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Book Review: Three Cups of Tea

Three Cups of Tea
By Greg Mortensen

K2, more dangerous than Mt. Everest.  Mountaineers long to summit this peak.  Imagine spending your life training and preparing for this event all to lose it all and end up saving a friend and blowing your chance to summit K2.  That is what happened to Greg Mortenson.

On the way down from his failed attempt he becomes lost and arrives in a small town called Korphe.  Tired, cold, hungry, plagued with malnutrition, and lost Mortenson is taken in by the leader of the small town.  He spends several weeks there recovering from his time up at the K2 base camp and while there he discovers that Korphe does not have a school for the children to meet in.  The children meet outdoors in the cold and those who do not have the money, write their assignments in the dirt.

This book is about Mortenson's journey from that point to his building of the Central Asia Institute (Link here).  His purpose?  He has dedicated his life to building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan for the children and especially young girls so that they can be educated.

As soon as I started reading this book it was hard to put down.  The book is full of adventure from beginning to end.  From the graphic account of his failed attempt at K2, to the heart wrenching story of his sacrifice to scrape the money together to build the school in Korphe.  But it doesn't stop there.  Not only does Mortenson build the school in Korphe, he continues to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan.  Jean Hoerni helped Mortenson start the Central Asia Institue (CAI) to build schools in the area.

I found this book to be both encouraging and challenging at the same time.  Encouraging in the fact that it shows that it is possible to help people that are different and challenging because it shows the struggle that people will have starting up a project like this.  However, I believe the story is meant to be encouraging, and it delivers.  After I finished the book I wanted to rush out and join Mortenson in building these schools.

Excellently written book.  I highly recommend it to everyone.  There is a lot of lessons of leadership and servanthood that are found in Mortenson's story.