Jak: Hi, you’re listening to the Guide Gods Digital Collection, I’m Jak Soroka in conversation with Claire Cunningham. We’re here to take a deeper look at some of the voices within Claire’s show, Guide Gods.

Claire: Every interview that I did, I did a thing, an exercise that I had learned from a colleague called ‘tell me something you love.’ It’s simply an exercise where you sit with a partner and you repeatedly ask ‘tell me something you love?’ and they tell you something and then you thank them, and then you ask the question again and I did this with all the interviewees.

But when I, when I did interviews with the Jewish community, I guess I had reached the stage where I was a little bit more empowered in my disability identity, and I actually added a question of ‘tell me something you love about being disabled’, which I hadn’t done in the first interviews and I felt it was a risk to ask it, but I chose to just try the question out.

What was, what I found really extraordinary and really beautiful is that even the people who at the end of the day I felt probably wished that they weren’t disabled, they said two things, all of them said two things: They said that they were thankful for being disabled because it connected them to other people, and it had sometimes brought them into a new community of people. And secondly that they were thankful for being disabled because it had opened their understanding of other people. It had made them more understanding of other human beings and more accepting perhaps of other people’s situations.

And I think it was interesting to hear that from people who were maybe not that happy at being disabled and from people who were very politically engaged and empowered by their identity around disability, and I found that really beautiful actually, that that was a commonality that we all had.

Jak: It was beautiful to listen to.

[Violin plays underneath]
[Interview clips]

Claire: Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 1: Getting absolutely soaked to the skin, in the pouring rain in the summer. When my son was young, we used to love, we used to go out and puddle jump, I know you’re supposed to tell your children ‘don’t do that’ you know but we used to go out and puddle jump and get soaked and then come in and get changed and you know and into our jammies and dressing gown in front of the fire with hot chocolate.

Olives, oh yeah, /I would fight you to the death for the last olive, you can have the chocolate, last chocolate in the box you can have that, last olive no, you’ve problems there, you’ve got competition and olive oil, I cannot have olive oil in the house, I would drink it.
Oh and Guinness I love Guinness.

Claire: /Thank you. [Laughs].

Claire: Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 2: Nutella.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 2: My partner.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 2: My family.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 2: Er, enjoying myself.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 2: Dancing.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 2: [pause] Living.

Claire: Thank you. [Laughs]

Claire: Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 3: Travelling.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 3: Food.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 3: My friends.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 3: Ooh, myself.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 3: Being alive.


Claire: Tell me something you love about Judaism?

Julia: Music.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about your faith?

Julia: Laughter.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about being disabled?

Julia: It’s awesome. It’s beautiful.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about being disabled?

Julia: Connection with community.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about being disabled?

Julia: This is how I was made.

Claire: Tell me something you love about being a Crip?

Julia: Fierce, feisty, subversive. [Laughs]

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Julia: Colour.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Julia: Poetry.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Julia: The sound of the river when it flitchers over rocks.

Claire: Thank you…When it what over rocks?

Julia: When it flitchers, when it does this little flitcher over rocks.

Claire: Flitches? Did you make that word up?

Julia: I guess so! I love making up words [laughs].

Claire: [Laughs]


Claire: Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 5: Gardening.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about your faith?

Interviewee 5: Shabbos.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about your faith?

Interviewee 5: Community.

Claire: Tell me something you love about disability?

Interviewee 5: Being different.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about your disability?

Interviewee 5: Being able to help others.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about your disability?

Interviewee 5: Being accepted.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?
Interviewee 5: My kids.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 5: Sleeping [laughs].

Claire: Thank you.

Claire: Tell me something you love about your faith?

Interviewee 6: My community.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about disability. Or your disability?

Interviewee 6: I understand other people with it.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love about your disability?

Interviewee 6: I have been to the highest heights and the lowest lows.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Interviewee 6: Dinosaurs.

Claire: Hence the t-shirt.

Interviewee 6: Hence the t-shirt.

Claire: Thank you. That’s all. I won’t plague you anymore. [Laughs]

Jak: Thanks for listening, I’ve been Jak Soroka in conversation with Claire Cunningham, and you’ve been listening to the Guide Gods Digital Collection. This is the end of the series. I hope you have found the material as enlivening and enriching as I have.

[Violin plays]

[Audience members from live show clips]
[They overlap each other]

[Harmonium plays underneath]

Claire: Tell me something you love?

Voices: …Life…

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love? [Repeats intermittently].

Voices: Laughing… my husband… humanity… travelling… the water…

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: My eight grandchildren… cooking and then eating… sunsets…the ocean … I love being alive … life… singing… my family… the sea… swimming in the ocean… swimming… waking up very early… air con… music… food… holidays… my wife… singing… the water… peaches… the beach… summer… dancing… art… my children and my sister and my dog… myself [clapping]… being alive… being myself… laughing a lot… wine… music… wearing lots of layers… pizza [laughter]… surprises… my partner… my daughter… my children… Star Wars… ah, dancing… skating… my mum…painting… tea…

Claire: Tea? You’re at the right place. Tell me something you love?

Voices: …The feeling of putting on your socks… making my friends smile… life… home… our home is in Iraq…

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: …The sound of trains… the fresh morning air… being here… small smooth stones…

Claire: Small smooth stones. Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: …Glasgow [laughter] …Irn Bru…

Claire: She’s not a plant. Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: … Sausages… I love… dragons… red wine… [Laughter] I love my husband… my freedom… hugs… rainbow bee-eaters.

Claire: Rainbow bee-eaters? Me too, I think that’s a local one.
Tell me something you love?

Voices: …The sound of rain on the roof… wide-open spaces, easy to spell words… [Laughter] sign language… floating in the sea… love to eat and love a beer… kindness… happiness… the bush… the ocean… being here… life… Australia… nature…

Claire: Australia. Thank you.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: Family… tea… watching birds, watching birds…

Claire: Watching…?

Voices: …Birds.

Claire: /Birds! Got you. Watching birds, thank you.

Voices: /Books. My sister.

Claire: Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: …Sunsets… cigarettes… my son… challenges… life… chips and vinegar… ah a moment of quiet… clear skies… sounds… red wine…

Claire: There’s a theme in this corner.

Voices: …Dancing… my home… music… my family… my wife… signing… chocolate… possibility… a sugar free diet… cake… quiet… my favourite woolly jumper… conkers…

Claire: Conkers, brilliant. Thank you. Tell me something you love?

Voices: …My grandma… my daughters… my kids.

Claire: Thank you.

[Harmonium fades]