For four years, we’ve been working hard in our slice of a very diverse, multicultural sort of life with the vision that we would one day transition into print and expand our focus outward. That time is now. 2014 has already been a historical year of firsts for us. We’ve:
- Started offline creative writing workshops in both Islamabad and Dubai
- Held our first internationally-covered Poetry World Cup (Singapore took home the cup in a tense final with Pakistan)
- Held our first paid writing competition
- Started our series of podcasts
- Published issues which have been read over 100,000 times (we released two this year)
- Covered major literature and film festivals
- Helped cement the career of several poets and emerging writers
But we’ve been operating under a very tight budget, funded entirely by Editor-in-Chief Maryam Piracha (who, in her other hours, works in the development sector). Each of our 30+ staff is holding down a full-time job on the side and has been working hard, past what can possibly be considered human, to get this magazine to where it is today. If there’s one thing we know for certain, it’s this: if the magazine has any chance of surviving and more importantly, expanding, it needs the funds to do it. We’ve started an Indiegogo funding campaign for this purpose. Take the next step with us… campaign backers will receive free copies of the anthology, artwork and other goodies.
Whatever you do, we hope you choose to be active.