Last year, this blog had its humble beginnings. When I started sharing my experiences during Ramadan over here, I hadn’t really planned much. The posts were spontaneous and had a personal tone. There wasn’t any process of structuring the effort either. Maybe that was part of the reason for all of you loving it so much.
A few of you were part of the journey with me last year. Having Iftar or Sehri with me, making trips to mosques, saying prayers together, polishing off deep dishes of Nihari and gobbling sweetmeats across the hoods of Delhi, and overall marveling at the cheer this month brings with it.
This year, I feel it would be a great idea if all of you could share your experiences during Ramadan over here too. Not only would it make the blog a lot more rewarding and interesting for the readership, but it would also be saved from being bludgeoned with the monotony that I stand to risk it with.
A few of you have already expressed an interest. The rest of you out there: please feel free to make this space the repository for your Ramadan experiences. Ramadan is an experience best experienced collectively — be it through beginning or breaking the fast together, saying prayers together, or even shopping together for Eid. In a similar way, the collective of our experiences would be something that everyone would love to read and know about.
Submissions can be made on onelunarmonth@gmail.com.
I’ve put together a list of broad guidelines, with the intent of making it easier for you to conceive the content for submission.
- Any experience, and I mean ANY experience, during Ramadan is welcome. Of course, as long as the experience has some connection with the month.
- A picture (your camera phone is good enough too), an anecdote, a video clip, a shared experience, a personal experience — whatever comes comfortably to you. It would be nice to include a small narrative (between 200-500 words) around the experience to bring about a better perspective for the readers.
- Examples could be: happenings during Sehri and Iftar, at home or the mosque or the market place // incidents from the work place // experiences with friends, family, co-workers, strangers – any experience which resonated with you in some way.
- While it would be ideal to share experiences from this year, any special experiences from past years would be interesting to hear too.
- The idea is to make the blog rich with as diverse a pool of experiences as possible. Which is why it would be great to have friends from all over the world to share experiences here.
- I thought I wouldn’t have to say this here, but suggestions and feedback from friends makes me feel that it might be wise to clarify. Friends with the background of a faith other than Islam are DEFINITELY welcome to send their submissions. In fact, I’d absolutely LOVE to have them here. The month of Ramadan isn’t an experience limited to just Muslims, but all of us already know that, don’t we?
- Experiences don’t need to necessarily be of a spiritual or religious nature. Just a human experience is enough, and not just good enough, that’d be great.
- A word of caution. Please refrain from submissions which contain any overt political or social statements. The idea is to spread the love and cheer that pervades during the month of Ramadan. An overall care in maintaining sensitivity to a global readership is requested.
- Oh, and once you’re done with putting together your experience, don’t forget to include a short note on yourself. Everyone would love to know some more about you too.
All of us would look forward to hearing from you soon. Have a wonderful Ramadan ahead.