Porter (profession)
Porter ( Engl. Porter ) is a professional .
The porter carries suitcases , bags and other luggage over short distances for a fee . Porters are often found in large train stations and airports .
The profession developed from the servants at the heyday of international rail traffic . However, the tasks at that time still included running errands and other services . Other (outdated) names for such servants are " Kuli " and "Boy". Since these terms have a rather derogatory and humiliating meaning these days, they are no longer used.
In upscale hotels, guests' luggage is picked up by the porter upon arrival and taken to the room by the bag handler .
The luggage of expedition or adventure travelers (such as mountaineers , desert or jungle tourists, researchers, etc.) is still often transported from camp to camp in remote or impassable areas by local porters (who are often still called "coolies") . During expeditions in the Himalayas, members of the Sherpa ethnic group are usually used as high porters and now also as mountain guides . A distinction must be made between the load carriers that transport the equipment in the (high) mountains to the base camps. The sirdar is the leader of high mountain porters and porters.
The supply of mountain huts done before, where other transportation (route, goods lift , helicopter ) were not available or too expensive, by cabin carrier . The term Alpensherpas occurs colloquially . In the meantime, supply by helicopter is mostly cheaper, so that in Europe there are only a large number of hut carriers in the Tatra Mountains . There they have been competing every year since 1985 in a Sherparalley , a load- carrying competition .
Physiology and Ergonomics
The Belgian Norman C. Heglund studied the carrying of loads. According to this, African women use a pendulum movement when carrying loads on their heads when walking on the flat. This minimizes the ups and downs of the load and the energy expenditure of those walking.
High mountain wearers, on the other hand, carry higher loads over mountainous terrain without any particular movement, without haste and typically regular breaks - in extreme cases, 45 seconds break after 15 seconds of carrying so as not to leave the efficient aerobic operating range of muscle function. They carry woven baskets or backpack racks, heavily loaded over a headband and with their back inclined. Sometimes there is also a small load in a flatter sack in front of the chest, which hangs on shoulder straps. A T-shaped walking stick is used to support the load during a break from walking while standing, platforms are used in between to completely lower the load.
The American anthropologist NJ Malville determined an average of 146% of their body weight as carrying load in middle-aged (20-49 years) male carriers.
literature
- Beatrix Heintze: African pioneers. Caravans in western central Africa (approx. 1850–1890). Lembeck, Frankfurt am Main 2002.
- Robert Lessmann : The little people who carry heavy loads. Vienna 2008, ISBN 978-3-85476-263-8 (carrier in the Himalayas, the Andes and East Africa, publication funded by the Austrian Development Cooperation )
- Sonja Malzner, Anne Peiter (ed.): The carrier. A “supporting” figure in colonial history. transcript, Bielefeld 2018, ISBN 978-3-8376-3753-3 .
- Volker Matthies: In the shadow of the discoverer. Indigenous companions of European explorers. Christoph Links Verlag, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-86153-989-6 .
Web links
- Eva Berger: Reviews: Indigenous companions and porters
Individual evidence
- ↑ StudienVerlag: Buchdetail. (No longer available online.) In: studienverlag.at. Archived from the original on June 1, 2016 ; accessed on June 1, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ limited preview in the Google book search
- ↑ Slovakia: Europe's last Sherpas work in the High Tatras - DIE WELT. In: welt.de. Retrieved June 1, 2016 .
- ^ NC Heglund et al .: Energy-saving gait mechanics with head-supported loads , Nature 375, 52-54 (04 May 1995); doi : 10.1038 / 375052a0 .
- ^ NC Heglund et al .: The mechanics of head-supported load carriage by Nepalese porters , Journal of Experimental Biology 2016, 219: 3626-3634; doi : 10.1242 / jeb.143875 .
- ^ NJ Malville: Porters of the eastern hills of Nepal: Body size and load weight. In: American journal of human biology: the official journal of the Human Biology Council. Volume 11, number 1, 1999, pp. 1-11, doi : 10.1002 / (SICI) 1520-6300 (1999) 11: 1 <1 :: AID-AJHB1> 3.0.CO; 2-E , PMID 11533929 .
- ↑ The Sherpas' recipe for success: sweat and drudgery science.orf.at, November 21, 2016, accessed on November 22, 2016.
