WRR@LARGE

by Angie Brenner

If you educate a boy
You get an individual
If you educate a girl
You get a community
- African Proverb
Sometime between the reception and podium, Greg Mortenson, author of the New York Times bestseller Three Cups of Tea, slips off his shoes and stands on the stage of the Point Loma Nazarene University’s Brown Chapel in stocking feet. This big midwestern football player and mountain climber looks oddly comfortable with the audience of more than 1800 people. The event venue had changed three times due to increased interest in Mortenson’s highly publicized book.

Kathie Diamant, the MC for the evening from San Diego’s National Public Radio Station, KPBS, tells how Mortenson’s book was chosen as this year’s One Book One San Diego − a sort of a book club for the entire city.

“Some men climb mountains,” says Diamant, after mentioning that San Diego State University has made Three Cups of Tea mandatory reading in next year’s curriculum. “Other men move mountains.”

Actually, Greg Mortenson does both.

In 1993 bad weather thwarted Mortenson’s climb to the 28,267-foot summit of K-2 in Pakistan’s Karakoram mountain range. He became disoriented and ill before being led by his guide into the tiny village of Korphe. The failed attempt to reach the peak hit Mortenson hard. This climb was to honor his younger sister Christa who had died, and the opportunity of a lifetime was missed. Or so he thought.

While recouping in Korphe, Mortenson became friends with the village chief, Haji Ali. “As the guest in the village, I was told that the first cup of tea offered is to the stranger, the second is to a friend, and the third is for family,” Mortenson tells the audience. “And, for family, they will do anything. When I left, I asked them what was most needed in the village. Haji Ali, himself illiterate, said that the children needed to be educated; they needed a school. They were scratching out math problems with sticks in the dirt.”

Mortenson returned home, sold his few belongings, and while living in his car, began to raise money to build a school for the children of Korphe. “I typed out letters on a manual typewriter at night,” he says. “The only response was $100 from Tom Brokaw. But it gave me hope. I went to Westside Elementary School in Wisconsin where my mother is the principle and spoke to the students. Six weeks later they presented me with 62,342 pennies. That began the Pennies for Peace program, now promoted by my eleven-year-old daughter.”

The first substantial benefactor, Jean Hoerni, gave Mortenson $12,000 to return to the Pakistani village to build the school. “When I walked into the village, Haji Ali just shook his head. He never expected to see me again. “‘You can not get materials to the village unless a bridge is built,’ Ali told me. So I returned home once again to find more money to build the bridge.”

Journalist David Oliver Relin found Mortenson’s story of school building so compelling that he worked two years with him to write the story.

“My publisher wanted the subtitle, One Man’s Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations,” says Mortenson. “‘Greg, only 12% of non-fiction books make money, and terror sells,’ they told me. So, I agreed with their title for the hard cover release if they agreed to use my sub-title for the paperback publication should hard cover sales not do well,” As it turned out, the hard cover sold a dismal (by New York publishing house standards) 20,000 copies. “The paperback version of Three Cups of Tea has been on the NYT’s Bestseller List for nine months now.”

We can see Mortenson’s wide grin twenty rows away.

The story is remarkable on so many levels. It’s a story about compassion and trust, and believing in a goal and not letting it go no matter how the odds are stacked against you, and how to fight terror and hate through peace and education.
Mortenson talks about the two Fatwas against him that ordered him to stop teaching girls and ordering him leave the country. The Council of Mullahs would determine his fate. Inside the Imam Bara Mosque, Mortenson joined eight stern-faced, black-turbaned men and expected the worst. Syed Mohammad Abbas Risvi greeted him and placed a red velvet box that contained the decree on the carpet in front of him and opened the lid.

“We direct all clerics in Pakistan to not interfere with your noble intentions,” read the Mullah.

Mortenson believes that his refusal of all U.S. government contributions (and millions of dollars have been offered) helps his credibility in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. “They might think I was a spy if they learned that I took money from my government,” he says.

“I just returned from a speaking engagement at the Pentagon,” he says. “They purchased 5,000 copies of my book.” Again, Mortenson’s signature broad smile illuminates his face.

The building of schools near terrorist training camps in Afghanistan, with the resurgence of the opium trade and Taliban, proves to be even more of a challenge. Recently, one of his schools was threatened by the local Taliban despot who said that they would kill students if the school wouldn’t stop educating girls. The local authorities intervened, made arrests, and stopped the Taliban before anyone was hurt.

Building schools in two of the most politically charged and dangerous countries in the world, and encouraging that more girls attend, always puts Mortenson at risk.
When he’s not overseeing the building of a new school, Mortenson travels the world fundraising for his organization, CAI (Central Asia Institute). Already he has had 140 speaking engagements this year and just returned from an event in Florida where President H.W. Bush, Barbara, and their son Jeb, listened to him speak and offered a contribution.

He tells of the e-mails he’s received from an army captain stationed in Afghanistan who candidly says that this war can not be won by bombs, only education can create peace.

“I’ve come to realize that the Pentagon has no idea about this part of the world,” says Mortenson. “The captain stationed in Afghanistan says that he has no problem ordering thousands of dollars worth of bombs to be dropped on cities, but can’t get $4,000 to help rebuild a school.

The speaking engagements are working. Mortenson now has sixty-four schools under his belt, and 25,000 students being educated, many of them are girls. And, he’s adding to the success stories.

Mortenson receiving award from Muslim girl scout

“One of the first girls I saw in Korphe was writing in the dirt with a stick. Even with much taunting and ridicule from boys, she has since graduated from high school. We paid the $800 for her medical training. Now she has returned to her village in Chunda, Pakistan, and with her medical skills has reduced the morality rate of women during pregnancy from about twenty a year to zero.”

Mortenson admits that he creates his good luck by building relationships based on trust and patience, and he takes the time for the third cup of tea.

Mortenson will carry his message again during his many San Diego speaking engagements, including the Camp Pendleton Marine base.

“You can not get peace through politics,” he says in closing. “You can only get peace through people.”

Web Links:
www.threecupsoftea.com
www.ikat.org