A gift for an entire village. A failed mountaineer becomes a philanthropist after a village without a school saves his life. Greg Mortenson and his Bozeman-based Central Asia Institute

Thirteen years ago this month, Greg Mortenson, a towering American with a passion for mountaineering, found himself lost and alone in the glacial expanses of Pakistan’s Karakoram Himalaya. After failing to reach the summit of K2, the world’s second-highest peak, he wandered for weeks, emaciated and exhausted, finally staggering into the impoverished village of Korphe. Residents had never seen a foreigner, but they took him in, sharing their meager provisions and nurturing him back to health.

As he recuperated, Mr. Mortenson was appalled to find children practicing multiplication tables by scratching numbers on the frosty ground with a stick. They had no paper or pencils, and the village could not afford $1 a day for a teacher.

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THREE CUPS OF TEA: One Man’s Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations … One School at a Time
By Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
Viking
333 pp., $25.95

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"I’m going to build you a school," Mortenson told them. "I promise."

Bozeman-based Central Asia Institute http://www.ikat.org/

By Marilyn Gardner

Full Story: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0912/p17s01-bogn.html?s=hns

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Bozeman man’s refugee message goes nationwide. Mortenson’s call for Pakistani aid makes magazine, TV. 55 schools established in Pakistan and Afghanistan through the nonprofit Central Asia Institute http://www.matr.net/article-18459.html