Emily

=Emily's Reading Log (Passage Master, Connector, Researcher, Discussion Director)=  Summary: Greg Mortenson gets lost while desending K2 after a disasterous failure to reach the summit. He eventually finds his Balti porter, Mouzafer, and they head to Askole, a city that will get Mortenson home. He gets lost again, and finds himself in the little village of Korphe. He's the town's only foreigner. The chief takes him in and allows him to spend the night. Passage Master: "//He was looking inward that afternoon, stunned and absorbed by something unfamiliar in his life to that point- failure//" pg 8 Reason- shows something about Mortenson's character, that he never fails and is determined, and also a reason why he wasn't paying attention to where he was going when trekking down to Askole. Value- since this gives you a glimpse of his determination and desire to succeed- this could be important later when he begins to build schools
 *     Chapters 1-               2

"//He escorted him through the gate with the hospitality that is unforgivable for the Balti not to extend//" pg 24 Reason- shows you the Balti values (hospitality) and about the culture Value- the hospitality that the Balti extend to Mortenson is part of the main reason WHY he comes back to build schools       **      

That's a good observation Emily. This book does tell us alot about Bati culture and values. Thanks for pointing it out! -Rachel. 5-18-08 5:45 pm

Summary: Mortenson stays at the village Korphe for a few days (or weeks?), while there, he's treated to immense hospitality. The people at Korphe give him sugar for his tea (sugar is a luxery) and let him sleep under the best quilt. They give him the best of everything they own. While in Korphe, the village leader shows Mortenson the school, which isn't even a building. The students only have a teacher for 3 days out of the week, and they have to use sticks and mud to write with. It's then and there that Mortenson makes his promise to build a school for Korphe. Mortenson returns to America and begins fundraising. It takes him about a year, but he eventually gets $1200 from Dr. Jean Hoerni, a scientist and fellow climber, and other donations. Mortenson returns to Pakistan and resides in a cheap hotel in Islamabad, until he purchases the supplies needed for building. After alot of bargaining and countless pots of tea, Mortenson and his friend/assistant/translator Abdul finally get the supplies needed and make their way to Korphe. The ride is dangerous- as the roads are narrow and on jagged cliffsides, and the cars aren't all that safe or reliable. Slowly but surely, though, they're making their way there. Connector: Chapters 3-7 deal with alot of different topics, so I'm just going to pick a couple to connect. **
 * Chapters 3-7
 * **     When Mortenson and his truck of supplies, along with his drivers and assistants, get stopped at that bridge by the Taliban, that made me think of the Taliban today. There was one man, who gave Mortenson a cigarette and said 'America number one'. That would never happen today. Also, I've noticed that that one instance was the only time the Taliban was ever really mentioned in this book. I thought that it would be alot more present than it is so far. It's kind of funny to think that driving on the cliffs was more dangerous than the Taliban. I guess I thought that dealing with the Taliban would be one of his big challenges with building the school, I didn't think that getting there would be such a huge problem. However, we're still really early in the book so I don't know if groups like Al-Qaeda or the Taliban will have a greater presence later on.      **
 * **     When Mortenson is given the lush silk quilt to sleep under, the finest material item in the home, it reminded me of how we treat our guests. At our house, when we have guests over, we always serve them dinner or dessert or whatever first, they get to pick what's on the television, and have choice of seating at the table or in the den or whatever. And while that shows hospitality, it's really nothing compared to how the Balti people treat their guests. It's kind of interesting to think about- the people in the poorest countries give their guests the richest things, but the people in the richest countries don't extend the same level of hospitality.      **

** Chapters 8,9  ** Greg arrives at Korphe, greeted enthusiastically by the Balti people. They were surprised that he actually came back to Korphe because most westerners make promises that they'll return, but don't. So they're all set to build the school until Haji Ali says that they need to build a bridge before they build a school. Mortenson then leaves to return to America so he can raise more money. When he returns to America, Marina breaks up with him (I personally think that's very selfish of her). Mortenson loses a little bit of his motivation and drive- as he's just lost his job and girlfriend, and is broke on top of all that. He gets a call from a fellow climber (and one of his heros) Dr. Louis Reickardt called him. He gave him a much needed pep talk that got Mortenson's motivation back up. Now he's ready to conquer the next step- building a bridge. ** ** Researcher: // Inshallah // - if Allah wills; God-willing (this is a commonly used term, so I thought that I should look it up)
 * Summarizer:

Dr. Louis Reichardt- one of the first Americans to summit K2 on September 6, 1978; also one of the first to summit the East Face (or Kangshung Face) of Mt. Everest in 1983 (a seemingly impossible expedition); an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, a UCSF professor in physiology, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the first American to summit both K2 and Mt. Everest.**

[|****http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Reichardt [**  **

Chapters 10-12 **

Greg returns to Korphe and helps to build the bridge. After building the bridge, Mortenson goes back to America. While there, he meets Tara Bishop. They fall in love and get married after six days (wow). Eventually (after many self-delayed flights) Mortenson goes back to Pakistan and begins to build the school. Right when they're almost done building, Haji Mehdi (the leader of Askole) says that the school has to be destroyed so it doesn't 'poison' Muslim children. He makes Haji Ali give him 12 of his best rams in order for the school to be built. ** Think about the quote "Americans care about Buddhists, not Muslims." (pg 127), why do you think this is? What do you think about Mortinson's marriage to Tara after knowing her for only six days? Is it really possible to fall in love that fast? How do you think Mortenson will handle the job of being the director of the Central Asia Institute (CAI)? Do you think he'll live up to Jean Hoerini's expectations? Why do you think Haji Ali wasn't upset for what Haji Medhi had done? How would you have handled the situation?
 * Summary:
 * Discussion:

Chapters 13, 14 Summary: Mortenson is in the city Peshawar, searching for a new place to build a village. His friend Gul takes him to Waziristan (a buffer region between Pakistan and Afghanistan). They stay at a smugglers warehouse, but are captured. Mortenson is locked up for 6 days, guarded by armed guards. He doesn't know if he will live or die, as foreigners aren't welcomed in this region (Osama Bin Laden's ant-American movement was beginning to take hold). He's finally released by a man named Khan, who takes him to breakfast and a soccer game. The reason why he was taken hostage and released aren't really clear. WHen Mortenson gets back home, his wife Tara gives birth to their baby- Amira Eliana Mortenson. But he gets a call from Hoerini explaining to Mortenson that he is dying. Mortenson makes the journey back to Korphe to finish building the school and to take pictures. When he returns, Mortenson and his family go to Seattle to show Hoerini the photos of the school. Hoerini dies a few weeks later. Passage Master:  ** **   "For a Balti to let a foreign man, an infadel, have that kind of intimate contact with your wfie took an incredible leap of faith. I felt humbled by how much they'd come to trust me." (pg 179)   ** **//This quote shows how much the people of Korphe trust Greg. They treat him as family and as one of their own, even though he's not even Pakistani. It shows a huge contrast from before when he first arrived at the village, to then- when he performed a life-saving medical procedure.//**

** Chapters 15-17 ** ** Summary: A fatwa has been issued against Mortenson for educating girls, he now has to go back to Pakistan to work out an agreement. He returns Pakistan and has a meeting with some men (many religious or village leaders) to discuss the fatwah (which was declared unjust). At the meeting, they also discuss new schools to build- this time they're building more than one every few years, now its a few every year. The CAI is beginning to pick up, more and more villages want schools and word of Mortenson is spreading. He also began to build women's vocational centers, so women would have a place to gather and talk during the win****ter. Now that Mortenson had built schools, he also wanted to make clean water available so more children would live to go to school.

There also was a refugee camp that Mortenson helped give fresh water too. The refugees were displaced from their homes by Indian shells that destroyed their homes. Mortenson and his friends/associates came and helped the camp- it even became a sort of permanent residency.**

The shelling of the villages in Pakistan made me think of the separation of India and Pakistan. This happened in 1947, and people are still fighting over it. What I thought was weird was that the book says that India denies shelling Pakistan. I think they did that because the western view is that India is the "nicer" country- with Hinduism and curry, and Pakistan isn't because of the reputation it gets from the terrorists. If India confessed to their actions, people probably wouldn't view them the same way. I mean, no country wants to be seen as one that bombs civilians into refugee camps.**
 * Connection:
 * Chapters 18, 19 **

** Summary: Mortenson's support from other climbers has increased dramatically- now people are clamoring for him to sign up their expeditions or projects. Two people even gave hime checks for $20,000! Now, however, he's so busy that his work is starting to slip. The Board of Directors want him to expand so he can shed some of the workload, but Mortenson doesn't want to. He does, however, hire an assistant.

When Mortenson returned to Pakistan, he found that a bunch of mosques and schools had been built by the //Wahhabi.// They are linked to funding military extremist schools that teach jihad, however, not all the schools are "bad"- only a small percentage neglect their study of math and literature for intense religious study. While in Pakistan, the attacks on September 11th occured. He had brought friends that were desperate to get out, so they took a helicopter out of the village and went to the airport. After seeing his friends off- Mortenson returned to Korphe where, sadly, he learned that Haji Ali had died.**


 * Research:

//Wahhabi:// extremist sect of Islam that followers believe is the most pure form of Islam, believe that they should follow only the teachings of Muhammad, focuses on the unity of God as followers call themselves //muwahiddun// "unitarians". Originated in Arabia, believers consider wahhabism the one and only religion that matters. The founder believed that it was his mission to have a holy war (jihad) on the other sects of Islam. Because they believe that luxuries are evil, their mosques and clothing are simple. Although it is the dominant sect on the Arab peninsula- it has a smal effect on the Middle East. Osama-bin-Ladin and the Taliban are linked to wahhabism.** [|**http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/society/A0851259.html**] [|**http://atheism.about.com/od/islamicsects/a/wahhabi.htm**] [|**http://www.apologeticsindex.org/w14.html**] [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wahhabi<span** ** Chapters 20, 21 Summary: After 9/11, reporters are clamering to get into Afghanistan. When Greg returns, he finds that many reporters want to use him to get on the other side of the border so they can report stories they wouldn't get otherwise. Mortenson finds this disgusting. 9/11 has had an impact on how people view him. Some mullah's are delcaring fatwahs against him, when they previously supported him. Mortenson was upset with how the government was spending the aid money in Afghanistan- or rather, how they hadn't spent it. He gave talks in DC and during his visit he was offered 2.2 million from the government. He declined- saying that he didn't want to be linked to the government because people in Pakistan might not trust him as much.

Discussion Director: Mortenson comments that the reporters only want to get stories about the top Taliban leaders so they can make them out as villains, do you think that what the media was doing has affected how us in America view the situation? Do you think that the whole truth was reported?

How do you think the government handled their claim to aid Afghanistan? Do you think they did a good job? What would you have done differently?

And finally, how do you think the government handled the 9/11 attacks? Do you agree with what they did (i.e. bombing Afghanistan)?** **__ Chapter 22, 23 __

Summary: The support for Mortenson's cause and the CAI skyrockets because of an interview he did for Parade magazine. People all over America want to help. While visiting Korphe, Jahan (a girl from Korphe) asks Mortenson for money to go to medical school so she can be a doctor. Jahan is the first educated girl from Korphe. This shows ENORMOUS progress with what Mortenson's work has done. Mortenson decides to go to the areas where the Kirgiz horsemen asked him to build a school. He goes there, after a dangerous and long journey (getting caught in an opium fight- yikes!), and is going to begin a new chapter in his career. Now he's going to a new region with new customs, and basically has to go through what he did in Pakistan- again.

Passage Master: "Osam is not a product of Pakistan or Afghanistan. He is a creation of America. Thanks to America, Osama is in every home."** **This quote shows how the US attacks in Afghanistan could actually have worsened the relations between America and the Arab/Muslim community. It shows how we have created an off-kilter image of Osama, making him seem more powerful than he actually is.** ** "Mortenson put his hands on the shoulders of Sadhar Khan's brown robe, as he'd done a decade earlier, among other mountains, with another leader, named Haji Ali, conscious, not of the gunmen sill observing him through their sniperscopes, nor of the shahid stones, warmed to amber by the sun's late rays, but of the inner mountain he'd commited, in that instant, to climb." **   **This quote shows how Mortenson has climbed and summited his first internal mountain, which he set out to do 10 years earlier, and now is ready for another one. He's going to try to do the same for this region as in Pakistan. He has accomplished what he set out to do in Pakistan, and is now ready for a new mountain to climb**.