Even as you are reading this, Ali Bushnaq is in kathmandu preparing to scale Mt Everest. A civil engineer by profession, he spends his weekends climbing and hiking in the great outdoors as a form of relaxation. His idea of a 'nightmare holiday', he told Lorraine Chandler, would be to lie on a beach.
Towering at 195 cm with not an inch of fat on him, 43-year-old Ali Bushnaq is a formidable looking man and looks ready for the challenge of conquering Mt Everest.
I meet him a week before he was to leave for Nepal to join the Everest Peace Project Climb for Peace.
His ascent of the famous 8,848-metre (29,029-foot) peak is particularly noteworthy because his team consists of 20 climbers of various nationalities and faiths.
The project is an experiment in cross-cultural living, as team members must rely upon each other for survival and success throughout the 65-day expedition.
As for so many climbers before him, this is the ultimate test in endurance and skill for Bushnaq too, who has been an avid hiker and amateur climber for many years, in addition to having participated in running races and triathlons whenever he could.
A former Boy Scout and rugby player, Bushnaq caught the climbing bug on his first visit to Nepal in 1998. He organised a trip for eight friends and family and climbed Mt Nala (5,500 metres) on the Nepal-Tibet border. A visit to Nepal has become an annual event and he has been there five times on climbing trips.
"I spend all my spare time with people who like hiking and mountains," says this Abu Dhabi based mountaineering enthusiast.
He and his wife, Sandra, became friends with a German couple, Johannes and Claudia Wolfer, who also lived in Abu Dhabi, and went camping every weekend in Oman.
Bushnaq joined Johannes for numerous hikes and when the couple returned to Germany, Johannes invited his friend to join him for a trip to the Alps in 2003.
The pair arranged to meet at a coffee shop in Italy's Lake Como at 6 pm on a certain day - without any liaising on mobile phones. A plane, train and boat journey later, Bushnaq was on time for his appointment.
They spent a blissful week hiking through the Maritime Alps, which form the border between Italy and France. They walked between 10 and 12 hours every day, sleeping in lodges at night.
A wistful look comes over Bushnaq at the memory of those days much like it would on others who reminisce about lazing on golden tropical beaches. But the common factor of wistfulness stops here. While the whole world might equate 'holidays' with 'relaxation', to Bushnaq the two words simply don't attach.
"My brother was on vacation in Las Vegas recently," he says, dismissively. "But I would never consider a holiday that doesn't involve hard work."
His three children, ages 5 to 14, he is happy to insist, are just as passionate in their love for the outdoors, but he laments that his wife shows no interest in exploring the outdoors.
I suggest that perhaps she may not have the time, considering she works full-time, does the housekeeping and looks after their three children.
But Bushnaq waves my suggestions away as if these duties shouldn't be impediments to developing a love for the outdoors. He is even willing, he says, to look after the kids if she is expresses a desire to go off and do something adventurous.
I wonder where he'd find the time (to sit with the kids) and how she would drum up the urge to scale a few peaks after a full day at work and attending to her family's needs back at home.
He sort of puts the lid on my simmering thoughts when he says, "I'll be gone for a couple of months on this Everest expedition so I told my wife, 'I want you to stay fit while I'm away'. You see, I think I'll be fit and hiking in the outdoors even when I'm 70, and I want Sandra to be able to enjoy the same level of fitness and lifestyle."
I let out the quietest sigh of relief that my husband is more interested in taking me to the movies than urging me to climb a few mountains.
I
I was a bit of a tearaway in my teens so I'm glad that my son, Nader, is not like me - although my daughter might be.
I'm a very organised person. That's something my mother took a lot of care to teach me and I think it has really contributed to my success. If you're mentally organised then that will show through in your work. I make proposals that are accepted at first submission because of how well-organised they are.
I try to teach my children organisational skills but I don't really spend as much time as I should with them.
I was never really interested in sport as a competitive activity. To me it is more a means of keeping fit. I feel your body is an engine that you need to look after by providing it with a proper diet and subjecting it to good exercise.
While studying in the United States, I took up scuba diving and also became a certified lifeguard. I also learnt how to ski and fish while I was there.
When I discovered the sport of running, I loved it! When I returned to the UAE (in 1987 after completing university in the US), I started playing rugby twice a week and I didn't miss a single practice session or a single game for 15 years.
Nowadays, I find climbing to be a great way to keep fit.
I love to look at mountains, especially at sunset or in the early morning.
I'm very glad to be participating in the Everest Peace Project. We want to show the world that apartheid is wrong; there should be no walls between different countries and different faiths.
When we read of other nationalities, we are only too ready to make assumptions about what they are like, but we don't really think that they too have families and problems (just like all others).
I take a deep breath whenever I think about climbing Mt Everest. I've never been worried about other sport events in which I have participated, but this is a biggie.
I am 100 per cent set on going on the expedition and will do my best to reach the top. There's no turning back now.
I'm very optimistic that my body won't let me down. I'm not a very competitive person by nature, so I am just competing with myself, testing my own physical fitness and enjoying it.
Me
Me and my wife:
I met my wife, Sandra, in 1990. She is a cousin of mine and was working as an air hostess with Jordanian Airlines at the time of our marriage. As well as running the house now, she has a well-paid job as a communications officer for the UAE Offsets Group.
It's a very demanding position and she's also kept very busy by the children, who depend on her more than on me.
Sandra is very strong and doesn't reveal her emotions as easily as I do. She doesn't show that she is worried about the risks I'm taking climbing Mt Everest.
We're very different from each other and I think that's why we're happy together. I know it's not easy for her to see me go on this long expedition, nevertheless, I wanted to test her reaction. So I told her I was thinking of not going. She got upset and wanted to know why. It was something I had wanted to do so much, she said, urging me to just go ahead with it.
I'm lucky to have her and it's not as if she lets lets me get away with everything. Recently, some friends suggested I join them on a hiking trip in Oman 10 days before I was to leave for Kathmandu, but Sandra put her foot down and insisted I spend those days with the family.
Me and my Ottoman roots:
My family roots go back to Mostar in Bosnia (where the family was known by the name of Rizvanbegovic). My great grandfather was the brother of Ali Pasha who became governor of Bosnia.
(The Ottomans) were very strong during those days, but when they began to lose their power in Europe, they retreated to the Middle East and my forefathers moved to Caesaria, south of Haifa in Palestine, in 1870.
My grandfather, Ali, was born there and my family changed their name to Bushnaq to blend in (with the local populace).
Our family intermarried with Palestinians but always kept links with the home country. I've always wanted to visit Bosnia, but when Sandra and I got married in 1991, the war erupted.
Me and Al Ain:
I was born in Nablus (in the West Bank) but came to Al Ain when I was 5, as my father was working in the agriculture department. My mother went on to be the principal of Asma Elementary School.
I still think of those days amid the sand-dunes. It was fantastic. We were always outdoors playing football. We spent weekends camping out.
After completing my university, I returned (from the US) to Al Ain and lived in an extension my parents had built for me at our home. I worked in a consulting firm, D Balfour and Sons, from 1988 to 1994. There I learnt (more about) water engineering and went from junior engineer to being the resident engineer.
In May 1994, my wife said, "Let's move to the big city" and we went to Dubai. During this period, I started working for Fosroc, a company that supplies construction chemicals. But after a year, Fosroc transferred me to Abu Dhabi, and here we are still.
My parents still live in Al Ain. My dad, Sami, is 81, while my mother, Dalal, is 65.
Me and growing up:
I had two brothers and a sister. But in 1982, my brother, Omar, was killed in a car accident during his last year in high school. Only two years younger than me, he was my best friend and we had spent our whole lives playing together.
I was in the US at college but I came back to the UAE when he died. As the eldest (child), I tried to act as a role model for my sister and brother, Ziad and Lana, to show that life goes on. I felt a new responsibility towards my parents.
I eventually went back to the States in 1983 and got a scholarship to study for a bachelor of science in civil engineering at Saint Martin's College in Washington state.
As a person, I experienced a lot of inner growth while I was there; learning to love the mountains, swimming, reading books and developing a love for music. I also began to love running.
I completed a master's in engineering and management at the college.I probably would have stayed on in the US had my brother not died. (But) I felt a commitment to return to my family.
Me and my job:
I worked in Fosroc until July 2003, when I moved to Ben Salem Management Consultancy. I'm the regional manager and am in charge of expanding the company. My boss, Boutros Salem, is very supportive of my Everest climb, despite the fact that I have to be away from work for over two months.
Myself
What does climbing mean to you?
It's like any task you do. Even in engineering, you have to be trained and properly equipped and you have to plan well. I like the logistics of (climbing) and also like its physicality. I enjoy depending on my body and pushing it to reach the goal.
I like arriving at the different milestones on a mountain. They are like targets you set in life. You don't climb from the bottom to the top in one day. When you reach the peak, you look back at the base camp and feel a sense of achievement - because of the preparation, the planning, and the determination that made you push your body to its limits.
Do you wish you had taken up sport as a career?
I was 25 when I started playing rugby and I envied those who learnt to play it as children. I definitely wish I had started young; there's a good chance I would have become a professional rugby player. I don't regret the money I spend on sport because I missed out on a lot of organised sport as a child.
If challenges were mountains, what has been the biggest mountain you've climbed?
When I was younger, I was quite shy. I found it very difficult to give speeches in public and it's a setback I have overcome. Now I'm quite used to addressing a large number of people at seminars.
What sort of lessons have you learnt while climbing mountains?
Think positive and don't let anything bring you down. Always laugh and smile even if the going is tough. If you can develop these skills, you'll be the kind of person others would want to have around them.
If you are successful in scaling Mt Everest, what would be your next challenge?
I'd love to take up climbing as a career. It's the thing I enjoy most and I'd like to educate people on sport and nature. I would also be interested in doing something in tourism, opening the doors of the Arab world to foreigners and show them the beauty here ...
My ambition is to put together a group of people from various countries who enjoy outdoor activities and help them look at their countries in a new light, so they can explore newer opportunities for tourism. Look at how Nepal has promoted its mountains.
If I had a bit of capital, that's what I'd do. I would not be doing it for the money but for the love of it.
