The Weave

A project to link Istanbul, Kathmandu and New York City

Mountain Sisters is an initiative to connect communities with a stake in mountain stewardship. That stake may be due to their location within or at the gateway to mountainous regions, or they may have important research institutes focusing on mountains, or they may have substantial diaspora communities from such areas.

Three Sisters is a project to spearhead that network by creating a partnership among Kathmandu, Istanbul and New York City. These links are being established within the rubric of Sister Cities International in collaboration with Mountain Legacy International.

Mountain Sisters began with a simple observation.

Mountain regions are becoming increasingly important to the future of the planet. They supply water to billions of people, shelter extraordinary biodiversity, preserve unique cultures, attract travelers from around the world, and are among the first places to experience the effects of climate change.

Yet the future of mountain communities will not be determined in the mountains alone.

It will also be shaped in universities, airports, ports, research laboratories, businesses, city halls, investment firms, manufacturing centers, and neighborhoods thousands of miles away. Prosperity increasingly depends on relationships that extend far beyond local geography.

Mountain Sisters was created to help build those relationships.

Beyond mountain stewardship

Our interest in mountain stewardship remains central. Healthy mountain environments matter—not only for the people who live there, but for the communities downstream and, ultimately, for all of us.

But stewardship alone is not enough.

Communities also need opportunities: opportunities for education, entrepreneurship, tourism, trade, scientific collaboration, investment, cultural exchange, and professional development. Those opportunities arise when communities are connected to one another.

Mountain Sisters therefore seeks to strengthen not only mountain destinations, but also the gateway communities that link them to the wider world.

Gateways as communities

A gateway is often imagined as a place people simply pass through.

We see something different.

Gateway communities are places where ideas meet. They are centers of learning, commerce, transportation, culture, innovation, and diplomacy. They are home to universities, airports, manufacturers, entrepreneurs, immigrant communities, artists, scientists, investors, and nonprofit organizations.

These communities do far more than serve visitors. They create the networks through which knowledge, opportunity, and cooperation travel.

Strengthening those gateways strengthens the mountain regions they serve—and vice versa.

Sister Cities as infrastructure

The Sister Cities movement offers an ideal framework for this work.

Municipal partnerships provide continuity and public recognition, but the real work is carried out by citizens:

Every successful connection makes both communities stronger.

A growing network

Mountain Sisters is not intended to be a club for mountain towns.

It is an invitation to any community that recognizes its future is linked with others.

Some partners may sit high in the Himalayas.

Others may be major metropolitan centers.

Some may be transportation hubs.

Others may be university towns, manufacturing centers, or ports.

What unites them is not altitude, but a willingness to learn from one another and to build practical collaborations that benefit everyone involved.

Three Sisters

Our current work includes established cooperation between Ithaca, New York, and Pokhara, Nepal; now we are bolstering and broadening that cooperation through Three Sisters, an initiative connecting New York City, Istanbul, and Kathmandu.

These cities occupy very different places in the world, yet each serves as a gateway: connecting regions, cultures, institutions, and opportunities.

Together they illustrate what Mountain Sisters hopes to become—a growing network of communities that see international cooperation not as charity or diplomacy alone, but as a practical investment in their own futures.

The initiative is being developed in collaboration with civic leaders, educators, nonprofit organizations, business partners, and members of the international Sister Cities movement, including David Caprara, Sister Cities International’s Nepal country representative. We also look forward to working with additional public and private partners as the network grows.

Join the conversation

If you live or work in or near Kathmandu, Istanbul, or New York, or have connections to any of these communities, we’d love to hear from you. Whether your interests lie in tourism, education, research, entrepreneurship, conservation, public policy, manufacturing, culture, or community development, there is a place for you in Three Sisters.

Questions? Ideas? Interested in participating?
Contact Seth Sicroff
Coordinator, Three Sisters Initiative
Mountain Legacy International
Email: sicroff AT mountainlegacy.org