Name: I Tried Being a Porter on Africa's Tallest Mountain | Superskilled with Eva zu Beck
Uploaded: 2025-11-17T17:06:52.000Z
Duration: 32 min 48 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Some of the strongest people on the planet don't hang out at the gym.

Adverbs of manner

Hell, they're probably nothing like what you imagine.

These women work as porters on the tallest mountain in Africa.

equipment up and down rocky trails at extremely high altitude, all the while setting up camps, guiding tourists, and

I want to find out how they get so strong.

And what does it take to work as a high altitude porter?

In this episode, I plan to climb the tallest mountain in Africa, all the while carrying heavy loads just like the porters of Kilimanjaro.

And given that I don't really frequent the gym, this could just be a terrible idea.

Frankly, I just don't want to keep going.

I'm Eva Zubeck, and I'm an adventure filmmaker and YouTuber.

My mission is to show you the powerful potential hardwired into the human DNA and help you unleash it for healthier, happier, and

But, you know, it's just that feeling before a big trip where you're like, I'm sure I've forgotten something, but

My mission here in Tanzania is to climb Mount Kilimanjaro.

But this isn't your typical Achille trek.

My challenge is to become a porter for a week and see what it's like to carry heavy loads at a high altitude.

Honestly, I'm not sure why I keep doing these things to myself.

You know, looking around here, it's so lush and green and beautiful.

You definitely think that we're going to some tropical resort, you know, and

I don't know why, but I'm feeling just, like, a teeny, tiny bit nervous.

It's weird because I've been on this mountain before, so I should know what to expect.

But, you know, the last time I was here, I was just a tourist with a light pack, and

this time, I'm trying to replicate what the porters do.

So going from tourist to porter feels like a completely different ball game, and

I don't think this is going to feel like a holiday at all.

Kilimanjaro is a pretty serious mountain.

The tallest peak on the African continent.

That's taller than any mountain in Europe or the contiguous United States.

I was about to meet my climbing team, the guides, the porters, the staff that would hopefully lead us to the summit.

It's a predominantly female team, and I'm so excited to learn from these strong women.

So this year, this is the real behind the scenes of any Kilimanjaro expedition, because in order to go up the mountain, you need to carry a lot of stuff with you.

And to do that, you need a lot of people.

So all this stuff is being carried up Kilimanjaro by people, by the porters of Kili.

And over the next few days, I'll be learning how to do that, too.

The porters of Kilimanjaro are the true unsung heroes of the mountain.

They're the ones who carry all the gear and food up and down these trails, setting up camps and ultimately making the mountain accessible to 30,000 tourists that visit every year.

Just a few years ago, it was an all male profession, but

more recently, women have started to join their ranks.

Rose, Elia, Mani, and Gracie here are some of these porters, and

they were about to teach me all about their line of work.

This is just like one person's head carry.

And I'm supposed to be carrying stuff like this on my head.

Well, it happens to be one of the best paid gigs in the region.

If you spend two weeks working on Kili, you end up making as much money as you would over an entire month back in the city.

Starting tomorrow, I'll be learning how to carry the standard load that every porter is required to handle.

But today, I get to warm up with something much lighter.

This is about the weight of a standard tourist backpack.

And it's the last day that I get to carry such little weight.

These guys have had to develop seriously impressive strength in order to work here, and

Each porter is responsible for carrying one specific set of gear weighing just over £40.

All right, we're gonna let the girls pass.

Not only strong, they're also faster than us.

The fact that these women were so speedy was no coincidence.

In order to get hired to work on the mountain, they have to compete with men who, on average, are physically stronger.

Subtitles ListPlay Video

I Tried Being a Porter on Africa's Tallest Mountain | Superskilled with Eva zu Beck

stuff

entire

strength

precious