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You can hand out condoms, drop bombs, build roads, or put in electricity, but until the girls are educated a society won’t change.

Greg Mortenson

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Greg Mortenson
Age: 66
Born: 1957
Born: December 27
Humanitarian
Mountaineer
Nurse
Philanthropist
Writer
Rochester
Minnesota
Change
Drop
Educated
Girls
Build
Condoms
Hand
Condom
Society
Roads
Girl
Electricity
Hands
Bombs

More quotes by Greg Mortenson

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By the way, although the subtitle of the book Three Cups of Tea is fighting terror, one school at a time, that was not my choice, as fighting terror is not why I do this, I do it to promote peace, and give hope and opportunity to children deprived of education.
Greg Mortenson
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My father ended up starting the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre, which is on the slopes of Kilimanjaro. My mother started a school.
Greg Mortenson
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Once I started the first school, I realized this is what my life is meant to be, is to promote education and help kids go to school and that's very clear.
Greg Mortenson
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When ordinary human beings perform extraordinary acts of generosity, endurance or compassion, we are all made richer by their example. Like the rivers that flow out of the Karakoram and the Hindu Kush, the inspiration they generate washes down to the rest of us. It waters everyone's fields.
Greg Mortenson
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the people who live in the last places - the people who are most neglected and least valued by the larger world - often represent the best of who we are and the finest standard of what we are meant to become. This is the power that last places hold over me, and why I have found it impossible to resist their pull.
Greg Mortenson
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I've had two fatwas issued against me by despot mullahs opposed to education - and important to know that the great majority of Imams and Islamic religious leaders support education for all children.
Greg Mortenson
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The older I get, the more I appreciate my childhood. It was paradise.
Greg Mortenson
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I think Americans yearn for other alternatives to peace, than the path our government has currently taken, and perhaps why there is great interest in this book, and the message to fight poverty and ignorance with education.
Greg Mortenson
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Trust in Allah, but tie up your camel.' Sign in Skardu
Greg Mortenson
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Haji Ali taught me to share three cups of tea, to slow down and make building relationships as important as building projects. He taught me that I had more to learn from the people I work with than I could ever hope to teach them.
Greg Mortenson
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I've learned that terror doesn't happen because some group of people somewhere like Pakistan or Afghanistan simply decide to hate us. It happens because children aren't being offered a bright enough future that they have a reason to choose life over death.
Greg Mortenson
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The people of Pakistan are some of the most hospitable, kinds and generous people I have met anywhere, in the over 70 countries I have visited in my lifetime.
Greg Mortenson
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Yes, I was detained for eight days in Waziristan in 1996. It was against my will, and my passport and money were taken from me. I was not mistreated or harmed, but I was also not allowed to leave.
Greg Mortenson
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In America we now live more in fear than in hope, and eventually that will lead to ignorance and hatred. We need to have optimism that the world can be a better place, and we can leave a legacy for our children. Being bilingual, travel and studying geography, culture and religions can help.
Greg Mortenson
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In Three Cups of Tea I was fairly critical of the military. And I mentioned that they're laptop warriors and there's no boots on the ground. But I can say now that they've gone through a tremendous learning curve.
Greg Mortenson
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Slow down and make building relationships as important as building projects.
Greg Mortenson
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Some of the most memorable moments I've had is to have my family along - who are our greatest ambassadors for peace. Politics will never bring peace, but people will.
Greg Mortenson
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. . . hope resides in the future, while perspective and wisdom are almost always found by looking to the past.
Greg Mortenson
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If we try to resolve terrorism with military might and nothing else, then we will be no safer than we were before 9/11. If we truly want a legacy of peace for our children, we need to understand that this is a war that will ultimately be won with books, not with bombs.
Greg Mortenson
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You have to attack the source of your enemy’s strength. In America’s case, that’s not Osama or Saddam or anyone else. The enemy is ignorance. The only way to defeat it is to build relationships with those people, to draw them into the modern world with education and business. Otherwise the fight will go on forever.
Greg Mortenson