“Three Cups of Tea” co-author Greg Mortenson will speak at 7:30 p.m. March 3 at the University of Illinois Springfield’s Sangamon Auditorium. Mortenson is the co-founder of the Central Asia Institute’s Pennies for Peace program.
“Three Cups of Tea,” by Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, is said to be required reading for military commanders and special forces deploying to Afghanistan.
The book begins with Mortenson’s failed 1993 attempt to climb K2, one of the world’s most challenging mountains. Exhausted, he was separated from his group and found himself in a remote Pakistani village, where he was nursed back to health.
When he discovered the village kids couldn’t go to school because they couldn’t afford the dollar-a-day salary for a teacher, he promised to return and build a school. He did — and more than 100 others. Last year, President Barack Obama designated $100,000 of his Nobel Peace Prize award to be donated to Mortenson’s efforts in Afghanistan.
Tickets for the event cost $30 and are available at the Sangamon Auditorium ticket office, 206-6160.
The event was featured in a January 26, 2011, article in The State Journal-Register.
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