On June 19, 2014, Babar and Haris Suleman – a father-son pilot team – began the adventure of a lifetime – a round-the-world trip to fulfill their own dream and inspire the dreams of others.
"Breaking out of the routine of day to day life requires bravery in more than one form," 17-year-old Haris said after he and his dad took off from Indiana's small Greenwood Airport in their single engine plane. The plan was extraordinary: Haris would attempt to break the world record as the youngest pilot to ever circumnavigate the globe in 30 days, and the mission would do much more than garner the attention of Guinness Book. It would raise funds to build schools in Babar's native Pakistan – in villages where boys and girls have no educational opportunities.
A tragic crash during their journey ended their lives, but not their mission. In this remarkable and inspiring story, we come to know the Suleman family as they search for meaning – not in death, but in the way Babar and Haris lived.
Haris would write during his journey: "A lot of people have expressed concern that the journey that my father and I have set out on is a risky venture. Some have even questioned why we would put ourselves through such a challenge. I simply ask them: Why did Edmund Hillary Climb Mt. Everest?– ...Why did Marco Polo travel to China?"
Theirs was legendary travel with a purpose. Babar and Haris cared passionately about education, and wanted to help the most underserved children in Pakistan. To do it, they teamed up with one of the most respected educational organizations in the world, The Citizens Foundation. At the time of their death on takeoff from Pago Pago, American Samoa, they had raised $500,000. The outpouring of support for their cause since their deaths has been extraordinary – and their final goal of $1 million has been realized more than three times over.
The story of Babar and Haris Suleman captures the struggle immigrants face when coming to America, and what it means to find success and achieve your dreams. It also speaks to the way children of immigrants rise up to seek their place in the world. How a Pakistani immigrant father and his American-born son bond over a shared sense of adventure and a powerful will to live a life of purpose is a lesson for us all. They challenged themselves and in doing so made an enormous difference. In this film we follow in their footsteps and witness death not as an end, but as a new beginning.
