Thousands of New Zealanders defied heavy rain on Monday to pay their
respects to the country's greatest modern-day hero, Everest conqueror
Sir Edmund Hillary, who died on January 11, as he lay in state at
Auckland's Anglican Cathedral.
The cathedral's doors will stay open all night to allow thousands
of mourners to file past the closed casket, draped with the New Zealand
flag and watched over by a military guard, before his state funeral
service on Tuesday.
Some queued up two hours to honour the man regarded as the
best-loved New Zealander of his generation, whose exploits on Everest
and in the Antarctic ensured him a lasting place in history.
Representatives of local Maori tribes and the Nepali and Indian
communities made their tributes along with Buddhist monks from Sri
Lanka, Tibet, Thailand and Myanmar and Indian women wore blue saris, a
symbol of the sky at the top of the world that Hillary and Sherpa
Tenzing Norgay reached in May 1953.
New Zealanders all over the country will watch Tuesday's service on
giant screens being set up in main cities, and the funeral will be
transmitted live to Nepal and to New Zealand's Scott Base in the
Antarctic, which Hillary helped establish 51 years ago.
Hillary's widow, Lady June, joined members of the Nepalese and
Indian communities Sunday night in tossing flowers into Auckland
harbour at Mission Bay, in a traditional farewell gesture at an
informal remembrance service.
The only sour note sounded in the funeral preparations has been an
alleged snub by British royals, who will not have a family
representative at the funeral.
Hillary was one of only 24 Knights of the Garter appointed by Queen
Elizabeth, and his achievement as the first man to step on the summit
of Mount Everest during a British expedition was announced on the
morning of her coronation in 1953.
New Zealand's Governor-General Anand Satyanand will represent the
queen at the funeral, and Buckingham Palace said she would hold a
memorial service to honour Hillary in April at St George's Chapel in
Windsor Castle.
