Success after failure

After not being able to reach to the summit of Mount K2, Greg Mortenson is pulled back, welcomed and sheltered by the nearby villagers of Korphe. During his stay for seven weeks, he observed the condition of the villagers. Besides poverty, he encountered many aspects about the villagers that made him do something for them. The major factor that led him to take some initials to help the villager was he wanted to bring education on that village. There he saw many young girls who were interested in learning and so he thought this would not only help them but the villagers would benefit as well. So he went back to United States and thought of building a project where he could contribute something towards to villagers of Korphe. There he gathered funds and some technologies in order to build schools for children of Pakistan and Afghanistan. He came back and built many schools for them. He devoted his time understanding the people and educating the young girls.

This is one of the moments where I found that had an important insight in Three Cups of Tea. Personally I found that Greg Mortenson wanted to bring a change in the village and the villagers so he did something humanitarian a social cause to the people out there. When he was not able to climb Mt. K2, he could have just gone back to his country and carried on his life but he had different things in his minds and helped the villagers for a noble cause. This was one of the most beautiful aspects of the book. Not even caring for his own family, he used to stay and help the villagers for the whole half of the year.

Talking about my experience in Global Beginnings, I did go through a lot of situations where I had to make choices and these choices have a positive and a negative impact. The first ten days in Paris was something which everyone would not even think of doing. Instead of getting to know about the French culture and people, I was so lazy to go out. In a sense, I was not at all interested in the learning about the French culture. As we began to experience many things about the French culture, I found many difficulties whether it is the language or the understanding about their culture. This made me feel completely left out and thus slowly and steadily, I started to socialize with the French people showing a keen interest in their language and culture. During this period of time, I encountered various aspects about their culture which not only broadened my knowledge of understanding but has helped me to connect it with my daily life as well. There after I have started to respect and appreciate different cultures.

A Gobal Lesson

"Three Cups of Tea is" one of the most remarkable adventure stories where Greg Mortenson went through dangerous and difficult situations and had a mission to build schools in the wildest parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan. During this period of time, he encounters many difficulties to promote literacy and education for girls in rural Pakistan and Afghanistan. His main focus was to educate the girls in order to promote the equality among the gender within the society. He believed that if girls were educated then it would help to decrease the birth rate, infant immortality and poverty as well. His major effort was to fight terrorism and promote peace. During his mission, he faced several difficulties; he was kidnapped in Pakistan and escaped a firefight between Afghan and the war people and he was criticized by many people who were against the Muslims. But in the end he succeeded in his mission to establish schools and educate the children in the villages. For his humanitarian efforts he was awarded and well appreciated by the people throughout the world.

It is obvious that this adventure of Greg Mortenson is not an easy route to lead one’s life for the sake of others. Likewise Greg Mortenson, a commitment to serve others has always been on the forefront. As a young Christian student, I have always been engrossed in helping my community. We were taught to serve mankind. My involvement in community service has always meant a lot to me. It brings a feeling of satisfaction to help people in need. I am committed to assisting others and being part of a cause which drives me in my personal philosophy of life.

As for now, Global Beginnings has not only helped me to become who I am but also has taught me different aspects about life. These aspects are concerned with the culture around me. It has helped me not only to experience the cultures and lifestyles of different people but develop ideas on how I can contribute something for the people around me. Now, I see myself as a person who is willing to lend a hand to contribute something to the society where I become a part of it. One aspect that I have learned from Greg Mortenson experience is that one must respect and appreciate each other’s culture in order to bring peace and harmony thus during my stay in Global Beginnings, I am here to push myself further to gain a wide range of knowledge from the European culture and implying that knowledge in my daily life. With some dedication and determination we can all contribute and change the world in which we live.

A day not to be forgotten

Nov 25, what a day to start with. I woke up at 11 am in the morning, didn’t had time to get my breakfast in the dining room, and on top of that I didn’t had anything to eat except for some leftover cereals. Along with just being alone in my room, I start to wonder here and there, trying to analyze things that were going through my minds every time, everywhere. As usual a small circular window reflecting the bright sun’s rays wake me up every morning. I feel quite demoralized when I look my so called messed up room and see nothing but my clothes scattered on the floor, the pillows shapes like some kind of weird creature, and my books are all jumbled up. First of all with this kind of atmosphere, either I want to go to bed again and sleep the entire day or just go out and never come back to my room. Sleeping has always been a hobby for me. I can sleep forever.

Moving on with my tight schedule, the first thing I usually do in the first hour is open my computer, see if there is any connection to internet. Talking about internet, the place where I am staying has one of the worst internet connections I have ever encountered so far. Luckily there was connection on this particular day. Going to the official college website has always been like face booking or using skype these days. More then anything else, I use the college website every five minutes. The consequence of not going through the college website is that you miss everything that has been assigned. The best part of going through the college website is to look at the grades for different courses. This is the only thing that motivates me to do better on my academics.

After hours of wondering what I should do or where should I start from, I start to open my word document and type few lines about the events and activities we had gone through. Well this is the most interesting and the most boring part of writing a journal. The most interesting part which is one can describe the things they did as they want and the boring part is to write journal for every events. Sometimes I feel that I don’t have anything to write and the words that come through my mind are lost before my hand starts typing. Knowing what to and what not to write, I began to flip the pages of “Indecision” which is the book for our philosophy classes and started taking notes. This lasted for five minutes and then I felt like the gravity is pulling me and trying to convey the message “go back to sleep Sugam.”

Not able to concentrate on a particular thing, I start to stretch myself in order to gain my consciousness. I remember most of the times, Professor Bill Thomas with his wicked look and smile told me to get out of my room and explore the city around and in that way I will be able to learn and concentrate on my work. Its not that I want to spend everyday staying at my room, trying to figure out the things I need to do. I am quite an outgoing and a compatible person but the only thing that bothers me is that it consumes much time to go to the nearest city. After spending hours and hours of time playing guitar, sleeping and thinking about things which are not supposed to be thought, the sun slowly started to move towards the west.

As Professor Bill says to connect everything with “light” which is the main theme for the course, I decided at least to end the day with something useful and worthy. The courses that we have been taking has been designed in such a way that each one of them offers and integrated theme for the semester an this has been very useful as I have been able to make connections through each and every course so far. As of now, we have been experiencing the French culture for a while, I decided to meet one of the French students from a Business school in order to share a bit of culture and get to know their culture more. It was around 5 pm when I finally decided that I should move out of the Chateau and meet a student in the city of Strasbourg. When I reached the city, I met this student called Guiyom who was just waiting for me. As we started walking around the city, we shared many aspects about our culture and got to know each other well. The main purpose of our meeting was to learn more about each others lifestyles and the language we speak. Basically, our conversation was mostly based on the studies we have been taking and the experiences we have gone through. It was an amazing experience to get to know the French student and this helped me a lot with the courses I have been talking as well.
After spending couple of hours with the French student, I started heading back to the Chateau as it was already 8 pm. As I reached the Chateau I took a moment to remember the things I had done on that particular day. I started the day being a bit sloppy as I was not able to concentrates on any thing but as I went to the city to explore a bit about the French culture, the day seemed quite fine and at least I had something to work on. Now I have realized that sitting in the room for hours and figuring out what I should do and end up doing nothing, it is better to explore different people, places and cultures around you. For instance, I have learned to be more conscious about the people around me rather than trying to analyze the unnecessary things in life.

Something to learn about European Parliament

After Visiting the Council of Europe, how could we have missed out an opportunity to visit the European parliament which in fact is just located in Strasbourg. Along with our visits to many cultural, musical and monumental places, this was the perfect opportunity to learn something with the political world especially the renowned parliament of many European countries. Personally, my interests don’t lie in the political sector and I have nothing to say about them, I gathered all my thoughts and tried to capture the political scenario of the Europe. As I walked across this huge building with the member flags that were showing the unity among the European countries, I was simply amazed to see how important it was to have cooperation between the different European nations. As we walked inside this lavish building, I could feel the patriotism of how people felt with themselves.
Moving on with the European parliament, it is the only directly-elected body of the European Union. With the members comprising of 736, the European Parliament are there to represent the citizen. The elections held once every five years by the voters’ right across the 27 member states of the European Union. There are generally 7 political groups who work together and help to achieve a positive result in the election process. The Building comprises of more than one thousand offices for staffs and administration and nearly three thousand people work every day. During office hours about 250 staffs and civil servants are seen working throughout the day. Furthermore, I came to know that the twelve starts on the European flag represented a symbolic flag which symbolized perfection. Altogether there are twenty three official languages that are spoken in the parliament. The Parliament organizes its work, through a system of specialized committees. The work of the European Parliament is important because in many policy areas, decisions on new European laws are made jointly by Parliament and the Council of Ministers, which represents Member States.
Parliament plays an active role in drafting legislation which has an impact on the daily lives of its citizens: For example, on environmental protection, consumer rights, equal opportunities, transport, and the free movement of workers, capital, services and goods. Parliament also has joint power with the Council over the annual budget of the European Union. It particularly focuses on the human rights and the democratic values throughout the world. The right to speak, read and write is basically what Parliament focuses on.
So after few hours of discussion with the concerned person at the Parliament, we finally ended our yet another interesting journey at the European Parliament. With some knowledge on how the Parliament functions and the important roles that they have been providing not only with the European nations but all around the world, we finally end our journey in the political world. Even though it was just a brief introduction to the European political world, this will definitely help much in the coming few years as most of students focuses on this particular field.

"City Light" The Charlie Chaplin Movie

There might be very few who has not heard of the great Charlie Chaplin, the man who took the genre of comedy into greater heights. I still remember my childhood days where I would be watching Charlie Chaplin movies for hours. I had the opportunity to again cherish my days, as we went to watch a movie of Charlie Chaplin at Strasbourg. As usual our professor Bill Thomas involves us into diverse cultural experience in order to gain a wide knowledge of why we are here during our first semester where we could be staying in campus. Whether it is an orchestra concert, dance concert, a play, classical concert or even a classic movie, he makes us utilize the most out of everything.
Moving on with the movie, I was thrilled to watch Charlie Chaplin’s movie after ages. Throughout the movie, I kept my eyes open as I didn’t wanted to miss even a single part. The most remarkable thing about the movie was that it was shown on a projector and was interpreted with the huge orchestra. This was totally an amazing experience for me as I had never encountered such a show so far in my life. Throughout the show the musicians showed their composer and quality performance in order to compliment the movie. While watching I had the sense of idea on how much the musicians had to put efforts to provide the background music for movies.
As the movie began to flow with the music from the orchestra, I was able to pick out certain themes that would relate in my daily life. As far as I understood the movie, it had all the ingredients that a well directed and well written movie is all about. It had comedy, tragedy, and a moral story that would resemble with our everyday lives. The movie was all about how Charlie Chaplin meets this beautiful blind lady, starts falling in love with her and tries to make her feel that she is one of a special kind none the less of her blindness. Charlie tries to help her out even though he has been going through with his own troubled life. Even though he himself can’t afford anything himself, he is able to sacrifice everything for that lady and make her happy. During this course of time, he goes through a lot of difficulties but in the end he makes his way to her heart and makes her see the world through her own eyes. For me this movie was not just about humor but it had the essential elements that we go through every day. The show ended with an amazing performance from the orchestra group and the performers received a huge round of applause from the whole crowd as everyone completely loved the show.

A reflection on the dance performance

Dance is definitely a form of art but the dance show which I had recently visited was one of a kind. It was not just a particular dance rather it was a form of an act of drama, athleticism, coordination, and enthusiasm. So far this the most unusual show I have ever visited. Along with its unusual character, it was a pleasure to watch the dancers perform on the stage. The stage was set up in a horrifying light effects and its presence was simply very evil. The woman who was the narrator of the act had one of the most howling voices I had ever heard which such enriched the whole act. The backup musicians and the act of the whole performance complimented each other in a very fascinating way. Personally, I felt that the message the performers were trying to convey was that there is always the good and the bad and it all depends on how one take their life. When the show started with the performers who were naked where they were wrapped with the shining cloth, I thought it had to do with some kind of evil spirit. The act had to do with so much of light as provided the different aroma with the stage. I felt that light had the major effect on the outlook of the act as it looked really scary and haunted. There were different interpretations within the whole act as it was sometimes going very fast and sometimes it was slow.


If I had to go back and think about the performance, I would just be able to appreciate the performers as they had put forth so much effort to make the whole show energetic and lively. It was praiseworthy to see the endurance, fluidity and flexibility of the performers as they were the ones who kept the crowd look totally astonished. Personally, I believe this was one of the best visits I have encountered. This has not only made me think again and again but had inspired me that human can achieve anything if they have the will and determination.

An Instrumental person in my life

Inspirations are always a learning process and thus many people are influenced by one another. In the book “Three cups of tea” Greg Mortenson set off in 1993 with a group to climb K2 which is the second largest mountain in the world. He never expected he would make it almost to the top. Even though he was not able to make it to the top, he didn’t get demoralized rather he took it as a learning process. He never expected two Balti men would help him off the mountain and welcome him to be a member of their village. He never expected to start 22 schools in Pakistan while spearheading an effort to educate girls as a result. Since his maiden voyage, Mortenson has spent nine years advocating girls’ education in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Mortenson told the crowd that while recovering from the physical and emotional exhaustion of the climb, he visited a local school and was moved by the conditions he saw. Children were studying in the dirt, and the village couldn’t pay for teachers. Before long, they asked Mortenson to help them build a school. He was also instrumental in building a bridge and getting eye care and a clean drinking water system to the area. After returning to the United States, Mortenson began looking for potential sponsors to fund the project. But this was not the end of his journey; he spent a good deal of time helping the people in one way or the other. So him major influence has been the villagers that motivated him to do such a wonderful job.


Looking at my own experience in Global Beginnings, there has been someone who has been the most instrumental person guiding me throughout the process and that man is none other than my father. He has always been a key to my success. This is my first travel outside my home country and I have never travelled without my family. It is quite difficult for an international student to adjust with the cultural differences. So far, the first semester in France has been full of ups and downs. As we move towards the end of the semester, the screws are getting tighter and the courses are getting tougher. Apart from home sick, work overload, relation with different professors and the cultural differences that I am going through, I have been really stressed out. This has been the toughest times and I am still trying to hang on. I have always admired my father for his support in what I do. He has always motivated me when I struggle and hence push me further to excel whether in academics or life in general. My father calls me almost every day in order to make me feel that I am not alone. Generally, when I tell him about my assignments and workloads, he is always ready to help me and give advices. If I would say that a person who has really had a hand in my success is my father.