From Deseret News archives:
Locals help out villagers in Kenya, Africa
"They don't know how destitute they are," Bret Van Leeuwen warned.
"They have absolutely nothing, yet they are so grateful and happy for what they do have," said Becky Woolstenhulme, 18, of Provo. "It was an eye-opener for me. It changed my life big-time."
The president of Stratus Insurance Services, Van Leeuwen discovered the Mnyenzeni Valley and its cluster of five villages several years ago. The valley is about 300 miles south of Nairobi near the South Coast.
He founded Koins for Kenya, a charity set up to help fund projects in the valley that improve education, agriculture and the water supply.
Pilling and Woolstenhulme were part of a group of Utah Valley residents Van Leeuwen took to Kenya for three weeks to work with villagers. He makes up to four trips a year, Pilling said. Volunteers pay their own way.
Included in the group were two Boy Scouts working on their Eagle Scout rank. One was Pilling's son, C.J., of Orem, and the other was Scott Peterson of Alpine.
The boys taught the natives how to build wooden desks for the schools. They built several hundred, Deanna Pilling said. The desks get the children off the floor.
Van Leeuwen works only with villagers who are willing and able to pitch in and help themselves. Every project is self-sustaining.
He paid his first visit to Kenya several years ago.
"The first trip hooked me," he said. "The second one — I fell in love."
His visits have continued despite warnings not to travel abroad following the 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon. What he found were people who wanted a hand up, not a handout. Many had family members who had died of HIV/AIDS or who were suffering from malaria. But they were willing to build schools for their children and improve their community without assistance from the government.
"It gives them ownership and promotes a sense of accomplishment," Van Leeuwen said. "They're so willing to do whatever is necessary to achieve their goals and to dream that I can't help but embrace them."
One boy lost his father to a snake bite and his mother abandoned him. The boy rises at 4 a.m., studies, then goes into the field to earn money to eat before school.
