Luncheon Report

Today I met the first woman to become a lawyer in Pakistan. Well, I didn't meet her personally, but she spoke at the sold-out Three Cups of Tea luncheon in Houston today. Greg Mortenson, the keynote speaker and author of Three Cups, introduced her to the crowd.

Portia, Queenie and I were really touched by the words of this sister lawyer. Mortenson said that she had suffered beatings and stonings at the hands of fellow students and teachers for daring to seek an education. Her family also opposed her ambitions but finally she was able to persuade them to grant permission for her to study law. She is the first woman to pass the bar exam in Pakistan and is now doing advanced studies at Montana State University--no doubt with the encouragement of the Mortenson family who lives in Montant. Her goal is to become an advocate for the property rights of women and widows in her country.

Mortenson's speech concentrated on three themes:

• the importance of elders
• the importance of building relationships to build peace
• the importance of the education of women

Mortenson quoted a statistic that only 10% of American children had ever spent any time listening to their "elders" (grandparents or others of that generation) recount stories of the events of their lives and the history they had lived while 99 to 100% of Pakistani and Afghani children have done so. He pointed out that in the US children are becoming ignorant of the history and culture that shapes their society. Listening and building relationships with the "elders" in Pakistan and Afghanistan is a major emphasis for the Central Asia Insitute in its efforts to expand schools and education for girls in the region and is a key to its success.

With respect to the importance of building relationships, Mortenson praised our military leadership for finally "getting it" and placing emphasis on building trust and partnership with the people of Afghanistan as they struggle to resist the forces of the Taliban in their country. Three Cups of Tea is now required reading for those taking counterinsurgency training. He shared an email from General Petraeus, who after reading Three Cups of Tea, summarized what he learned from it: "build relationships, listen and respect the people."

Mortenson criticized the current administration's secret discussions and failure to consult our military leaders and the important Afghan elder groups before setting the policy for a new surge. He fears that plans to bring troops away from the "forward" positions in the countryside and back into the fortified positions in the cities risks the destruction of the relationships they are successfully building in the remote areas more subject to Taliban violence.

"Unless girls are educated, things are never ever going to change," Mortenson said. He quoted an African proverb: "If you educate a boy, you educate an individual. If you educate a girl, you educate a community." According to statistics from UNICEF, in 2000 there were 800,000 children in school in Afghanistan--almost all were boys. Today there are 8.4 million children in school--2.5 million are girls! That is impressive progress. That is the hope for our future together.

The crowd was filled with many Pakistani and Afghan women as well as several groups of high school students. The table next to us was an all-Pakistani or Afghan group and I noticed their enthusiastic response to Mortenson's speech--especially his words about our military's current approach to their mission in that area. The high school students wanted to set up Facebook relationships with their counterparts in Afghanistan, only to learn that the internet wasn't quite as ubiquitous in the mountains of that country as it is on the Gulf Coast of Texas!

It was an inspiring event that renewed my belief in the importance of education--especially for women--in the pursuit of peace.