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From Wednesday’s Daily News-Record:

By Kelly Jasper

HARRISONBURG — The film opens on a shot of a young Ugandan, a boy with a sack over his shoulder. As the boy treks through dark city streets, he is lit mostly by the camera that films him.

That nameless boy, captured on film three years ago, leaves his home in the village every night, flees to the city just to find a space to sleep in a dark alleyway. This, he says, is safer. The rebel soldiers won’t look for him here.

Like many children of Uganda since the country’s civil war began 20 years ago, he finds more security in the streets than in his own bed. It’s a concept unfathomable to many Americans, says Katie Koon, a 22-year-old Harrisonburg resident.

A year ago, Koon wondered what would happen if only more people knew of the plight of these children. On Monday, she found out when she partnered with the Boys and Girls Clubs of Harrisonburg and Rockingham County to screen the film that first raised her awareness of Uganda’s brutal civil war.

The film’s name? “Invisible Children,” because the children of Uganda’s civil war have truly been forgotten, Koon says.

Few records are kept detailing how many children are captured, taught to fight, and learn to kill just so they’re not killed themselves, according to the filmmakers.

While early estimates on the number of child soldiers hovered around 25,000, a report just this week from the World Bank places the number of abducted children at 66,000.

The Cause

In 2003, three film students flew to Africa. They came home with the footage that became “Invisible Children.” Teams of college students now tour the county screening the film.

For the team that stopped in Harrisonburg, Monday night was only one stop in a three-month road trip this semester.

The program in Harrisonburg was unique because, following the film, two paintings by James Madison University art students were auctioned off to raise money for the organization.

Both are large, at least 4 feet by 4 feet. One features a smiling African boy, backlit by a brilliant sunset. In the other, chains of children link hands. Their silhouettes are marked by words of their trials: raped, beaten, crippled and blinded.

Others, according to the film, have starved or been forced to kill because of the war.

The presentation is wrenching. But make no mistake, Koon says. This campaign has a goal. A table of T-shirts, handmade bracelets from Uganda and DVDs beg for attention. This is about awareness.

The Children

It doesn’t matter that Uganda is some 7,000 miles away. “Invisible Children” brought the war home, Koon says.

The conflict is nothing new. The brutal civil war started more than 20 years ago, when a “spirit-possessed” woman named Alice Lakwena and a man named Joseph Kony rallied thousands and formed the Lord’s Resistance Army in a failed attempt to overthrow the government.

Since the war began, estimated death tolls have varied, ranging from 100,000 to 10 times that number.

As the war dragged on, the LRA began to prey on children “to fuel their illegitimate war,” says Lisa, a volunteer with the organization Invisible Children, which was formed after the film was created. They mostly zeroed in on young boys and girls from the ages of 5 to 12.

Children who aren’t abducted flee, like the boy seen in the opening shot of the documentary.

The challenge Monday night was to imagine what that would be like. The “Invisible Children” team asked youth at the screening to think of the things that they take for granted: Peace at home; a bed to call their own; a place to live free from the fear of abduction.

“We don’t realize how lucky we are,” Koon says.

Kids in Uganda — all younger than her — have none of these same luxuries, says Koon, who’s 22.

The Campaign

Since the making of movie, the filmmakers have gone on to lobby politicians, organize demonstrations and sponsor a scholarship program for students.

Most importantly, they say, the organization builds grassroots compassion for its cause.

“Many have heard about the crisis taking place in Darfur, yet that remains the world’s third worst humanitarian crisis while northern Uganda is the second and Congo is the first,” according to the presentation. “Darfur and Uganda are actually linked. The Ugandans flee into Sudan while the Sudanese flee into Uganda, only to go from crisis to crisis.”

Since the film was finished, the situation in Uganda has improved, but there’s still much to be done, according to organizers with “Invisible Children.” They played a video update following the main one-hour film.

In August, Uganda’s government and the LRA began peace talks, but the groups have made little progress over the last several months.

Until peace endures in Uganda, Invisible Children says it wants to continue spreading word of the conflict. The organization’s campaign offers initiatives on the local, national and global scale.

Koon says she hopes to stay involved.

“America is such a youth-centric nation,” Koon says. “How could we not care about these children, too?”