Teachers College dean lends a hand in Africa

Tes Mehring, dean of the ESU Teachers College, wanted to do something out of the ordinary for her summer vacation.

Every few years, Mehring likes to seek out destinations in developing countries in Eastern Europe and Central America.

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he and five others from her church fixed on the idea of visiting Africa, perhaps through a zoo or missionary program.

"Going to Africa has always been a dream of mine," said Mehring, "and I wanted to combine humanitarian efforts with sightseeing and a photo safari.

The group settled on a Kenya-based company called Micato Safaris, which arranged a 16-day tour of Kenya and Tanzania. Included in the trip were visits to Nairobi orphanages and a remote village of the Maasai tribe.

"We were each allowed to bring 32 pounds of humanitarian supplies," said Mehring, who took 150 children's books provided by ESU professors Gary and Barbara Bleeker. Others in the group took infant formula, medication and other supplies.

There are 3.5 million people in Nairobi, Kenya's capital. "More than two million are extremely poor and live in slums. Over a million are street children," said Mehring.

"The orphanage we visited is a safe haven which provides food and shelter, and educates the children to have a trade or craft they can use to make money."

In contrast to the polluted, urban environment of Nairobi, Mehring found the open plains of the Serengeti to be much like Kansas. "I'd always envisioned Africa as a long, dusty plain, but the Serengeti is a lot like the Flint Hills, only a little taller. There were miles and miles of grassland, and the villagers do scheduled burns, just like we do in Kansas."

Mehring visited two different Maasai villages, each consisting of seven to 10 windowless huts made of dung and mud. With elevations over 5,000 feet, summer daytime temperatures were in the high 60s.

The Teachers College dean was curious about the education of the Maasai children, and was shown the village school. "It was a building about the size of a one-room school, but it had a dirt floor. About 50 children, ages three to seven were sitting on a wooden plank."

"There were no materials, no pen or paper, just a piece of broken blackboard for writing vocabulary words. A lot of the learning was done by rote," she said.

"But it was quite amazing what these children knew. The older ones all knew their alphabet and they had good mathematics abilities. They also knew a lot about the world around them. They knew which plant to use if a bee stung them, and knew that another plant could coagulate blood. The kids in America would not know these things."

Along with their humanitarian intent, the group was in Africa to see the wild countryside and they did not return home disappointed. "We were eyeball to eyeball with lions. The first lion we saw came right out of the bushes in front of us," said Mehring. "The roar of a lion is something that immediately brings goose bumps. I've heard that a lion's roar carries for five miles, and I have no doubt that's true."

"The flowers were also incredible," she added. "I saw geraniums that were six feet tall."

Most people in Kenya enthusiastically greeted Mehring and her company and encouraged other Americans to visit. Like many other countries in the world, tourism in Kenya has dropped off due to heightened terrorism concerns.

The travel problems will not stop one Kenyan that Mehring met. A Maasai tribal leader named "Benjamin" intends to visit Emporia next April and tour the university and area public schools.

Last Updated July 2, 2007>