mumbai while girls in standard iv were busy playing with barbie dolls bhagyashree sawant was aiming high literally after reading about bachendri pal and her mountaineering escapades in an english textbook this siondharavi girl from a lowermiddleincome neighbourhood decided there was one thing she would do when she grew upi wanted to scale mount everest just like her even though i had no clue what mountaineering was i knew i wanted to be on that very height someday said the girl who is 18 years old today and despite poor finances almost managed the feat reaching around 1200 metres from the summit sawant was on the same expedition as arjun vajpai 16 of delhi who is currently the youngest indian to have climbed the mountainsawant proved to many that determination is the key to achievement last year after pune girl krishna patil scaled the 8850metre peak sawants will grew stronger i went through all the articles written about her and then researched more on the various trekking institutes in the city that could help me said sawant who spent all her free time in finding the best way to make her dream come truemost of the institutes refused to take me along since i had no experience and the minimum height one should have scaled to get to mount everest was 6000 metres so i asked them to take me to a 6000metrehigh peak to begin with said sawant whose determination was enough to impress the asian trekking institute and soon sawant was on her way to scaling the first peak of her life but the problems didnt end therewe needed money for everything from buying equipment to registering with the institute to scale everest we could not even manage to find enough sponsors with her father struggling to find a job and mother working as a clerk in a college raising funds was a big problem we had to mortgage my mothers and grandmothers jewellery to raise enough money to get me to my destination she addedsawant finally made her way to kathmandu on april 12 the fierce winds and sudden rains affected her health every step was getting difficult since i had never done this before and the boots were very heavy but i didnt show the pain fearing that they would send me back after scaling 7350 metres of the worlds tallest mountain though she was sent back to base due to lack of oxygen i was two days away from reaching the top but i am still happy i reached where not many people in this world do