Book Review

Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin. Three Cup of Tea. New York: Penguin Young Reader Group, 2009, 209 pages.

This book is from the author’s personal story of how he discovered himself from the failure of mountain climbing to the rescue by the village Korphe in Pakistan. His life goal occurred a big change and resulted the commitment of building schools for poor children in Pakistan and Afghanistan mountains which inspired by the kindness offering that the little mountain village’s chief he stayed. Furthermore, this book is about the process of how he achieved this life goal.

Biography of The Author
Greg Mortenson is born in Minnesota and move to Tanzania with his parents when he was just three months old because of his father was missionary. He went back to the domestic of the United States when he was fifteen years old. Mr. Mortenson is also a previous mountain climber. He is the cofounder of the nonprofit organizations the Central Asia Institute and Pennies for Peace. He has established many schools in rural and often volatile regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan, which provide education to more than 28,000 children where few education opportunities existed before, especially female children.
Introduction of The Book
Greg Mortenson, the author of this book, went to Pakistan for climbing the second highest mountain in the world, K2, to memorize his dead sister. After the unexpected failure of his challenge, he got lost in the mountains. However, from the opportunity of visiting the little mountain village, Korphe, Mortenson starts his second life.

When Mortenson was in Korphe, He heard from the chief of the village said that Korphe is so poor that they can only hire one teacher with another nearby village. The teacher would go to Korphe three times a week, and ian the other days, Korphe’s kids could only do the homework the teacher assigned.

Those kids reminded Mortenson his little sister. Although he didn’t have many assets, he knows he has to do something for them. He put his hand on the chief’s shoulder and promised his that he will help the village to build a school.

At that moment, Mortenson didn’t know his promise has not only changed Korphe, and many of the children in Pakistan, but also his entire life. It costs three years from making his promise, his going back to the United States for raising the donation, then going to Pakistan for buying the building materials, including building a bridge, to finish the building in Korphe.

In this whole process, the author brings us to go from the world we are familiar with to a world we are unfamiliar by telling Mortenson’s story. From the interaction between people and people, from one culture to another culture, from Christian to Muslim, we know about the personality of Mortenson, and we discovered the kindness of human beings in this world together with Mortenson.

This book is not only related to the social business or charity, it actually reveals a conflict between the western world and Muslim world. For a long time, we receive the news and information from the western world that how cruel, how bad, or how “heathenism” that Muslimism are, which on the other hand, the values that might be created by the western world. For Asian people like us, who are not living in the western society, we could hardly and truly feel the hatred towards the Muslim people as well as Muslim society from the western society due to the series terrorism actions. As the result, through the journey that Mortenson went by, it illustrated a real outlook of Muslim world by the aspect of a western civilian (but not by western politics or western military forces).

In this sensitive area, the power of religious is actually higher than the power of politics and dominates the highest decision making. A lot of Americans may question Mortenson that why they’re donating money to support the terrorism and let those terrorism to get education. And this kind of thinking is the just original obstruction when Mortenson was trying to achieve his dream and his social business. On the other hand, previously, the Muslim society also doubted the purpose that Mortenson’s proposal of building schools in their own land is a method to invade their society and values, thinking, etc.,. Moreover, although most of the central Asian people are Muslim, they actually are separated into different religious sects. The hatred between each sect usually caused wars, which make the situation more difficult and the achievement harder to reach.

As the result, Mortenson needed to attend to the religious court very often to defend his project from being suspended. In the other hand, he also needed to coordinate every party and try to eliminate the conflict between each of the group. The growing up background of living twenty-three country that Mortenson has actually help him to adapt in a multicultural environment and do the necessary act to keep the situation in a harmony way.

Although recently the media exposed that Mortenson might involve in a scandal of embezzle funding from Central Asia Institute that shall belong for constructions, it was still a dignity behavior in the very beginning that Mortenson was tried his best to devote himself into the social business. I would leave my comment regarding to the unethical part later.

Mentioned to Central Asia Institute, which is funded by Mortenson, its main objective is improving the education level in the poor area in Pakistan and Afghanistan, especially for female children. Under their research and observation, after the male children received appropriate education, they tend to move to bigger city for work so they can earn more money. However, regarding to female children, on the contrary they tend to stay at hometown and take care of their families even they are well-education. The different shows that the female education is extreme important in the area cause as long as female could get education, they could go home and teach their family and pass down the traditions and all necessary knowledge.

Nevertheless, it’s much more difficult that drive female education then male education because the fact that the Muslim society is patriarchy, particularly in poor or so-called conservative areas. All we know that the Muslim Halal regulated a lot of restrictions of female’s daily routines, not mentioned the project was driven by an American, their enemy! Except for the religious barrier, some of the Muslims also doubted that Mortenson might brainwash their female children the “evil” western thinking and knowledge and in the end destroy their traditional values when building up schools and hiring teachers to the mountains sponsored by Central Asia’s funding.

What Mortenson could do is contentiously communicating with each community and does the action to prove his social business project is not deceiving people, not trying to brainwashing people and the most important thing is, truly improving people’s lives. It took three for Mortenson to build the first school, and now it has passed a lot of three years. The Central Asia Institute and Mortenson have built hundreds of schools and helped thousands of children and may have already changed their lives.

After the successful debuted and significant feedback from publishing the <Three Cup of Tea> I & II, there are more and more people around the world approve Mortenson and his social business and willing to donate money and other resources they have, to make the project keep going and expand. Mortenson and Central Asia Institute has proved their concept is accepted by the world.

Personal Reflection and Evaluation of The Book
About the story of Three Cups of Tea, three of my most impressed part is “Introspection”, “Respect” and “Determination”.

Introspection
For a long run, the author always believes the western style progressive way is the only and undoubted way for all human beings in the world. This concept has been changed after he went to Korphe and devoted himself into his social business, he realized that not only destroy old buildings and construct new huge landmark is the way to prove a country or an area’s advance. The western society have imposed their own values and the standard of “developed” on other society permanently.

However, through Mortenson’s eyes and words, I know that how to keep the balance with the nature, how to sustainable use the resources that the motherland gives us, and how to construct a sustainable community is also a possible answer of the definition of development. It’s not always a standard in this world, because it is so big, and a lot of cultural has been live peacefully with the nature, no matter it is advance as the western world.

Regarding to the lesson, I think humans shall be more humble to things no matter we already know or we don’t know. However, it is blind spot for most of people especially when they are willing to do the charity or social business. We have heard a lot of real cases like the Taiwanese charity institute Tzuchi destroyed a communities’ original lifestyle by “teaching” them how they should live after natural disasters like typhoon or earthquake. It is actually an arrogance behavior that the part who provides helps thinks their position is higher than the part who receives helps. People shall always look into themselves and exam whether our own values could really impose on other before taking actions.

After the introspection, we shall learn how to respect people and community.
Respect
After Mortenson complete his first fundraising and went back Korphe to build his first school, he is so hurry to accomplish this project, which leaded him to take a highly pressured way to manage all the construction progress, and in the end made everyone so tired and not willing to work anymore. At this moment, the chief of Korphe, Haji Ali, told Mortenson that “these mountains has been here for a long time, and so do us. You couldn’t tell the mountains what to do, instead you have to learn to listen to them”. Haji said, “If you want to success in Pakistan, you have to respect our lifestyle.”

Haji also told Mortenson that “You have to spend your time to finish these three cups of tea. Although we haven’t received any education, we are not stupid. We have been here for a long time”. This makes Mortenson think “The Americans always think things shall be done in an efficient way. However, Haji taught me to spend time for three cups of tea, to slow down and respect the relationship with workers, as my respect towards building schools.”

Just the same with Mortenson and his social business, when we starting our Good Night Market project, first of all we not only have to know our target audience and understand what they really need, but we have to respect their original custom of life. Of course, it is not wrong for us to have an ideal model or vision about how the project should run, how we should help people to live the way we want them to be. However, if we don’t respect the real needs from our target audiences and amend our plan, we might face a very serious rebound from them and the original intention of helping people might be eventually out of tune.

Determination
When I browsed in the internet and tried to find some useful materials for supporting my book review, a sentence jumped into my eyes. “How could one man change the world? Mortenson’s story is worth us to think about our own answer.” Our personal power might be weak, but as long as we gathered our power together and accumulate it, we could become huge power that no one could neglect. And even the first power is used up; the program still would not be stopped.

It is always easy to become a follower; however, it is always hard to become the raiser. No matter the fact that whether Mortenson took funding from the Institute or not, we still have to admire his courage of making his very first step, fighting for each party to achieve his goal just for those poor people who is almost no one cares about. It is very difficult to reverse people’s stereotype towards one thing they believe for a long time, especially for something is “political incorrect” just like poor people, drug abuser, homeless people etc. It becomes more complex when issues are related to religion. As my personal point of view, Central Asia is a taboo for western people to talk about because of the terrorism. And what Mortenson have achieved is not only changed Pakistan’s Children’s life, but also changed the way the American people see other people.

It is not easy to convince people that your social business project would result which level of successfulness, but as long as we know that our project is right (by introspect ourselves and respect others real needs), it is right for us to keep our determination and strive for our project. And one day we will definitely meet the one who is willing to give us his hand, just like Mortenson met.

The similar social business I have ever joined is Kiva.com. Since two years ago, I have made sixty loans in fifty five countries or regions, from East Asia to Africa, from Middle East to South America. Of course it is not one hundred percent the same with the construction program, however, through each online lending project, I could see the real people with their real needs but not a dream or a hollow version like “Send Your Love to Africa” campaign. Most of the time I see a woman or a group of women with their farm, their goat or their grocery store, I see a man with his barber shop, his fruit trees or with his car. I know his name, age, his repayment plan and his mid-term life plan.

Sometimes the local NGO volunteers would send a middle review to us, or just post it on the lending page for letting us know if everything is all good, and we could reply via the website if we have anything want to tell the borrower. Most of the time there will be no reply, but we know there would have some communication happened. And the reason why I contentiously support the Kiva program is because it’s just like what Mortenson is doing. We are not giving those people in need what they want, but we are helping them to get the ability for living, and that is the most important part a social business shall achieve. Although there are numerous of NGOs in this world to help people, the resources are still not unlimited. As long as we could find a way to make a program sustainable developed even after we left, it would be regarded as a successful program.

In this book, except for the part of dealing the political or religious issues, I think the author concerns about how could a poor village sustain on their own. And the tool is by education, especially female’s education. But the education is always a sensitive part. For example, which material should the teacher adopt for teaching? What kind of point of view should the teach stand for when he is teaching children? All intangible issues shall be solve after the plan was made, and the truth is building schools is not hard but building the trust in people’s heart is hard.

After I read this book, I’m starting to do the survey of the similar project in Taiwan. There are still several aborigine village in mountains couldn’t receive sufficient educational resources, and currently they got support from Christian organization or College student clubs. I think for student club it is very suit for providing this kind of service because there are always new fresh student join the club every year. However, the quality of teaching and how to pass down the intelligence of teaching from graduated students is a big concern. I could choose to become a man power of teaching or form a group to service a selected area. It is very important for Taiwan’s teenager’s education, not only on the mountains but also in those families formed by denizened bride.

Regarding to the part that I don’t like in this book, I feel like the author is trying to form himself to become a hero, a typical hero that will be shown in American novels or movies. I don’t know whether it is just the personality the author have, or it is his strategy to making his book selling goes up, and then increase his influence and eventually raise a huge amount of funding from donation or he just wants to get fames. It is also confused me that the attitude is heroic arrogant or just the confident due to the cultural difference. Except for this part and the scandal, I think it is a very good story for people to discover the totally different world, culture and people, try to understand and respect the other unknown part that we think we have known. It is also a very good story for inspiring people to think about how they could help this world and then devoting themselves into their own social business.
Conclusion
I’d like to use conclusion to talk about my feeling regarding to the scandal of corruption and the risk of the lure after success. First of all, in fact I believe the author has the right to get a certain amount of money that belongs to him, after he has done such a great and difficult achievement. As long as he really did those things he claimed in the story. In my morality, if body is getting hurt or harm, and the results are truly helped the target people, even a small trick or some prettify to the story is acceptable.

However, some evidences shows that in some areas, while Mortenson claimed he and Central Asia Institute have built schools there, it actually has no buildings or it is an old building that isn’t built by Central Asia Institute. When deceives happened, things are not running in a correct direction. While reading this book, I always feel like the author was trying to make himself as a hero, an extraordinary people who is just not normal. For making a successful business, a good story is always welcome; however when it is a social business, shall we put ourselves into a higher ethic level? Or since it’s a nice program for helping people, we shall pretend nothing happened? This controversial debate has been going on in my mind for a long time since the lecture mentioned about this corruption, and currently I don’t have the answer that could convince myself.

It’s also makes me think about how to prevent a social business end in failure because of the irresistible lure of money and fame coming after the success that would change a person from inside of his mind. Even it is a social business, it still requires well superior governance. The “hero” of the social business program shall know how to shift his power in the company/organization to a group of managing levels so that the impact of the potential corruption would be able to minimize. It’s not a pure business. We are using people’s empathy to earn money for people in need. We are also influencing people and drive them joining the social business. In the other words, those stories are not actually belonging to us.

We have the right to collect money which under the regulation because we still need to live lives, but we couldn’t “steal” the money we claimed to donate out. It is truly hard for human to obey just because we are human beings; therefore the self-awareness and superior governance is specifically important. This is what I’ve learned in this book regarding to the social business.

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[ 1 ]. Part of the content is quoted from Three Cups of Tea, Greg Mortenson, Author’s Introduction