On May 4, 1975, Junko Tabei lay buried under a wall of snow and ice on Mount Everest. An avalanche had swept down the mountain, knocking her unconscious and trapping her in a crevasse. Her Sherpa guide, Ang Tshering, dug frantically with his hands until he found her. When she opened her eyes, she saw the jagged blue sky above and felt the crushing weight of the ice against her legs. She was bruised, bleeding, and terrified. But as the team helped her to her feet, she made a quiet decision: she would not turn back.
The summit was still 1,000 metres above, and she had come too far to let an avalanche stop her. Junko Tabei was born in 1939 in a small farming village in Fukushima, Japan. She was a frail child, often sick, and doctors said she was too weak for strenuous activity. But at age ten, she climbed a local mountain with her school and felt an electric thrill. From that day, she saved every yen she could to buy climbing gear. In 1960s Japan, women were expected to marry young and stay home.
Mountaineering clubs refused to let her join. So she formed her own all-women's club, the Ladies Climbing Club of Japan, and they trained on ice cliffs and rock faces, often mocked by male climbers who said women belonged in the kitchen. By 1975, Junko had climbed some of the highest peaks in the world, but Everest was the ultimate test. Her team of fifteen women and six Sherpas faced brutal winds, frostbite, and avalanches. They had little money and used second-hand equipment. After the avalanche, many of the Sherpas urged the team to descend.
The summit was still 1,000 metres above, and she had come too far to let an avalanche stop her.
Junko's legs were swollen, and her ribs ached with every breath. But she remembered the faces of the women who had sponsored her, the housewives and factory workers who had donated their small savings. She could not let them down. She decided to continue, but only if the team agreed to carry on together. On May 16, 1975, Junko Tabei became the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest. She stood on the roof of the world, gasping in the thin air, with the wind tearing at her face.
She planted a small Japanese flag and left a tiny doll her daughter had given her. The descent was just as dangerous: she slipped on an ice slope and nearly fell into a crevasse, but her teammates caught her rope. Back at base camp, she collapsed into her tent, exhausted but alive. She later said that reaching the top was not the hardest part; the hardest part was deciding to keep going after the avalanche. Junko Tabei's achievement shattered stereotypes about women's physical limits. She proved that determination could overcome both nature's fury and society's prejudice.
After Everest, she climbed the highest peak on every continent, becoming the first woman to complete the Seven Summits. She also founded a mountain conservation organisation and continued climbing into her seventies, even after surviving cancer. One memorable detail: she once said that her favourite climbing snack was pickled plums, which she carried in her pocket on every expedition. Junko Tabei showed the world that a small, quiet woman from a Japanese village could stand taller than any mountain.