Mark Swivel was on business in Bangladesh when a man approached him in the street, and sang him How Deep is Your Love? Little did the Australian lawyer and writer know at the time but the incident would later spark a stage play which is showing at Byron Community Centre next Friday night. Verandah Magazine has two tickets to give away – simply leave a comment below the story on our Facebook page to in the draw.
It was January 2010, when a man approached me in a village in rural Bangladesh. He asked me: “Are you liking the Bee Gees?” “Sure,” I replied. “When I was a kid.” This man, Asit, as I later found out, a school teacher, proceeded, there and then in a dusty street, to sing me How Deep is Your Love? This lovely, absurd moment is the heart of my story.
In 2010, I visited Grameen Bank to do a course on microfinance to help work I was doing in Australia. I’m a lawyer and writer – and I was looking to make a difference in my spare time. Grameen won the Nobel Prize in 2006 its for work doing microloans for eight million borrowers, mainly women, to fund small businesses, who are slowly, slowly putting poverty in a museum.
Women’s Centre Meeting: Mark Swivel learned the realities of village life.
So, I fell in love with a bank and the idea that the wonderful women of Grameen could transform their lives, moving from illiteracy and purdah to education and prosperity. Along the way, I met some extraordinary people – from Shumutu with her fish farm to Habibunessa the mango nursery queen, even the founder himself, the wildly charismatic Dr Muhummad Yunus. I saw how the bank worked up close. It is truly a great achievement of grass roots community development, in a country ravaged by civil war, famine and floods. Along the way I discovered that 8 is 4, shampoo is black and cauliflower is a much-loved vegetable. I also learnt that the realities of village life diverge from the Grameen myths. The women remain part of a patriarchal system and microfinance is no panacea. Life is complex, no kidding!
Author of the one-man show, How Deep is Your Love? Lawyer and writer Mark Swivel making friends with money.
I see How Deep is Your Love as a tale about a man who falls in and out of love with a bank – and settles into a friendship. In the end, he comes to relish the tiny connections he makes with the people he meets – and is still in touch with – that can help melt the fear that these days threatens to cover us all in fog.
Spalding Gray is a hero and I love his Swimming to Cambodia. I borrow his approach: a man at desk spinning a rambling yarn. I’m told it’s funny and moving, even inspiring. It’s for anyone trying make sense of our big bad world or if you just like good stories and a smart laugh.
This is my first show since my play Water Falling Down was done at Queensland Theatre Company in Brisbane and in the USA in 2011-12. I moved to Mullum from Sydney in 2013 or more particularly to Kathryn, my proverbial childhood sweetheart. We’re now married. I also recently joined the board of the amazing Spaghetti Circus, am the happy secretary of Eureka FC and a very proud member of the DustyEsky Male Choir. So, my love for life here in the Northern Rivers is deep. How deep? Deep.
Byron Theatre Friday 24 July 8pm
Bookings: byroncentre.com.au ($20/$15) or at door ($25)
