“I’m a comedian and i was travelling to Sydney to do open mic spots and so I was travelling four hours on a train to do a four minutes of stand up,” he said.

“I thought it’d be nice to do a spot closer to home and go home at a reasonable hour, so it was kind of selfish to start with. But once it sort of caught on and it started growing … we started to develop a nice little scene in Wollongong.”

The monthly night of entertainment has been pulling small crowds for the last two years at Corrimal eatery 2 Doors Up, starting with a handful of budding comedians to a bursting line-up of 20 to 30.

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Abdul never dreamed his venture would last this long and is proud it has been an avenue to nurture and grow the Illawarra comedy scene further. Now he has to turn comics away and put them on the waiting list for the next event – like the upcoming gig on April 13.

But there’s plenty of room for an audience with some comics killing it every time with laughter while others leave the room so quiet even the crickets can hear a pin drop.

“My first time I did stand-up was at [the now defunct] Jane’s Bar … and there probably an audience of maybe six people, they were all comedians, and it was a pretty horrific experience actually,” Abdul laughed.

“I don’t know what it was about that torturing moment that made me go ‘I’m going to do this again multiple times a week for the next two years’.”

Fez Mez Open Mic Comedy, 2 Doors Up, April 13. For more information or to sign up for future open mics visit their FACEBOOK page.

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