EMILY REID/Arizona Daily Wildcat Ray Umashanker has returned to Tucson from Africa, where he climbed Mount Kilamanjaro in the name of his son, Naren, who took his own life.

A UA assistant dean conquered Africa's highest peak in an effort to raise money for a scholarship honoring his late son.

Ray Umashankar, assistant dean of industrial relations for the College of Engineering and Mines, returned last week from his climb to the 19,340 foot summit of Kilimanjaro.

The climb was in the name of his son, Naren, who took his own life more than a decade ago.

Umashankar began his climb on Sept. 23, and the whole trek took six days.

"To me it was so magical," he said. "When you enjoy it so much you don't feel the tiredness or the pain."

Although Mount Kilimanjaro is not known as a difficult climb, Umashankar stressed that this stereotype is somewhat unfounded.

"Because it's not a technical climb, people may say, ÎOh, I'll just take a few days and try this,'" Umashankar said. "Many of them don't make it to the top. It's shocking to see people being evacuated and being affected by the high altitude."

Although Umashankar's group made it to the summit without incident, many other travelers to Mount Kilimanjaro, located in the northeastern corner of Tanzania, were not so lucky.

A group starting the climb a week before Umashankar ran into terrible weather, and three porters ended up freezing to death near the top of the mountain.

Because of this, Umashankar ended up donating most of his old equipment to the porters after he had finished his climb.

"The news that three porters died on the mountain, that haunted me a lot," Umashankar said. "It does happen, but when it happens when you're there, it is very different than reading about it in the paper."

SUSIE LEMONT/Arizona Daily Wildcat Outdoor Adventures trip leader Kate Morley, an interdisciplinary studies senior, hikes to the summit aof Mt. Humphrey's Peak near Flagstaff on Saturday. A group of students camped and hiked to the peak, Arizona's tallest, this weekend.

In addition, four gunmen hijacked a shuttle bus going to the base of Kilimanjaro the day before Umashankar took the same bus.

These misadventures did not keep Umashankar from enjoying his experience, he said.

"It was truly an extraordinary feeling," he said. "The climb was a challenge, but I could see the wonderful things that life still had to offer."

Umashankar also made sure to allow plenty of time for mental reflection on his trip.

"For me, every morning I wanted to be the first one to leave," he said. "I wanted time to be alone with my thoughts. The grandeur of the mountains and what it does for me when I'm alone is so important for my emotional well-being."

To honor his son's memory, Umashankar hopes to create a scholarship in Naren's name, which would cover tuition for two UA resident students every year.

The climb was planned so donors could give donations to the Naren Umashankar Memorial Scholarship Endowment per foot of elevation Umashankar gained.

Umashankar had raised around $13,000 for the scholarship in his son's name before his climb and has not yet calculated how much money was raised during the climb.

Although Umashankar admittedly entertained thoughts of quitting before reaching the top, thinking about his surviving family members pushed him forward.

Nita Umashankar, Ray's daughter and a UA junior, especially motivated him, he said, by competing in a dance performance that helped raise money for her late-brother's scholarship on Aug. 17, despite injuring her knee three days earlier.

With his daughter and wife in the back of his mind, Umashankar reached the top of Africa's tallest peak, despite an artificial hip he received after a mountain biking accident in 1993.

"My family has been so incredibly supportive of my need to go on these kinds of things," Umashankar said.

"I cannot even tell you how proud of him I am," his wife, Sushila Umashankar said.

Despite her support, Sushila, a senior lecturer in the Department of Marketing, said she has asked her husband to make this his last high-elevation trek.

She lost another child due to health problems.

"I don't know if I could bear it if anything else happened. Trouble finds its way into our life anyway, and I just want to make sure we live a quiet life," she said.

Because of this, Umashankar said he was going to obey his wife's request.

"I absolutely love the mountains," Umashankar said. "It's an indescribable feeling, but my wife's concern is genuine. Since she's allowed me to do all these things, I should really respect her opinion."

Still, Umashankar has not completely ruled out the idea of returning to high altitude climbing.

"I need an escape clause," he stated in an e-mail.