The Enemy is Ignorance

18 February 2008



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Three Cups of Tea Inspires

There are a great many books that one misses when they first hit the market, and Three Cups of Tea is one such for this journal. A New York Times bestseller and one of Target.com’s Bookmarked Book Club selections, the book is the true story of Greg Mortenson, director of the Central Asia Institute and former mountaineer. It reads like a great adventure novel, and it is all the more astonishing because it is non-fiction.

Greg Mortenson started off with a more interesting life story than most. Son of Minnesotan Lutherans, he grew up in Tanzania as his missionary parents worked to build a more self-reliant local population. He fell in love with Kilimanjaro and become a climber of no small accomplishment. His younger sister Christa had contracted meningitis as a small child and suffered from seizures and other difficulties ever afterward. When she passed away, he vowed to climb K2 and leave a necklace of hers at the top as a tribute. He failed to make the summit and was saved by the Balti folk who live in Pakistan’s part of the Himalayas.

Having set the story up in the first couple of chapters, the remainder of the book is his quest to build schools for the people in that part of the world. When he discovered that dozens of kids gathered in an open field and did their multiplication tables in the dirt with sticks, he found a better way to pay tribute to his little sister. A Lutheran American raised in Africa building schools for Shi’ite children in the remotest parts of Pakistan – Hollywood couldn’t make it up.

One comes away from the book understanding three things quite clearly. First, Mr. Mortenson, or Dr. Greg as the people he serves call him, is a doer, not a talker. While most will wear a bracelet with “Live Strong” on it and do no more, he put himself in physical danger frequently to benefit children he’s never met. Second, one realizes that his way is the only way to truly defeat terrorism and Fascislam – one educated child at a time. Third, Dr. Greg’s wife Tara is no less a real American hero than he is. Few women could let their husbands leave for monthw on end to visit a dangerous and distant part of the world to benefit complete strangers.

Published in 2006, one only regrets not having read the book then. Three Cups of Tea is the antidote to the depressing news from Central Asia, compassion in action. Readers are encouraged to support his work with donations to the Central Asia Institute, PO Box 7209, Bozeman, MT 59771, USA.

© Copyright 2008 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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