Bibliofreakblog

Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin

Immediately after finishing this book, I wanted to sit down and write a check out to the Central Asian Institute (Greg Mortenson’s foundation) but I didn’t and then my hours got cut back at work and so I never did write that check.  But I did go around talking about it to everyone who would listen for the next three months.  And now I’m telling you. 

The story goes that Greg Mortenson was climbing K2, up in the Pakistani part of the Himalayas, the second highest mountain in the world.  He and his teammates were nearly to the top when they had to turn back.  Heading down, Mortenson got lost and stumbled hungry and dehydrated into the village of Korphe, where the village head himself cared for him until he was better. 

While in the village Mortenson noticed that “school” consisted of children doing their times tables by themselves in the snow.  Mortenson vowed to come back and build them a proper school. 

A decade and a half later he has built 78 schools throughout Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The part to which I believe most Americans can really relate comes of course during 9-11.  Greg Mortenson was with a few board members in Pakistan when they heard the news that a village called New York had been struck by terrorists.  The U.S. embassy recommended that all U.S. citizens leave the country.  The board members with Mortenson were afraid and eager to leave the area, but Mortenson wanted to stay.  He felt that he was among friends, many of whom he’d known and worked with for close to ten years, and who would lay down their own lives for him. 

Due to bureaucratic passport reasons, Mortenson did end up leaving the country, but immediately wants to get back.  He is questioned by the CIA in Singapore, where they flat out ask him where Osama bin Laden is.  Mortenson’s response?  “I hope I never know that answer.”

It’s a great story, whoever tells it, but the book is successful because Mortenson did not write it.  David Oliver Relin wrote it.  This has two main benefits, the first of which is obvious: It’s well-written.  The entire book reads like one long special interest piece from Time or Parade.  Relin’s writing background is in fact in journalism, but never does it become a list of statistics or feel like a report.  Relin accompanied Mortenson to Pakistan and his descriptions are his own first-hand interpretations of the landscape-not dolled-up versions of what Mortenson has told him. 

The second benefit of Relin’s writing is that he is free to praise Mortenson.  Greg Mortenson is a determined, compassionate human being, and should be praised.  However, his greatness would have been diminished by his own modesty had he written the book himself. 
Buy Three Cups of Tea on Amazon

If you like this book/author, you might like:

(my reviews in blue)

Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer
The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan
A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier Ishmael Beah
Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World by Tracy Kidder
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad
Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil by Deborah Rodriguez and Kristin Ohlson
Deep River by Shusaku Endo
Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
The Memory Keeper’s Daughter by Kim Edwards 
The Poisonwood Bible by Barabara Kingsolver 
Lipstick Jihad by Azadeh Moaveni 

Other works by Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin:

Three Cups Of Tea (Young Readers Edition)

Other works by Greg Mortenson:

Listen to the Wind: The Story of Dr. Greg & Three Cups of Tea
Stones Into Schools

Other Works by David Oliver Relin:

None

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