Filmmaker Statement

One summer fifteen years ago, my best friend and I decided to fast for Ramadan for the first time. Because our immigrant parents feared persecution in America, we grew up in secular Turkish households in the Midwest and knew nothing about what fasting entailed or the rules required of us. We only knew that we needed to abstain from eating from sunrise to sunset. That summer taught us the power of religion as a creator of community and was an exercise actively making a choice to incorporate a practice into our identity, rather than have it influenced by a parent. What I love about this story is that it flips the immigrant religious narrative on its head. Instead of children of immigrants rejecting the religion of their parents, they wholeheartedly embrace it and want to be a part of something important. I want audiences to consider this unique perspective and begin to expand their knowledge on the complexity of religious and cultural practices.