Room To Read by John Wood

I do not really feel I am on a break now. There are tonnes of things to be done. Amidst the hectic stuff (never have I imagined it to be), I managed to read a book called "Leaving Microsoft to Change the World" by John Wood.


It is an amazing book about John Wood's attempt to give millions of kids around the world access to basic education. It started with his travel to Nepal to scale the mountains but indeed found how scarce the access to education and books the Nepalese kids. After much contemplation he left his good job at Microsoft to pursue his passion.

I was compelled to read this as one of my passions is to do charity. I see charity is somewhat something that can I make an impact on. I am not talking about large scale charity. Although I have started in small scale, I think we have not done enough to make a change. Perhaps one day I will be able to do that. As for now, I will keep on doing the small scale that I am able to do.

Having said that, the other individual reason why this book is so great is that, Wood managed to weave nicely his business acumen honed during his years at Microsoft and how those skills applied to his passion of doing charity. He started off with not knowing what do except to help the Nepalese kids with books. From books donated by friends, now Room To Read has grown leaps and bounds. From Nepal to installing the program in Cambodia, Laos, Sri Lanka, Laos and Zambia. It is amazing. By being true to himself, Wood managed to pursue his passion and attract the likes to do the same. This book is simply amazing and this very book is made official academic literature in Korea recently.

My suggestion - read the book, and you can take away what you want to take away from it. Be it the spirit of giving and receiving much more, or why it is important to give access to education especially to girls. Or simply, business wise - how to run operation with low overheads! That is why this book is great - it is all in there.

Speaking about giving access of education to girls. I will now move on to my next book written by Muhammed Yunus, who won Nobel Peace prize for his work in getting women out of poverty in Bangladesh by introducing micro-finance for the women to start business. Perhaps many of you among the readers of my entry would lightly state "Ah, Malaysia has done this. Helping the poor!" Bla Bla Bla... I am not convinced. Doing it with impactful results is completely different story - that is the reason John Wood and Muhammad Yunus are different breed. That is the reason these two are my idols as far as making a difference in the world is concerned.



** This happens to be one of my favourite songs of all time - What About Now by Chris Daughtry. It bring tears every time I listen to this. And now, when I watch the video clip of the song, it encapsulates the spirit of the book above and ironically, John Wood is in the video, handing over books to children!

Anyway, I really suggest you guys take a look at this book if you are into this sort of thing. Happy reading!