Thomas Kellenberger climbing in the Great Himalayan National Park. Photo from Facebook account of Thomas Kellenberger
BERN, Switzerland (MindaNews / 15 Nov) – Thomas Kellenberger, the Swiss founder of a children’s foundation in Cagayan de Oro City in Mindanao, reached Nepal last week and is nearing Southeast Asia in his attempt to walk from Switzerland back to the Philippines.
Kellenberger said Saturday in an online interview from Bhalubang, Nepal that he had already walked 9,500 kilometers (km) or about two-thirds of his 15,000-km target.
Kellenberger has walked for 427 days since he started his fundraiser, “Kuya Thom Goes Home: A Walk for a Cause” in August 25, 2021 in Rüderswil, Switzerland. Nepal is the 17th country that he reached in his trek back to the Philippines. He plans to arrive in Laos, the first Southeast Asian country in his route, by the end of this year.
Kellenberger told MindaNews he felt refreshed after a five-day break that he took in Nepal to heal his injured knee and to recover from the stomach ailment he got during the trek across India.
Thomas Kellenberger with new-found friends in India. Photo from Facebook account of Thomas Kellenberger
He said he used the break to take stock of his situation and used a “paradigm shift” to recover mentally, trying to go back to the reason for his two-year long trek.
“I was psyching myself up, because it didn’t help for me to have negative thoughts. I had a bad knee and was recovering from diarrhea, so there was little I could do except to rest and recover,” Kellenberger said.
He also undertook “self-therapy” and “compassion therapy” drills “to try to get myself grounded again.”
It also helped, he said, that he would again have walking companions for a month or more.
Two Swiss friends would join him from Pokara to Kathmandu and a Swiss television team was set to film in Kathmandu an update episode of his trek. A Swiss friend, Marijn, had walked with him for two weeks starting from Chandigarh in India.
Thomas Kellenberger with Swiss walking companion Marijn in Shimla, India. Photo from Facebook account of Thomas Kellenberger
Kellenberger also survived near mishaps during the India-Nepal leg. After negotiating the difficult mountains of the Great Himalayan National Park, Kellenberger was nearly hit by a football-sized stone that got dislodged from a peak and hurtled downwards, missing him by inches.
“That’s the irony of it. After escaping any kind of injury climbing the mountains, I nearly got hit and almost get killed by a falling stone,” said Kellenberger. “That is something that always returns to my mind.”
In Lal Dhang, India where he spent the night in the “Forrest Nature Camp,” Kellenberger injured his left knee when he tripped on a manmade sling and fell forcefully on a stone.
He admitted he was in a dangerous situation while trying to cross the jungle, having been warned about the presence of animals like elephants, leopards and tigers in the jungle.
“In the thicket of the jungle I don’t see far. No idea what is hiding behind the lush greenery or lying in wait there. With every sound I hear my heart pumps faster and I get totally concentrated. I have to admit my stress level is quite high here,” Kellenberger described his tense situation.
Then while he was limping along out of the reserve, he was attacked by a swarm of hornets but still managed to outrun them. “When the hornets finally let go of me, I experience nausea and almost have to vomit,” he added in his Nov. 5 post.
Leaving India and entering Nepal, Kellenberger said then that he felt tired of travel and adventure, and longed for his family and the familiar. “I listen to Swiss music and dream of home in Switzerland and the Philippines,” he posted.
But Kellenberger said he tried to take a positive attitude, saying he has “the feeling that he will be able to reach Cagayan de Oro next year.”
“I don’t know where this assurance comes from, but I am glad that I am a spiritual person and I find the motivation to keep going,” he said.
He said he has also become more aware and conscious of the things that happened in his journey, aside from taking down notes on his journal or voice recording his experiences. “In my normal life then- working from Monday to Friday- I could not even recall how I spent some of the days of the week. But on my walk starting from Georgia, I could recall exactly what happened, I could revisit all the things that I did on those days. I think my consciousness has been heightened,” said Kellenberger.
In one of his posts on social media, Kellenberger related how near Shahzadpur in India he met a farmer plowing one of his fields, and how the man allowed Kellenberger to plow part of the field with his tractor and invited him later for tea and cookies. “I‘ve always enjoyed helping on my uncle and aunt’s farm (in Switzerland) and now find myself almost nostalgic for those times,” said Kellenberger.
He said he also recommends to fellow travellers to just walk in some parts instead of taking rides all the way. “Walking gives you a more intense experience of travel. You meet more people and have closer contact with them,” said Kellenberger.
He urged Filipinos to try walking across some of the islands instead of just riding across the archipelago.
Kellenberger plans to walk two months across Nepal, estimating to reach Laos by the end of December, and then on to Vietnam.
He reckons reaching the Philippines in March next year, where he will walk the final leg of his two-year trek starting from Claveria in Cagayan province at the northernmost tip of the Philippines, and then on to Banawe and going south by the major highways linking the islands before reaching his final destination, Cagayan de Oro City. (Brady Eviota / MindaNews)