Summer Camp 2021 Imaginaerium: Day 7

Hello everyone!

Seven days done! Next up on Imaginaerium, a festival from Thailand called Songkran.


And what better way to celebrate a festival than with some booze? In this case, fantasy booze!

As an a bonus, I think How to Drink that has a D&D world on WA! Hi H2D!

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For today's Imaginaerium, we are going to peer into the brilliant minds of the Anvilites who are taking part of Summer Camp and see what advice they have for us. One of WA's greatest assets is its amazing community, so lets get better together.
Today, we'll talk to Melu, master of the ukelele and glue-book genius!

Tell us about yourself!

My friends call me Melu, and I’m a writer from Argentina. Tolkien is my Lord and Savior. I write sci-fi and one of my fave authors is Paul Auster. When I’m not trying to save the world (I’m serious! I work for a non-profit organization whose goal is to help people) I like to work on my world building, my crafty journal, play the ukulele, and learn new things.

What world/s are you working on for Summer Camp?

I have one world: Hanzelot, a galaxy. A galaxy has billions of planets, but I’m working on the world building of thirteen planets. These are the planets my characters visit on their journey through space and time.

Check it out here:

What is your past experience with Summer Camp?

SC 2020 was my first experience with the WA community. At the beginning my world was in Spanish and I met a lot of wonderful people in the Kiosco de Paella channel on the WA Discord server. Some of them, with time, became my family. Summer Camp helped me to put some order in my world building and as consequence in the story I wanted to tell. It was a fun month!

What did you learn from the past Summer Camps?

SC taught me that I’m capable to have good ideas for my world. The only way to improve is to keep writing and creating. Also, I learned a lot from the community and their fantastic articles.

How do you go about generating ideas for the prompts?

Last year I had a notebook where I wrote the prompts and then some notes to every one of them. My approach was to think, based on what I had already decided for my world, what prompt could help me to expand the core concept of a particular culture. At that moment, my scope was one planet and three nations. Although now I’m world building thirteen planets, my approach will be the same.

What's your approach to this Summer Camp?

Until very recently, I was obsessed with the badges. That was the one of the main reasons I did SC last year, WE and other challenges. Sometimes these challenges helped me to expand my world, others were a source of stress and burn out.
This SC my goals are: have fun with my friends and support them in their creative and daily endeavors, take care of my mental and physical health and use the prompts to expand and discover new things about my world.

What's your tricks for staying on track

Ask for help to my friends
Take breaks when I’m tired
Work on the prompts that are more interesting for me
Write because I enjoy doing it
Share my articles

How do you handle those bad days when we get stuck or can't seem to get writing done?

I remind myself that I’m doing SC because it’s fun, not a chore or an obligation. If I have the energy, I practice another of my hobbies, listen to music or watch silly videos on YouTube. Next day will be better and writing will be easier and a joy again.

Many thanks to Melu for sharing her insights with us! :D

No festival is complete without music, so here's some to keep you company while you write.

You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.

— Jack London