Printing Postcards for Prisoners
I like to take part in social causes, vehemently. I recently joined the Helping Households Under Great Stress organistion which supports families of detainees with friendly advice, encouragement, legal information and general goodness which makes us human.
As part of my personal 'campaign' I used to write to UK detainees, all of whom are Muslim, but most haven't been convicted. Those that have been convicted are spendling 15yr+ to life sentences based on weak evidence under the synthetic Terrorism Act 2001... However, this post was not meant to be overly political. These injustices anger me greatly and I know it is in my power, our power to do something - not demonstrate, or complain or boycott - but perform hardcore productive action to gain results. With Islam's code of conduct of course.
So I sometimes still post letters of thinking material to UK detainees and a few abroad. Some of them write back and we've built a good repertoire of trading 'how are yous' and 'what happened in your world todays'.
This card below was sent to me for Eid ul fitr in October - the Muslim festival after fasting - by a media-known detainee brother Babar Ahmad.
He did not design the card, another detainee did (I'll find his name inshaallah). Interestingly, this artistic brother received awards for his 'artwork within prison' and he also sent me a card with MY NAME PRINTED AT THE FRONT!! You could not imagine how pleased and honoured I felt to receive that, alhamdulillah! I'll have to find that card too.
Usually my artwork is printed, planned and sketched with good penmanship. These above were a few scraggly designs I posted last week. The pinkish card underneath reads 'Rahman', the Arabic word and Divine attribute meaning 'Compassionate'. Rahman is also the root name for a woman's womb = 'Rahm', therefore there's a strong compassionate connection between the Divine and the creation. The red & blue one was screen printed and I talk about how I made that for a poem here.
These notelets were mass produced the night before sending which is why they're utterly rubbish in design. I simply needed them to be sent pronto before the post went out. I used a paper punch, similar to the stationery hole punch, instead of round holes this punch cuts out small envelopes with pre-creases, the size of your palm, to be folded into shape. I punched out 100 of these and, glued'em on. Added a message with stars and RAN to the post office. Only 13 returned (the prisoners weren't allowed mail without formal procedures - crappety).
Babar Ahmad's campaign website is here - LINK
The HHUGS organisation website - LINK
And the paper punch I mentioned is here - LINK
May you have a great and colourful day!
Zaufishan.com Toodle-doo ★
Testing comment... *sigh* Nothing works these days.
ReplyDeleteI think it's a great idea to bring a little sunshine into someone's life. The work done by these prisoners is commendable - being in prison is the worst thing that could happen to someone, however it does give them a lot of time to reflect on life making them better people.
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