Richard Kazandzhidi Ms.

Sato Summer Reading 22 September 2013 Three Cups of Tea On identity, Gandhi says The best way to find yourself, is to lose yourself in the service of others which is presented by Greg Mortenson in his attempt at becoming a humanitarian committed to promoting education in Pakistan. After a failed attempt at climbing K2, the worlds 2nd highest mountain, Greg finds himself in a small village, Korphe, where he taken in and treated as a guest. In order to reimburse them for their hospitality, Greg promises to return and build the village a school. Mortenson is able to become a humanitarian and truly find himself through the hardships, sacrifices and failures that he had to face in order to make a change in Pakistan. As a consequence of Mortenson facing many hardships, he is able to turn them into new opportunities that he can work with. His hopes are crushed because he is not able to reach the summit of K2, where he planned on placing his departed sisters necklace. However, as a result of this hardship and failure, Mortenson finds himself in the village of Korphe where it starts off his new character of being a humanitarian. Much religious proclamation is exposed against Mortenson which turns out to be a big hindrance for him, since it could have easily ended his project. Instead of it being terminated, he gains the support of Syed Assam, a very significant and dominant person in the book which saves Mortenson. Mortenson realizes what he is going

through and goes on to say The older I grow, the more I miss my childhood. Things were much simpler and less obstacles were in my way realizing that the task he has in front of him is not an effortless one. Through help of other people and self determination, Mortenson is able to turn these problems into opportunities. Mortenson had to make quite a few sacrifices in order to complete his task of bringing education and peace to Korphe. Even in the start of the book Mortenson not only had failed to summit K2, he had returned home brokeand he set himself a task that he described as more difficult than summiting the worlds tallest peak- building school for the impoverished (Morteson 52) it is apparent that money was an issue for Mortenson and he continues to sacrifice it for the building of schools. For instance, when he starts the venture he spends all his money that he has. Instead of asking the people of the village to pay for Mortenson to come back and help build a school, Mortenson decides to sell all his possessions, including valuable books and his grandmothers car, in which he lived in. Even after Mortenson is successful with his mission in Pakistan, he claims very small amounts of money from the CAI. Not to mention he leaves his family back in the United States for long periods of time. This would not be possible if Mortenson did not make the proper sacrifices to cover his financial needs. Fate and chance go hand in hand in helping Mortenson become a humanitarian. As a result of his sister dying, Mortenson goes on a mission to find himself. If his sister did not die, he would never have been motivated to build a school. Coincidently, the wrong turn that he took led him into the village of Korphe, where he was welcomed warmly and treated as a guest. Mortenson was offered Half a dozen roast chickens, radishesHe had never seen so much food and he knew how rude it was to refuse this hospitality (Mortenson 93) clearly being grateful for this type of service. If he had taken the other turn, Mortenson may not have been received so

warmly and kindly. Furthermore, when Mortenson randomly chooses to stay at a particular hotel, he meets Abdul, who had the connections to assist Mortenson start his project. Finally, Mortenson is brought to national attention when Jahan bursts into a meeting asking Mortenson about money for a school, which makes a journalist, write about it. It is safe to assume to without the help and connections of other people, Mortenson would not have been so successful in his mission. Three Cups of Tea shows an important message that even though someone is faced with many dilemmas, if they can endure them, they will eventually succeed in what they are trying to do. Mortenson conveys a tone of voice throughout the book that can be interpreted as a mystified voice. Not every person just decides to build schools in an impoverished and Anti- American area. Yet Mortenson feels that this is the right thing to do, despite his failed attempt at climbing K2, he finally finds what he is truly meant to do. Sometimes it takes a failure to realize that, and that is evident with Greg Mortenson. Mortenson concludes his book by showing the young boys in Pakistan that bloodshed is not their only opportunity to evade poverty. Mortenson believes that through education and the school that he built, there will be less of a chance that they turn to terrorism.