Japanese mountaineer Junko Tabei, who died Thursday at 77, devoted her adult life to scaling peaks, climbing the tallest mountains in more than 70 countries. "Most Japanese men of my generation would expect the woman to stay at home and clean house," the mother of two said in the 1991 interview. Later in life, she became concerned about the degradation of Everest, completing master's studies in 2000 at Kyushu University in southern Japan on the garbage problem as the famous mountain was opened to more climbers.