A career that took Maeve on many diverse paths of creative expression
BRAY native Maeve Galvin has drawn on her experiences working in Cambodia and other developing countries to write her debut novel ‘ The Saviours’.
Formerly a journalist, Maeve decided to work in the NGO sector after fostering a keen sense for social justice in her first career. The Saviours is a story of the building of new relationships and the fixing of old ones and explores the complexities of aid work and why many are motivated to ‘save’ a country which isn’t their own.
Originally from Fr Colohan Terrace, she has worked as an international development worker across the United Nations and non-profit organisations for a decade and has lived and worked in Ireland, Cambodia, Nigeria, Myanmar and the United States. She currently lives in Temple Bar, Dublin with her partner Marcello.
In ‘ The Saviours’, Caitlyn Leahy is young, American and full of ideals. She lands in Cambodia with a mission to help save a country struggling to shake free its bloody past.
As Caitlyn tries to chart her own path in Cambodia, the presence of her mother – the infamous aid-worker Janice Steiner – complicates every aspect of her life.
Caitlyn falls for Tom, an Irish
UN worker who is desperate to escape the boredom of his life in Galway. When Janice’s reputation as one of Cambodia’s most celebrated and respected activists is called into question, the fallout affects all three of them.
This is a story of the building of new relationships and the fixing of old ones. The Saviours explores the complexities of aid work and why many are motivated to try to ‘save’ a country which isn’t their own.
‘I’m craving a weekend in Bray,’ said Maeve. The atmosphere around her Temple Bar home is usually all hustle and bustle, and now eerily quiet. ‘It’s so bizarre in the city at the moment,’ she said. ‘It’s very surreal, it’s never been so quiet.’
She is a former pupil of Coláíste Ráithín and Scoil Chualann, and she went on to study journalism in DCU.
‘I liked people, and language, and had aspirations of working on social justice and international challenges. Journalism seemed like a good fit.’
She freelanced for the Evening Herald for a couple of years, did some radio, and was a researcher for The Panel on RTÉ.
‘I graduated in 2008, just as the recession was getting particularly bad,’ said Maeve. ‘I also realised that media wasn’t really for me. I like the people, but I didn’t have a nose for a story.’
She went down a different path, and became an intern for Amnesty International. ‘I developed that curiosity about international affairs,’ she said. Maeve then did a masters in development studies, before volunteering in south west Nigeria working on HIV/AIDS at an NGO there.
Her first posting to Cambodia with the UN was meant to be a year and turned into three. ‘I worked with them for four and a half years between Cambodia and HQ in Geneva,’ said Maeve, who then went on to work for a private foundation.
‘I set up their Myanmar branch and was there for a year and a half. I’ve been back in Ireland since early 2018.’ She divides her time between writing, and consulting for businesses and NGOs.
‘I wasn’t in a war zone or refugee camp, I did desk work,’ said Maeve. ‘I did communications and reporting, that kind of thing, and was office-bound in cities. You’re still seeing countries grappling with much bigger challenges than Ireland. People are really struggling at a level we don’t have in this country, without the fall-back systems we have here.’
She said that while people in Ireland are facing struggles at the moment due to the pandemic, we still have systems such as social welfare.
‘In places like Cambodia, Myanmar and Bangladesh they don’t have that back-up. That can really create a vulnerability.’ She said that includes hunger, or getting into debt with nefarious financiers.
‘I worked a lot on the garment industry. There are big name clothing brands we all know and wear. At the moment, there are big orders which are no longer needed. A lot of brands have not honoured their commitments and paid for things like material already shipped in. Thousands of workers won’t get paid, and the factories can’t pay them.’
As a child, Maeve was very imaginative and always writing creatively. She thought that she would express that side of herself with journalism.
‘I spent my 20s chasing work,’ she said. ‘Working long hours, throwing myself into the technicalities of work.
‘Communications would have been a big part of the roles I’ve had - writing press releases, funding proposals and that kind of thing. The creative part was tucked aside.’
In 2015 she was living in Galway but working remotely for the UN headquarters in Geneva. ‘I was working from home, so a way to get out of the house and have some interaction with people, I joined a creative writing class.’
This helped Maeve to rediscover her creativity. ‘ There was one prompt in the class - write about someone you really hate, someone who bothers you. I wrote this really hardcore profile of a smug, ambitions, morally dubious UN worker. That was an early profile of Tom.’
While the setting is authentic, and illustrates the issues and life in Cambodia, the individuals are entirely fictional.
Maeve said that you do see ‘ Tom types’, there is hedonism and hypocrisy abound, but the people are otherwise invented. She also dove into figuring out what makes someone like that. ‘If he functions well in his role, does it matter?’
She explores the relationship between passion, and aid & development work, looking at privilege and wanting the esteem of things, and perhaps the very human traumas and set-backs that people have had.
‘What baggage could people be bringing to a place like Cambodia?’ said Maeve.
Mother and daughter Janice and Caitlyn are not without complication. While Caitlyn is idealistic and passionate, with her own ideas of the world, she is also naive. Janice is so single-minded in her compulsion to help Cambodia, other important things fall by the wayside. ‘I spent a lot of time thinking, what would they do in a situation,’ said Maeve. ‘ Then they started doing their own things, things I wasn’t expecting.
‘ Tom is so unlikeable, but I felt affection for him towards the end,’ she said. ‘If you spend enough time with someone you learn what motivates them. Once you understand that, maybe you can be a bit more sympathetic towards them. That doesn’t mean I approve of the real-life Toms!’
Now working on her second book, while writing keeps her busy, Maeve misses having coffee shops and airports in which to write. Hearing life going around her was a source of inspiration. ‘ There’s a bit of a drought in that respect,’ said Maeve. ‘I’m trying to read more books and watch more documentaries to inspire me this time around.’
She and her partner have a list of things they want to do when they can. ‘Doing the cliff walk is up there,’ said Maeve. ‘Sitting in a beer garden on the seafront with chicken wings and a pint, going to the Harbour bar, walking along the seafront.
‘I’m used to being able to just hop on the Dart, being so close to where I grew up,’ she said. ‘You don’t realise how much you’ll miss that until it’s gone.’