Friday's Internet Edition, May 09, 2008.
|
Jennifer Plyler, a senior at East Davidson High School, doesn’t have to imagine such a place. Last summer she visited Kibera, a slum on the outskirts of Nairobi, the capital of Kenya.
“The first thing you see is rusty tin roofs on top of each other,” Plyler said of the first time she approached Kibera. “These are small shacks, built out of mud. Six people will be living in 6-by-6 rooms.”
The people of Kibera live in these cramped conditions without running water or proper sewage disposal. Instead of roads, there are thin paths with sewage running down the sides of them. Needless to say diseases, such as malaria, are rampant in this squalid slum. But there were also some positive attributes that Plyler observed of the people who lived in such deplorable conditions. For starters, she said crime is not as severe there as it is in ghettos in the United States.
“The people of Kibera basically are their own police,” Plyler said. “There is no tolerance for crime there. There is hardly any drug use.”
What Plyler did see in Kibera was thirst for knowledge — especially among the children, who make up over half of the population. She was there on a mission trip with Harold and Ruthann Burchel, as well as their granddaughter, Ashley Burchel. The Burchels are friends with the Plyler family, including Jennifer’s parents, Sarah and Mike Plyler. Jennifer Plyler and the three Burchels were in Kenya for three weeks last July to convert residents of Kibera to Christianity.
“These children wanted to absorb all the information they could,” Jennifer Plyler said. “They were very attentive. Education is very valued in Africa.”
The trip was made possible by donations from members of Mount Zion Wesleyan Church, where the Plylers and the Burchels attend — as well as donations from other friends of the Plylers.
Lately, the area has been undergoing unrest. Not long after Plyler and the Burchels left Kenya an election was held with controversial results. These have been a lot of riots in Kibera since, but Plyler feels the converts to Christianity will stick to their religious beliefs.
“Once Africans receive the truth, they absorb it,” Plyler said. “This upheaval isn’t going to cause people to turn away from the truth that we gave them.”
Plyler, who graduates next month, developed an appreciation for the Kenyans from a previous trip to that country. In 2004, she went with Ruthann and Hal Burchel, along with her sister Lyndsay Plyler, and four other people to Nairobi. Then the eight missionaries traveled 10 hours by vehicle — about five miles on a primitively paved road and the other half on dirt road — to the village of the Pokot tribe. There, they built a church for the Pokot people, who had been worshipping under a tree before the philanthropic efforts of the locals.
“During my first trip, I developed a great affection for African people,” Jennifer Plyler said. “I thought they had a great spirit about them. They’re facing extreme hardship, but have so much joy about them.”
Jennifer and Lindsay were not the first of Sarah and Mike Plyler’s children to visit Africa on a mission with the Burchel’s. Micheal Plyler went in 2003. While the three Plyler children helped educate children in Africa, they have done well with their own education here in North Carolina. Lindsay is now Lindsay McClamrock, a graduate of High Point University. She works for Old Dominion Freight Line and plans to return to HPU to get her masters. Michael graduates from UNC-Wilmington this month.
Jennifer will start at UNC-Wilmington this fall and plans to major in athletic training. As a student-athlete at East Davidson, she has been on the tennis, swimming and winter and spring track teams. She is graduating near the top of her class and eventually plans to earn a doctorate in physical therapy.
The standout student definitely has more knowledge than the average college graduate. These trips to Africa have expanded her mind in ways that most teenagers have not been able to experience.
“You see our way of life around here, but it’s amazing to see how other cultures go about marriage and other traditions,” Jennifer Plyler said. “It also gave me a great sense of pride. The trip taught me that I could handle responsibility.”
Staff Writer Kevin Reid can be reached at 472-9500, ext. 230, or at reid@tvilletimes.com.