Three Cups of Tea discussion

“Three Cups of Tea” is a true story about the trials and accomplishments of a man, Greg Mortenson, which built schools in Pakistan. Mortenson is American, so the setting of the story follows him as he travels back and forth between America and Pakistan in the late 1990’s - early 2000’s. This, you will see, is a small matter in what unfolds in Mortenson’s life as he decides to commit his life to helping others. While this may seem like an honorable lifestyle, it is not without its tribulations. Mortenson is now known for his great achievements in Pakistan, but his story ironically begins with failure. Mortenson is a mountain climber – literally and figuratively – whose goal was to climb K2 in Pakistan, the second largest mountain in the world. His body however failed to withstand the brutal climb and he found himself too weak to continue. Making his way to the village of Korphe, he was nursed back to health by the locals who inhabited this village. While in recovery, Mortenson notices that the children had no school. Instead, he found the children gathered outside without a teacher and using sticks to learn. Mortenson was deeply disturbed by this so he declared to the village that to repay their kindness he would return one day to build a school. Thus, beginning the emotional roller coaster Mortenson was about to endure.
After gaining a newfound purpose to pick his head up after the K2 failure, Mortenson headed back the US to raise money for building the school, despite lacking the knowledge of how to fund-raise. Mortenson was not very successful to raise money at first, but as time went by he learned who to network with and how to encourage donations. He even went as far as selling his possessions just for his personal expenses to travel back to Pakistan. When he travels back to Korphe, he is met with yet another dilemma. The people of Korphe explain to him that he must build a bridge in order to get all the building materials across the river gorge. When he returned to the US to begin another expedition of fund-raising, his bad misfortune carried overseas with the loss of his job and girlfriend. However, on a positive note, time went by and Mortenson met another woman whom he married immediately. During this marriage he finished the school project in Korphe and went on to build more.
Mortenson learned to juggle what seemed like a double life with the paradoxes he faced between the US and Pakistan. During his time in Pakistan, Mortenson was kidnapped (never found out why), and had a fatwa (a religious decree) put on his head by a Muslim leader that did not agree with Mortenson educating girls. In the US, after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, he was condemned for helping Muslims and was interrogated by the CIA. Struggling to explain his actions and explaining how terrorism stems from poverty, Mortenson finally gains the support of US Representative Mary Bono and eventually gains national recognition for his work. The book ends with Mortenson deciding to continue his work into Afghanistan having gained positive reinforcement from back home.
In the end, what sets this story apart from most is that a plot usually leads up to a crisis, but in this case there is a continuation of crises in Mortenson’s life. Therefore, the structure of the story is more of an ongoing pattern of complications, crises, climaxes, and resolutions going up and down throughout the story. This makes the book hard to put down as the reader finds they are eager to find out what happens next. If ever a man deserved a country song, it just might be Greg Mortenson. On the other hand, Greg Mortenson worked on this book with David Oliver Relin, a journalist who observed and interviewed Mortenson to create the book. This means that the story is written on behalf of a first person point of view via the objective view of Relin. While the story is one of inspiration and tugs on the emotional strings of the reader, it is important to question the veracity of the story being that the work was heavily shaped from the mind of the protagonist himself.

And if you enjoyed that, there is a sequal that was written in 2010, STONES AND SCHOOLS. In that one, there is no co-author credited.