Show tickets help build schools
Tickets are on sale at Elgin Community College for two benefit performances of the American Place Theatre stage performance of “Three Cups of Tea” Sunday, May 1.
Audiences who come to hear Greg Mortenson's true story about building schools in war-torn areas of the Mideast will help build a school simply by attending.
Proceeds from “Three Cups of Tea,” shown at 2 and 6 p.m. in the ECC Arts Center's Blizzard Theatre, will go to an effort by community members and a group of ECC students and staff to raise $50,000 to not only help build a school in Pakistan for girls, but endow it for three years. The effort is being coordinated by Teach, Educate, Advocate Around the World, a group organized by the ECC Student Life Office.
“Everyone has been inspired by this story and the first Elgin performance of American Place Theatre's adaptation of ‘Three Cups of Tea' in October,” said Steve Duchrow, ECC's director of performing arts. “They're amazed by the lengths Greg Mortenson went to realize his vision. After much discussion, we determined that we could realize that vision too and make the dream of building a school in Pakistan come to life.”
Told in a one-person narrative, “Three Cups of Tea” chronicles Mortenson's quest to build schools in remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. From the first heart-stopping opening moments stranded on the mountain top, actor Curtis Nielsen brings the audience through Mortenson's very intimate, real-life journey. After a failed 1993 attempt to climb Pakistan's K2, the world's second highest mountain, Mortenson wandered, exhausted and disoriented, into the most desolate reaches of northern Pakistan. Alone, without food, water or shelter he stumbled into an impoverished Pakistani village where he was nursed back to health.
While recovering he observed the village's children sitting outdoors, scratching their lessons in the dirt with sticks. The village was so poor that it could not afford the $1-a-day salary to hire a teacher. When he left the village, he promised that he would return to build them a school. From that rash, heartfelt promise grew one of the most incredible humanitarian campaigns of our time.
That single pledge led Mortenson to found the Central Asia Institute and establish or significantly support 170 schools that provide education to more than 68,000 children, with an emphasis on girls education, in areas where few educational opportunities exist. In pursuit of his goal, Mortenson survived an armed kidnapping, fatwas issued by enraged mullahs, repeated death threats and wrenching separations from his wife and children.
“I think the whole story spoke to me because I come from a Third World country and I've seen what the lack of education can do to a community,” said ECC student and T.E.A. member Nancy Valladarez. “The play and the story are so moving. ‘Three Cups of Tea' showed me how we can change lives by providing opportunities for education.”
Two sellout benefit performances will provide the funds necessary to build a school and support it for three years. It all adds up: One penny buys a pencil, two pennies buys an eraser, 15 pennies buys a notebook, $20 buys one student school supplies for a year, $600 is a teacher's salary for a year, $500 supports an existing school for a year, and $50,000 builds a new school and supports it for three years. As such, selling 1,300 tickets and selling out both shows, in addition to T.E.A.'s other fundraising efforts will build and support a school in Pakistan for three years.
Single tickets for Three Cups of Tea are $40. Tickets are available online at tickets.elgin.edu or at the ECC Arts Center box office or call (847) 622-0300. Donations to this effort through T.E.A. can be sent by check payable to Central Asia Institute to Amybeth Maurer, Office of Student Life, Elgin Community College, 1700 Spartan Drive, Elgin, IL 60123.