year off right! With the success of our first climbing competition, we are proud to announce that we are entering into a sponsorship agreement with one of the judges, Panchamaya Tamang. She is well-known in Nepal and one of the up and coming indoor climbers in the country. We're also pleased to present the completed video featuring our first climbing competition, which took place in October, 2022.
We have agreed to help Panchamaya participate in and make her way to as many competitions as possible. We have the shared goals of bringing indoor climbing to the forefront in Nepal, to increase exposure for the sport and advance a new generation of competitive climbers that can represent Nepal to the world.
The Musa Masala Nursing Scholarship Program
This scholarship program is a project we've hoped to start since the beginning of Musa Masala.
The idea to help provide for the medical education for young people living in the area around the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital has been brewing and stewing all through its construction. Now, as the hospital is open and offering quality healthcare, we are proud to say that we have three students in medical programs in Kathmandu who all are from the local area.
Hospital Opening in Nepal! Celebrating Wongchhu Sherpa's Dream
On October 12th, 2022, the dream of the late Wongchhu Sherpa, to provide a hospital for his home village, came true. Musa Masala is excited to share the details of the day with you.
The difficulties the local population had in seeking proper care before the hospital was built became a present day reality when poor weather made getting to the opening ceremony difficult to impossible!
Lots of too-late monsoon rain kept Dr. Luanne Freer, one of the driving forces behind the project, stranded in Lukla, along with the entire Wilderness Medical Society trek team. Pem Dorjee Sherpa of Imperial Expeditions and the Himalayan Yokpu Foundation was also stuck…
Announcing: Our New Store!
Jam Jam, Musas!! We have so much going on with our projects with nursing scholarships, our climbing competition, the official opening of the Wongchhu Sherpa Memorial Hospital, and our upcoming dental camp and live Facebook/YouTube show, but we want to take a second and introduce you to our brand new Musa Masala online store!!
We are very grateful to Shannon Edwards who put the store together.