Dan Mayer's Blog

Three Cups of Tea - One Man's Mission to Promote Peace... One School at a Time.

This true story motivates you and makes you wish you were doing more for others in the world. It also goes into detail and the root causes of terrorism and fighting it with education and economic development, instead of only with weapons and war. I think the strongest part of this book are the examples that show how education empowered the people so much in ways that they always wanted to use that education to help their people. It shows how knowledge and understanding can spread peace at a time when there is so much deception between what is going on with governments and there people.

The quick summary of this book is that Greg Mortenson made an attempt to climb K2 on of the hardest peaks to summit. He failed and almost died on the way back down. Finding himself separated from his group and wondering in the frozen wilderness, he stumbled of the path only to find another one that led to a remote village that wasn't even on the map. The village nursed the sick Mortenson back to health and returned him safely to the base camp he was originally attempting to find. Mortenson after seeing the poverty and struggles of the mountain village promises to return and help them. Ever since he has been building schools all across the middle east, that educate and don't teach any religion.

The story takes awhile to get moving and the author twiddles on and on about every little person that is somehow helps in the process, but it is still pretty powerful and moving to see what one man has started. So if you want some alternative views of how to help improve foreign relations between the world and the US, this book is a good place to start. If you want an inspiring story about a flawed man giving his best, I would recommend this book.