The extraordinary true story of how a life-threatening climb up K2 inspired one man to give something back to the communities who saved himWinner of the Kiriyama Prize and the
Time Magazine Asian Book of the YearWonderfully evocative of the remote mountain regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan where the author works tirelessly to promote education with each new school'Captivating and suspenseful... this book will win many readers' hearts'
Publishers Weekly'
Three Cups of Tea is beautifully written. It is also a critically important book at this time in history' Ahmed Rashid, author of
TalibanGreg Mortenson is the director of the Central Asia Institute, and he spends several months each year building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. He lives in Montana with his wife and two children.
David Oliver Relin is a globe-trotting journalist who has won more than forty national awards for his writing and editing. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
‘Here we drink three cups of tea to do business; the first you are a stranger, the second you become a friend, and the third, you join our family, and for our family we are prepared to do anything – even die.’
Haji Ali, Korphe Village Chief, Karakoram mountains, Pakistan
In 1993, after a terrifying and disastrous attempt to climb K2, a mountaineer called Greg Mortenson drifted, cold and dehydrated, into an impoverished Pakistan village in the Karakoram Mountains. Moved by the inhabitants’ kindness, he promised to return and build a school. Three Cups of Tea is the story of that promise and its extraordinary outcome. Over the next decade Mortenson built not just one but fifty-five schools – especially for girls – in remote villages across the forbidding and breathtaking landscape of Pakistan and Afghanistan, just as the Taliban rose to power. His story is at once a riveting adventure and a testament to the power of the humanitarian spirit.
