Nepal, Jan. 22 -- Kalpana Maharjan combines her passion for sports climbing with activism Kalpana Maharjan is the first female journalist to climb Mt Everest from both the Nepal and the China sides. But the Lalitpur native doesn't just climb mountains for the sake of breaking records.

In 2014, Maharjan was attempting Mera Peak in the Khumbu region when she was struck by severe cerebral oedema that put her into a coma for eight days.

"After regaining consciousness I believed that God had given me a second life," recalls Maharjan. "So I decided that I would live the rest of my life for the public good."

Her first summit of Everest was in 2018, when Maharjan was 34. She climbed from the South Col route with four other Nepali women journal...