Mama Koko and the Hundred Gunmen

International human rights activist Lisa Shannon spent many afternoons at the kitchen table having tea with her friend Francisca Thelin, who often spoke of her childhood in Congo. Thelin would conjure vivid images of lush flower gardens, huge fish, and of children running barefoot through her family's coffee plantation. She urged Shannon to visit her family in Dungu to get a taste of real Congo, peaceful Congo, a place so different than the conflict-ravaged lands Shannon knew from her work as an activist. But then the nightly phone calls from Congo began: reports from Francisca's mother of gunmen from Joseph Kony's Lord's Resistance Army, which had infested Dungu and began launching attacks. Night after night, "Mama Koko" delivered the devastating news of Francisca's cousins, nieces, nephews, friends, and neighbors, who had been killed, abducted, and burned alive on Christmas Day. In an unlikely journey, Shannon and Thelin decided to travel from Portland, Oregon, to Dungu to witness firsthand the devastation unfolding at Kony's hands. Masquerading as Francisca's American sister-in-law, Shannon tucked herself into Mama Koko's raw cement living room and listened to the stories of Mama Koko and her husband, Papa Alexander, as well as those from dozens of friends and neighbors who lined up outside the house and waited for hours, eager to offer their testimony. These lively stories transport Shannon from the chaos of the violence around her and bring to life Francisca's stories of the peaceful Congo.