Page Turners – October 2023 review

In October the Page Turners made a second foray into non-fiction, reading ‘Three Cups of Tea‘ by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. This book tells the story of mountaineer Greg Mortenson who in 1993 was helped by the residents of an impoverished Pakistan village after a failed attempt to climb K2. He promised to return and build them the school that their village needed. Over the following decade he returned to the area and built not just one but fifty-five schools, especially for girls. We learn how he used his extraordinary skills to build relationships and gain the trust of the villagers, empowering them to build and run the schools, and how he inspired Americans to donate to the charity he set up to fund his work.

Most of us enjoyed the book. We found it to be well written and very engaging. We have learned that the authors have since admitted that some of the events in the early part of the book did not happen exactly as described but we tended to feel that the semi-fictionalised account helped to make the story more accessible and did not detract from the message of the book about the power of education to promote peace.

In trying to find out what had happened to the work since the book ended in 2003, we learned that the charity is still operational but Mortenson himself is no longer involved. Unfortunately, we can see in the book that whilst he was inspirational in the way he worked with the Pakistan communities, he was not good at record-keeping, time-keeping and the organisational skills needed to run a large charity. He was accused of misappropriating the charity’s funds and although no criminality was found, he was forced to resign in order not to damage support for the charity’s vital work. We were sad that this left a bad taste in the mouth when we had been so impressed by the amazing work he had done.

As always our reading inspired a wide-ranging discussion with topics such as the importance of girls education and international politics at the forefront of our minds this month.

If you would like to read this book we have copies available and would love to swap our page turner for one of yours.

Deborah Wallis, Convenor