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Seattle clings to hope for young hikers

The Columbian
Published: May 10, 2015, 5:00pm

SEATTLE — First came an urgent message on the neighborhood social networking site, five days after a devastating earthquake shook Nepal, killing thousands:

“Tie a yellow ribbon for Sydney. Tomorrow at 1 p.m … Community effort, all welcome!”

The ribbons, wrote organizer Amy D. Truex, signify hope for the return of Sydney Schumacher and Bailey Meola, 19-year-old high school friends missing in Nepal’s Langtang Valley. They have not been heard from since April 19, six days before the quake.

Up and down Madison Street, ribbons began to appear. In front of Cactus, a Mexican restaurant where Bill Gates occasionally dines al fresco. Near Howard Schultz’s neighborhood Starbucks. From Lake Washington, glittery in the spring sunshine, west to the home of the Russian consul general.

Then on Friday night, more than 200 neighbors and friends gathered on the lake shore, holding candles in the fading light, struggling with hope, fear and verb tenses. As in, “Bailey is someone who was really passionate about experiencing new things.” A pause. “No, is passionate.”

Is passionate.

The Schumacher family lives in this graceful Madison Park neighborhood, lush with the reds and pinks of rhododendrons in full bloom, now punctuated with pervasive symbols of pain. Ribbons drooped from recent rain. Posters invited all comers to the candlelight vigil and begged in red letters: HoldOntoHope.

The Meola family lives close by in Seattle’s Central District. Bailey Meola and Sydney Schumacher graduated together from Garfield High School and were spending a gap year traveling the world. They jetted off in February on separate journeys and met up in Thailand on April 12.

Destination? Kathmandu. Then the Langtang Valley and Kyanjin Gompa monastery.

They had planned to plant a Seattle Seahawks “12th Man” flag high up in the Himalayas in honor of the hometown football team, which won the Super Bowl the year the fast friends graduated.

Today, Schumacher’s and Meola’s names are on a master missing list posted on Facebook and dedicated to the casualties of Langtang Valley, one of the regions hit hardest by the 7.8 earthquake and avalanches that crashed down afterward.

There were 60 names on the list as of Saturday afternoon, including 41 Nepalese and three Americans: Schumacher, Meola and Dawn Habash, a 57-year-old from Maine on her fourth trip to Nepal.

Friday night’s vigil was dedicated to the missing and their loved ones, the adventurers and the trekkers, the researchers and the teachers, the pilgrims and the students — everyone who was touched by the April 25 disaster, Scott Pattison told the somber group.

Pattison, a family friend, said he had watched Schumacher grow up here in Madison Park. When his son outgrew his baby jogger, it was handed down to the Schumacher family and became the adventurous little girl’s main mode of transportation.

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