UPDATE: Thanks to your amazing support and generous donations, Project Silver Screen netted $490.34. With those funds, we've purchased a great refurbished projector sold directly from Epson for $299. There will be other small expenses like cables, a converter, power source, DVDs, a sheet or canvas for the movie screen, etc. I'll be flying to Cambodia in November to set up our first community movie showing for poor children and communities there! Stay tuned for photos, videos, and accounts, and please email me if you'd like to get involved or continue your support.
Thank you x 1,000,000!!!
-Norm
Thank you x 1,000,000!!!
-Norm
Have you ever set up a projector in your backyard and watched a movie with your family? Or gone to the drive-in movies on a summer night and enjoyed the smiles on your children’s faces?
Starting this winter, we’ll be delivering that same joyful experience to some of the poorest communities in the world, playing free outdoor movies in the slums, public parks, and rural villages of Cambodia.
Project Silver Screen will set up outdoor movie screenings, focusing on areas with a large number of street kids, homeless families, poor communities, rural villages, and even orphanages, schools, and hospitals.
Using a portable projector, a plug-in speaker system, and a simple white sheet as a screen, this unique mobile movie theater will entertain, educate, and enliven people who are living in desperate poverty.
Having lived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and other parts of Southeast Asia for the last couple years, I know these people, have walked the same streets, and visited their communities. Too often they are forgotten, marginalized, and face insurmountable odds in life.
Cambodia is the poorest country in SE Asia, only one generation removed from one of the most horrific genocides in history, where the majority of the population still lives on less than $2 a day, and virtually no public welfare or safety nets exist. Even public schools aren’t free, and the majority of poor children end up not in a classroom but working on the dangerous streets.
Starting this winter, we’ll be delivering that same joyful experience to some of the poorest communities in the world, playing free outdoor movies in the slums, public parks, and rural villages of Cambodia.
Project Silver Screen will set up outdoor movie screenings, focusing on areas with a large number of street kids, homeless families, poor communities, rural villages, and even orphanages, schools, and hospitals.
Using a portable projector, a plug-in speaker system, and a simple white sheet as a screen, this unique mobile movie theater will entertain, educate, and enliven people who are living in desperate poverty.
Having lived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and other parts of Southeast Asia for the last couple years, I know these people, have walked the same streets, and visited their communities. Too often they are forgotten, marginalized, and face insurmountable odds in life.
Cambodia is the poorest country in SE Asia, only one generation removed from one of the most horrific genocides in history, where the majority of the population still lives on less than $2 a day, and virtually no public welfare or safety nets exist. Even public schools aren’t free, and the majority of poor children end up not in a classroom but working on the dangerous streets.
Why movies? People need food, water, shelter, safety, etc. to survive, but I’ve also learned that giving people hope – even just showing them that someone cares – is an invaluable gift. By playing movies outdoors in areas where many people don’t even have electricity or a roof over their heads, much less televisions or movie theaters, we’ll be able to impact the most people for the lowest cost. We will also use these movie showings as a way to promote education and public health, getting other charities, organizations, and volunteers on board to deliver food, clean water, children’s’ books, incentives to go to school, toys, etc.
Think about if you were lying in a hospital bed without even money for food or medicine, or parentless, living in an orphanage with no toys, a child sent out barefoot into the hot streets to beg every day, or a homeless parent sleeping in a park with your entire family at night. If someone came along and set up a movie just for you (in your local language, Khmer, of course) chances are you would see the world a little differently.
Project Silver Screen is aiming to raise $1,200 by October 15, 2015.
That will cover the cost of:
- A durable mid-grade projector,
- A serviceable speaker system that can be heard by up to 100 people,
- A portable power source (most likely a car battery hooked up to converters, as they use in poor villages there),
- All of the appropriate cables, etc.
- Oh, and that budget will be plenty to purchase a few fun family-friendly DVDs of popular movies in their language, with English subtitles!
It may not be fancy, but to these people, it will be really special!
Please visit our GoFundMe page to make a donation.
Think about if you were lying in a hospital bed without even money for food or medicine, or parentless, living in an orphanage with no toys, a child sent out barefoot into the hot streets to beg every day, or a homeless parent sleeping in a park with your entire family at night. If someone came along and set up a movie just for you (in your local language, Khmer, of course) chances are you would see the world a little differently.
Project Silver Screen is aiming to raise $1,200 by October 15, 2015.
That will cover the cost of:
- A durable mid-grade projector,
- A serviceable speaker system that can be heard by up to 100 people,
- A portable power source (most likely a car battery hooked up to converters, as they use in poor villages there),
- All of the appropriate cables, etc.
- Oh, and that budget will be plenty to purchase a few fun family-friendly DVDs of popular movies in their language, with English subtitles!
It may not be fancy, but to these people, it will be really special!
Please visit our GoFundMe page to make a donation.
Project Silver Screen is a program run by Lifted, International, a 501C3 non-profit that focuses on lifting children out of the circumstances of poverty around the world. All of your donations are tax deductible and we keep administrative costs to a bare minimum so your hard-earned donations go directly to helping the children and people who need it most.
We appreciate your donations, no matter how big or small. Seriously – that’s incredible that you’d get behind this project and be such a big part of spreading joy in their lives.
Just by sharing this via social media and telling your friends, you’ll be making a giant difference. I CANNOT WAIT to show you the photos and videos of our Project Silver Screen movie nights starting this November in Cambodia, and report back about the huge impact it's made in their lives. Once we see it working in Phnom Penh, and then other parts of Cambodia, we plan to spread out to other countries and communities all across the world.
It’s only a start, but just like in the movies, when the lights go out and the projector comes on, anything is possible.
-Norm Schriever :-)
***
We appreciate your donations, no matter how big or small. Seriously – that’s incredible that you’d get behind this project and be such a big part of spreading joy in their lives.
Just by sharing this via social media and telling your friends, you’ll be making a giant difference. I CANNOT WAIT to show you the photos and videos of our Project Silver Screen movie nights starting this November in Cambodia, and report back about the huge impact it's made in their lives. Once we see it working in Phnom Penh, and then other parts of Cambodia, we plan to spread out to other countries and communities all across the world.
It’s only a start, but just like in the movies, when the lights go out and the projector comes on, anything is possible.
-Norm Schriever :-)
***
Who are the children we'll be helping?
Find out more by reading The Faces of Childhood Poverty in Southeast Asia,
or email me for more information.
Find out more by reading The Faces of Childhood Poverty in Southeast Asia,
or email me for more information.
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