Aug 29, 2007 - 04:04:38 CDT
FARGO (AP) - For the soft-spoken, unassuming man he is, Akol Joseph Maker has invited a staggering amount of personal scrutiny lately.In July, Maker, 29, a refugee from southern Sudan, let a Fargo filmmaking crew in on some family routines he normally keeps private. They filmed him making goat soup and a polenta dish in his Fargo apartment - a traditionally female role in his home country, which he assumed here as caretaker of three younger siblings.
The shooting was inspired in turn by another revelatory act of Maker's. Last year, he finished a book, "From Africa to America," which tells in wrenching, vulnerable detail of his escape from his war-torn homeland.
In recent years, as cruelty and carnage in Sudan migrated from the south to Darfur, so-called Lost Boys across the country have taken a more active role in the telling of their stories. Maker, who works and goes to school full-time, fidgets in the spotlight but feels a sense of urgency.
"In America, many people don't know what happens in other parts of the world," he said. "I tried to communicate that, be the voice of my country."
In 2005, Maker brought an article he had written to Mary Pull at North Dakota State University's Center for Writers. Pull, who had helped him with a school paper, read the story and questioned its veracity. Thousands of boys trekking alone through Sudan in search of safety, falling prey to crocodiles and hunger and marauding militias - it surely must be an awful exaggeration, she thought.
A little research convinced Pull otherwise, and she helped Maker publish his tale in World, a Christian magazine.
When Maker arrived in Fargo in 2003, after spending 11 years in Kenya's Kakuma refugee camp, he didn't expect he'd have to do a lot of explaining about the hatred-ridden place he fled.
He focused on adapting to life in America as he juggled family, work and school. He was mostly reticent about his story. In the meantime, war broke out in Darfur, waged by the government that had fought his people in the south. Help was slow to arrive.
Shortly after his article ran, Maker returned to the Center for Writers and asked Pull to help him expand the piece into a book. The criminal justice major, who had started learning English in refugee camps, seemed totally undaunted by the task.
After Maker pitched his draft unsuccessfully to several publishers, he decided to self-publish it. While he awaited its release this winter, he met Deb Damson, a Fargo writer who was instantly taken with his story.
She introduced him to Concord College professor and filmmaker Greg Carlson, who decided to tackle a documentary about Maker's life in Fargo, picking up where the book leaves off. He assembled a team that shot footage of the family dinner and interviews with Maker and his siblings.
Comments are reviewed for taste, tone and language before posting.
Some comments may be used in the Tribune's print edition.
We value and respect your privacy, but The Bismarck Tribune might
disclose certain information to governmental entities if served with subpoena.