← From Our Own Correspondent
From Our Own Correspondent
The Fourth Banned 'T'
00:28:15
Greece remains a land where millions go each year to enjoy their holidays.
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You're listening to a download from the BBC.
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This is from our own correspondent.
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You can hear the version of the
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programme we make for the BBC World
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Service by visiting our site at BBConline.
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But here's the latest edition broadcast on
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BBC Radio 4 and introduced by Kate Ady.
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Today, the Greek parents saying goodbye to children they can no longer afford to look after an embattled President Hollande prepares to address the nation tomorrow, but will he consider the Saint Tropez solution? In Chechnya, the war's over, the economy's on the way back, but for many it seems there's nothing to do but sleep. And you can say what you like, the Chinese censors tell us, but do not make fun of our loos. The Greek prime minister has been meeting the EU president, Hermann von Rompuy. He was believed to be pleading for more time to achieve the spending cuts demanded in return for emergency loans worth billions of pounds. The lenders, the eu, the IMF and the European Central bank are also in Athens. They are talking about a new round of austerity measures. There could be further cuts in civil servants pay. Holidaymakers who travelled to Greece this summer report the beaches were as lovely, the sunshine as welcome, the ancient sights as fascinating as always. But Mark Loewen says the effects of five years of recession have become more and more evident.
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I get a little tired after a while of the endless sheet washing, itinerary planning and bread buying. But then, living abroad, you come to expect it. For every summer, my humble apartment in whichever country I am posted turns into a convenient hotel for friends, family and anybody I may have met at a party years ago who decides they fancy a free stay. It can get a little trying, but on the whole, I enjoy showing my guests a new city through my eyes and taking them to my favorite spots. Seeing their reaction is the interesting bit, and nowhere more so than in Athens. For months, they've watched footage of angry street protests in the capital, heard stories of the impact of austerity. They come expecting the place to look and feel almost like a war zone. When a visitor of mine this summer told his colleagues he was going to Athens for a few days, one seriously asked whether he'd still find food in the shops. Where is the crisis? Said a university friend as I showed him around the city. You can't see it in many ways, you can't. It's easy to spend a few days in the crowded little restaurants of the capital, ambling through the popular boutiques, sipping iced coffee on a pavement cafe beneath the acropolis and not to notice anything amiss. Athens seems to function pretty much normally, as does the rest of the country. Greece is at its best at this time of year. The fabulous coastline gleams in the late summer sunlight. The the white stone houses of the islands, draped with bougainvillea and set against the deep blue of the Aegean, makes this place feel like the most blessed country in Europe, not the most indebted. Perceptions of Greece are easily warped. I met tourists this summer who said they'd been on the verge of canceling their Greek trips because of fears of unrest. But as they quaffed an ouzo on a perfect beach, they were relieved they hadn't. But listen to the stories of this warm and talkative nation. The that's how you find out what is really happening here. I spent time recently with a group of elderly ladies at a day center on the outskirts of the capital. They've gone there since retirement. The exercises and strong Greek coffee have remained the same. The talk hasn't. With pensions cut and set to be reduced yet further conversation is crisis filled. I can no longer afford to buy chocolate for my grandchild, 82 year old Maria told me as her kindly eyes glazed over with tears. If they cut my monthly pension even more, I'll be left with only a hundred euros with which to live. Am I not human? I couldn't help but think of my own late grandmothers as I sat listening to these women who have lived through so much wars, dictatorship and now simply long for a comfortable old age. But they, like so many here, are facing further savage spending cuts. Hermione, 84, with few teeth remaining, was keen to speak. My son asked to borrow €2 from me. He was so desperate, she said, crying. It was like a dagger through my heart. I can't afford to live anymore. All I want is to close my eyes and never wake up. After leaving the day center, I went to meet an elderly man, Costas Kokotsis, who depends on the box of free food he receives. His home in the western suburb of Parama was like something out of Dracula. Cobwebs in all corners, the sound of rats inside walls. Old, old belongings piled everywhere, sheets soiled and unchanged. On the table lay his mounting electricity bill that he can't pay, alongside his pension slip of €340 per month, a little over £250, it barely covers his rent. In fact, the tragic stories are everywhere. There's a foster care home south of Athens now taking in more and more children whose parents can no longer afford to keep them. A mother I met gave up her 10 year old daughter last year and now comes just once a week for a snatched moment together. It's hard not having her alongside me when I sleep, or seeing her growing up, she said. But there's no other option any more. This in a European Union country, a place of unparalleled cultural richness, of beauty, of history. How has it come to this? You can read the theories, study the statistics and. And yet it still seems incomprehensible that a country can fall so far, so fast. Those are the different faces of fascinating Greece. One sun kissed, sophisticated, joyous, the other suffering in ways that still stun me with every tale. It makes for a place that defies the expectations of my summer visitors, and which is at once enchanting, baffling and heartbreaking.
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And that's Mark Loen. The Russian republic of Chechnya continues to present formidable challenges to journalists. Its hardline president, Rumzan Kadyrov's not known for his support for a free and outspoken press. He's also said to preside over a personal militia which carries out kidnappings, torture and murder. This week, one of Russia's leading antitorture activists complained that his attempts to ask questions about the conduct of the security services there were being blocked by officials. Igor Kalyapin, head of the Committee Against Torture, and several members of his team found themselves being questioned by the authorities. Oliver Bullo has just been back to Chechnya and says that although the republic's a far more peaceful place than it was in the 1990s, people he met there seemed far from content.
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Meyerbeck, or I'll call him Majebeck that's not his real name, has always been the liveliest of my friends in Chechnya. Happy to go anywhere, anytime, if it has the slightest chance of being fun. That's why I was impatient for the trip we'd arranged together. I'd never been to the mountains and we'd spent hours the night before planning the route. It was going to be wonderful. Nine o' clock came and went, then 10, then 11. Eventually I called him. His voice was thick with sleep. I can't. Not now.
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I'll.
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I'll call back later when I wake up, he said and rang off. It was then that I think I finally realised how Chechnya had changed for the worse. I'd been away for four years and at first been impressed by what the government had done with the place. In the early 2000s, Grozny's apartment blocks were scarred by artillery. The roads by tank tracks. Now the streets are wide and well surfaced. The buildings are tall and gleaming. The signs of war are gone. This is a new society, Grozny seems to say. But if that is the case, why did none of my friends get out of bed? Meyer Beck was not the only heavy sleeper. No one got up before the afternoon. It was almost impossible to get anything done before lunch. The people I knew as energetic and determined have become depressed and slow. The atmosphere of ferment has become one of fear. While waiting for Maya Beck, I visited a human rights activist to try and find out why. When I arrived, he was deep in a Chechen language conversation with a middle aged woman whose hair showed grey roots from under her headscarf. When she finally finished, I asked the activist why everyone seemed so miserable. He gestured to the lady who was gathering up her papers. Listen to her story, he said. Find out for yourself. Over the next two hours she told me about her son, who had been jailed for fighting against Russia despite never having done so. Officials demanded bribes to have him released, and she estimated she had handed over a total of £100,000 in cash over the last seven years, but to no avail. Her resources were now exhausted. She could not even afford the bribe she needed to pay to get her pension. Are you not scared telling me this? I asked her. No, I am scared only of Allah, she replied. But please do not mention my name or that of my son. There would be consequences. The activist shrugged. You see what people have to tolerate? Of course they're depressed. They're just surviving, not living, he said, adding that he too would rather I did not use his name. Disappearances, you said. Murder and sham prosecutions have become so endemic that that even he could not speak publicly. My Herbeck finally rang me at 2.30 in the afternoon, apologetic and upset. He had not slept well for months, he said, and getting out of bed was proving impossible. It was not too late to set off, however, and I finally did get to see the wooded gorges and rocky cliffs of Chechnya's mountains. On all previous visits, going would have been too dangerous. I should come here more often, mayobeck said. Welby stood breathing in the clean air. It feels good. I haven't been for years. I asked why it is only a couple of hours drive from Grozny. I don't know. I can't seem to get anything done. Days pass and I just stay at home. He had lost his job some months previously, but was not looking for another one. There is little work outside state service anyway, and that would require paying a bribe he cannot afford. He now watches television during the sleepless nights and sleeps during the workless days. As we drove back towards Grozny, we passed a crossroads that raised a rare smile. I got hit by a cluster bomb there. Back in 1996. A Russian plane attacked us in a column of refugees, he said and chuckled. It was a strange thing to be nostalgic about, but it fit. When those bombs were falling, the Chechens still had a hand in their own destiny. Now, for a defeated nation and a defeated man, there is nothing to do but sleep.
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Oliver Bulo In Chechnya, ultra Orthodox Jews are an increasingly influential part of Israeli society. They're growing in numbers too. By the2030s, it's estimated one in five Israelis will be Haredi, as the Ultra Orthodox are often known. The escalating numbers partly explain why this conservative community, with its distinctive dress code and large families, has become the subject of so much media attention. This. This is a population that will be critical to Israel's future. Anecdotally, the ultra Orthodox have a reputation for not always being very welcoming to outsiders. So when Linda Presley visited Israel, she wasn't quite sure what to expect.
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I think you need socks. It's pretty much the first thing our fixer and translator, Alon, says to me when we meet at the hotel. I'm already sporting a floor length skirt with a loose shirt, so I'm feeling pretty confidently covered up. But Alonne's not sure if painted toenails in flat sandals might be a bit racy for our ultra Orthodox interviewees. I am sockless in Jerusalem, so my colleague Mark darts up to his room and produces a navy blue pair which I stash in my bag for an emergency, although I'm not sure I'll recognise one if it arises. Preconceptions are interesting, more so when they're challenged. We thought it would be difficult to make a program about the Ultra Orthodox community in Israel. We were worried people wouldn't talk to Mark and I not Israeli, not Jewish. Me, a woman. Would the men even be in the same room as me, with their strict rules about gender segregation? And although the Haredis I spoke to from London said, sure, come and see us, the message we'd got from most non ultra Orthodox Israelis was might be a bit tricky. Haredis are distinctive, especially the men with their long side curls and wide brimmed hats, dressed in regulation monochrome. But this is a community that's far from black and white, and I begin to appreciate that when we visit Matrix Global, a Large software company in Israel's growing high tech sector. This is a firm that services multinational household names and numbers more than 1000 ultra orthodox women amongst its employees. In a sleek modern office. We're greeted by the receptionist who's certainly well covered in her fitted blouse and knee length skirt, but in a fashionable kind of a way. In my get up and thank goodness I didn't put on those socks, she looks at me as if I'm slightly unusual. The leading light of Matrix Global is Libby Athen. She was one of those sure, come and see us. Heraidis who I'd talked to from London and the chief operating officer here. Before she joined Matrix, Libby was head of the computing department at Israel's Foreign Ministry. So this is a woman who's a practiced high flyer. And the women she employs are well qualified too. Unlike ultra Orthodox boys, whose curriculum in the yeshiva or religious school is dominated by the study of the holy Jewish texts, girls follow the same kind of academic curriculum as other Israelis. It makes many of them highly employable. And while their husbands continue to study the religious texts full time, some of them never getting paid work, many women will be the breadwinners for their often very large families. Libby's got six kids. Her husband was a rabbi for many years. Now he's studying again. As she shows us around the offices, up and down the stairs in our high heeled wedge sandals, she tells us most married women want their husbands to study. She says women are happy to have less. They certainly don't see their perpetual student partners as a burden. So does the fact she's got this high powered job change the balance of power at home with her husband? I ask, you know what a friend of mine said to me? Libby tells me, she said to me, libby, at work you're Margaret Thatcher, but at home you're just like butter to outsiders like me. It's all a bit arcane. The women here, purposeful as they stride down the corridors, brows knitted as they stare at computers, are software engineers and programmers, professionals in the world's most modern industry. Yet they're operating within strict parameters. A woman going out for a business meeting always has a chaperone. At Matrix, there are women only kitchens and spaces where no man is allowed. There's even a rabbi who floor walks the company. Not only can he answer any queries the women have, but he also checks what they're looking at on their screens. They're free to view anything work related on the Internet at their desks, but if they want to access something personal online like a bus timetable. They misuse the computers in the public areas. These have special filters on them preventing anything unsuitable being downloaded. You won't find anyone on Facebook, says Libby. Libby's happy to police the system, ensuring the rabbinical council stays happy with the setup at Matrix. But as she pulls out an iPhone considered almost an offensive weapon by more extreme elements in the ultra Orthodox community, I realise she doesn't quite live by the same rules as many of her employees. I'm like a bridge between two worlds, she explains. I deal with clients, I have a large staff of haredi and non haredi workers, and I just can't function without SMS and email.
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And that's Linda Presley the French President Francois Hollande tomorrow goes on television to talk to his people. He's been in power little more than a hundred days, but seems already to have lost the confidence of some of his citizens. This has been the week in which they've packed up their holiday things and returned to the everyday reality of work and school, and it's been a particularly tough return for the President. With unemployment hitting the 3 million mark for the first time since 1999 and the national debt soaring, the headlines have been unforgiving. Are you awake? Asks one weakly, sarcastically, while another suggests Shake yourself Hollande. There's a fire. Emma Jane Kirby, who's been holidaying in the glitzy seaside town of Saint Tropez, wonders if it isn't time for the man they call President Normal to start getting just a little bit more pushy.
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It's often said that it's only the well heeled who can holiday in Saint Tropez, but sit in a bar in the port here for just five minutes and you'll soon see it's really the high heeled who frequent this place. Every second woman here is precariously balanced on needle thin stilettos and she wears them not exactly confidently but non nonetheless, with a fixed determination, her head held high and her mouth curved in a slight but distinctly self satisfied smile. Or perhaps that's just the Botox. Oh good, surgeon nods the man sitting next to me in the cafe, appreciating the designer draped tanned and toned Barbie doll who's stilt walking past our table now and whose braless breasts, as pert as a pair of genetically modified pomegranates, appear to turn the corner a good two seconds before the rest of her. She looks about 45, which in Saint Tropez means she's probably at least 60, but she, like all her clones clattering and teetering behind and in front of her is out to impress. She may well have just walked down the gangplank of one of the scores of luxury yachts that are moored here, or she might equally have just caught the bus in from one of the neighbouring camp sites. But either way, she's come to Saint Tropez in the hope that as she passes, you and I will look up from our pastis and our newspapers and say, well, wow, look at that. Just along the Riviera coast, President Hollande has also been taking a moderate summer break, dutifully staying in the official presidential retreat of Fort de Braganson, an austere and cramped castle that President De Gaulle described as a loathsome and mosquito ridden nightmare to which he refused to return. But Hollande, the self styled President Normal, is doing everything he can not to draw attention to himself. Not for him the private jets and billionaire yachts favoured by his predecessor Nicola Bling Bling Sakozy. Not for him the Ray Bans and Rolex and raunchy photos of sun drenched kisses with pop star models like Carla Bruni. The celebrity magazine VSD did publish a photo of him dutifully taking his first dip in the Mediterranean Sea with his partner Valerie Treyweiler. But in his serviceable blue knee length shorts, the waistband slightly hidden by the sun starved but food filled overhang of his stomach, he looked so much like everyone's dad that the best headline VSD could come up with was Francois Hollande Normal, even down to his swimming trunks. But being unremarkable has come at a cost to the fledgling president. His approval ratings continue to slip and a new poll suggests 68% of French people feel pessimistic about their country's prospects, the highest level ever in the initial months of a new presidency. Being the Grey man and simply blending in may have been a crowd pleaser during the election campaign, when the electorate was gorged on the frenetic excesses of the omnipresent and flashy Sarkozy. But now he's taken up office, Hollande's rigid normality has started to look like indecision in Saint Tropez, where the port is already glutted with the flash and glitz of billionaires, yachts. A swarm of people has now crowded onto the jetty to drool over the arrival of yet another massive hunk of floating steel as it expertly crams itself in between the other boats, staking its claim among the notable. In other parts of France, public displays of wealth are uniformly deplored as abhorrent and, well, American. But in this town, you just have to show them what you've got. The French people rejected Nicolas Sarkozy partly for his showiness and his bossiness. But they nonetheless always demand their president should look strong and stand out. Perhaps Francois Hollande could benefit from a short stay here. Until the 1950s, Saint Tropez was really just a small fishing village. But ever since the arrival of Brigitte Bardot, this place has reinvented itself as a star studded hotspot. The place to be if you want to be a person who counts. It talks the talk and it walks the walk. And if your pastis costs you €12 and comes with lukewarm water and no ice, well, that's just the way it's meant to be. Here on my final morning in Saint Tropez, the mistral wind has ripped the warmth from the air and I can feel its sharp and spiteful breath on my skin. The bars are emptying and the holidaymakers are all heading home, where hefty tax hikes, spiralling public debt and exploding unemployment await them. There's a big storm brewing in France. President Hollande had better learn to swagger and fast.
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Emma Jane Kirby In France, runners who've registered for the Beijing Marathon may have been surprised when a clock counting down the hours to the start of the event next month disappeared this week from the official website. China watchers will tell them that it might not have been formally announced yet, but the race has almost certainly been put off so that the capital can instead host the biggest political meeting in 10 years, the 18th Communist Party Conference, at which the country's next set of leaders will be unveiled. Those new leaders will be considering what sort of policies they should be pursuing in the decade to come. Justin Rolatt has been travelling around China and learning something about the priorities of its communist leadership.
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Jeff sun is the scion of one of China's new rich and the founder of the China Supercar Club. He's got so many of the things, he can't even remember them all. With a bit of head scratching, he can list the two Lamborghinis, the two Ferraris, the Audi R8 and the Maserati. But then there's a long pause before his face suddenly lights up. Ah, yes, he said. And the Bentley. We met Geoff while reporting on the yawning chasms of inequality that have opened up in Chinese society. We filmed in some of the poorest communities I've ever visited, Chinese villages where no one has ever owned a car and where they still till their fields using a single donkey shared between dozens of farmers. China still claims to be a communist society and has a fearsome reputation for censorship. So why was it happy for us to do this? The answer says a lot about both China's ambitions and the challenges the country faces. A couple of years ago, I made another series, this one about China's great expansion into the world over the last decade. I hadn't expected the Beijing government to like the films. We met some very sympathetic Chinese people, but we also showed the corruption and brutality of others. Yet shortly after the programmes were broadcast, I received an email from a senior official at the Chinese Embassy inviting me to tea at a London hotel. It said the Embassy had in fact liked my programs. In the genteel grandeur of the hotel, the embassy official told me why. We thought you were fair, she said. You showed the Chinese people as they are. She took a sip of tea from the bone china cup and told me the rest of the world seemed to think the Chinese didn't have the same hopes, fears and ambitions as everyone else. They believe China is a threat to other nations. She added, we want people to understand they need to be afraid of us. My guess is we were allowed to explore the eye watering iniquities in Chinese society because the government reckoned that, on balance, we would again present a sympathetic picture of Chinese people. What's more, by showing just how rich many had become, it knew we would project a powerful message about China's success. At the same time, the poverty of hundreds of millions of others would illustrate the huge challenges the country still faces. Nevertheless, we did not entirely escape the census. The journalist's rule of thumb is that you can't report the so called three T's Tiananmen, Taiwan or Tibet. We inadvertently discovered a fourth T. In an article in the country's English language newspaper, China Daily, I came across an editorial featuring stinging criticism of China from the wto. No, no, not the World Trade Organization. This was the less well known World Toilet Organization. This WTO had ranked China as having the worst public toilets in all Asia. The paper explained how, in response, Beijing had introduced rigorous new hygiene standards. Now no more than two flies are allowed in any public lavatory. The paper was in no doubt about the importance of the issue. Clean public toilets are the symbol of a civilised society. It thundered. The controversy made me chuckle and I mentioned to our government minder that I wanted to cover this storm in a toilet bowl. It was Mr. Chen's job to ensure we didn't break any reporting rules. And he'd been a cheerful, relaxed companion throughout our three week journey. Now his face darkened. I don't think that would be a good idea, he said gravely. I laughed, assuming he was just being a bit conservative. No, he emphasised, I really don't think that's a good idea. I said it would only take a couple of minutes. Just a bit of fun. Mr. Chen vanished for a few moments. When he returned, his manner was forbidding. I'm sorry, Justin, but I have to tell you, you can't report this story at all. This was getting serious. Our Chinese fixer was visibly anxious and quietly warned me that if this went any further, Mr. Chen was likely to close down our production completely. I was learning an important lesson. China may be undergoing the most incredible economic transformation, but the Chinese Communist Party's instincts haven't changed. It may let you speak to the idle rich and to the abject poor, but threaten to embarrass it even with something as trivial as some criticism from the World Toilet Organisation and the sinews of power become all too apparent. We were close to the end of our long journey and couldn't afford to jeopardise our project. Now I decided I had to close the door on those Chinese toilets.
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A wise decision from Justin Rowlatt. He carried on filming and you can see the results on BBC2 tomorrow evening. And that's it. Next week we're back with two editions on Thursday as well as Saturday morning. Do join us. Goodbye.