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Global News Podcast
The Happy Pod: Sharing stories, one phone call at a time
00:28:04
Hearing meaningful phone conversations from passers-by on a bridge
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This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk. If you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Grainger for auto reordering. With on time restocks, your team will have the cut resistant gloves they need at the start of their shift and you can end your day knowing they've got safety well in hand. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click granger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. The holidays are all about connection, good food, good friends and those cozy moments. This season, skip the boring mocktails and celebrate with rk, the world's first zero proof spirits. All the taste and warmth of your favorite holiday pours with zero alcohol, zero guilt and the patented warm molecule for that festive kick. Perfect for toasting, hosting or gifting. Celebrate freely with RK0 proof. Visit rkbeverages.com this is the Happy Pod from the BBC World Service. I'm Celia Hatton and in this edition, how the placement of an old school phone in an unusual locations led to hundreds of people telling their stories and millions of views. There's so much shared experience and there's so much reassurance to be had from the shared human experience. Just knowing about that kind of reminds us of who we are. Also, a lot of things went through my mind. Happy thoughts I think that kept me going. Yeah, so much going through my mind. I was really scared. The teenager who swam for hours to get help after his family were swept out to sea. Why one man has devoted his life to preserving rare varieties of rice the city trying to become the best place to raise a child. This program is a source of immense joy for our community. Our neighborhoods don't have enough space for the children. It brings me so much joy just to spend this time together and the 82 year old goalkeeper still showing younger players how it's done. I think I'm worth my place in the team and I'm still making saves. When I get to the stage where I think I'm letting the side down, I will retire. First, let's start with a social media account that's using a relatively simple concept to attract millions of views online. If you'd have told me back when I was a kid that I'm going to study to become a kindergarten teacher, everyone would have laughed in your face. We realized at the end of this class that we already met. I remember his energy and so I decided to ask him do you want to Drink a beer with me. I was full of guilt because I saw that everything was going to change. If I would have organized my party, my parents wouldn't have gone. I feel like I've got to know so many people that I probably would not have ever met or gotten the time to know had I not have looked this way. Yeah, sometimes everything we have is everything we need. Those are clips from an account called A View from a Bridge. The idea is pretty straightforward. An old school phone is placed on a bridge and strangers are invited to pick it up and share their stories. Its creator, Joe Bloom, started the project in London two years ago. Now he travels to bridges all over the world to speak to people. Some famous faces have joined him along the way, including the composer Max Richter, actor and singer Cynthia Rivo and designer Paul Smith. The happy pods Thames and Celebi has been speaking to Joe. She started by asking him how the conversations happen. I'm actually at the other end of the phone. So it's a working phone, we have real conversations on it and often the phone calls go up to half an hour, 45 minutes. And obviously from that we then make our edit. I was trying to figure out how do we tell stories on social media? But cut the noise, you know, really just make it about the storyteller, make it about the person sharing the story. I'm a palliative and end of life care nurse. It's really a great privilege and an honour to be with people as they're dying and after they've died with the families. Don't ever cry in front of people, don't ever tell people about how you're feeling. I grew up with men that were really like that, like from back in the day that were like, you know, hard as nails, seemingly on the outside. Through many trial and error. I sort of had this idea of stripping it back. And you know, bridges aren't destinations, are they? They're sort of these places in between where no one really goes, just to go there. That opens up the mind to quite a beautiful place. For many years I tried to learn to articulate myself without crying. But now as an adult, I could cry and articulate myself at the same time. This is going to be a really hard question. Talk to me about some of your favorite videos that you've done, either through street casting or through more famous faces. I think all my favorite ones have been the street cast ones, to be honest. You know, it's that unexpectedness and it's just constantly proving myself wrong about how poorly I judge people. Or the world around me. A good example of that was we came across these three lads. Looked like they were sort of up to no good really. Just they ended up being the most sweet three lads ever. Hey, my name's Owen, this is Harrison and this is Roy and we live in Ilkiston. The main guy just stole the show really and shared this sort of deep details of his life and his struggles and what he wants from the future. Obviously I had a rough child with my mum dying and that. I kind of taught myself to be quite mature in the way, I think because obviously the things that I've been through and obviously family circumstances, I've just had to learn it all on my own. I've got a battle with myself, obviously to get on with my days. As sad as it sounds, he spoke so beautifully. And that video ended up getting I think like 7 million views in a ridiculous amount of time. What would I want to say to the world? I basically say, stick with your mates and be with your mum for as long as you can because she's not always around. I know you said that you prefer the street casting videos, but out of the people and the names and faces that people will recognize, which ones kind of most surprised you? Cynthia Erivo, she was great. Human beings in general are not good at saying goodbye, even when we're meant to. I think we get scared of either hurting someone or being hurt. She was lovely. She had a good cry on the bridge, but she really opened up and it was a really beautiful chat. And it's nice when the experience with a well known person just matches that of someone that we might have just picked up off the street. That's really what we aim for. People seem to really get quite a lot from. From A View from a Bridge. When the handbooks were given out for life, I got missed out. Like someone forgot to give me one because I just, even at that early age started to feel a bit like an alien. My only ambition was to be a footballer. And when that went pear shaped, I totally lost my direction really. And felt for a good 10 years just stuck. I'm really grateful that how it's received and the time people give it. How does it feel to kind of have the privilege to tell people stories in this way? Yeah, it feels amazing to be able to share these stories because, you know, these stories all exist because people are walking around with them. But until we kind of pull it out of a person and put it on a. On a platform, you know, these, these stories can sort of just go unheard or only maybe shared between a few people. So the fact that we're able to hear these tales and then share them to a wider world is just, it's unbelievable really. And long may it continue. What would you say is the importance of people hearing these stories? I guess that it all just comes down to that really quite simple thing of just relatability, right. And understanding that the feelings that we feel that might sometimes feel like totally can only be totally unique to our own experience. I guess it's a reminder that that is just completely wrong. And there's so much shared experience and there's so much reassurance to be had from the shared human experience. Right. Even if it isn't a relatable experience, it's. We're still sharing the experience of being human. And what that looks like for one person can be either similar or completely different from another. But just knowing about that kind of reminds us of, of who we are. Joe Bloom speaking to Tamsin Selby To Australia where a 13 year old boy is being hailed a hero after swimming for several hours to help save his family who were lost and afloat in the sea. The group of four got into difficulties after getting into the water off the town of Quindaloop in Western Australia with a kayak and two paddle boards. When the weather changed, they were swept out to Sea. The 13 year old Austin Appleby set off for shore in the kayak which soon capsized. He swam the rest of the way for about hours. Meanwhile, Austin's mother, brother and sister stayed afloat on paddle boards. By the time they were rescued, they had drifted 14km offshore. Austin and his mother Joanna spoke to the BBC's Kasha Madeira and explained that when he first left in the kayak to get help, they didn't think they were too far from land. He took off in the kayak and we didn't realize how damaged the kayak was. So obviously as he progressed towards shore the he took on a lot of water and, and he couldn't keep it going. The decision was either you know, if I can roll back to, to shore to get help quickly but I couldn't leave the kids at sea. So him being the oldest and the strongest, we said we'd sent and he was quite happy to go in which was a very hard decision because you don't want to see any of your kids have to do that. He headed back for shore and then myself and the other two kids ended up drifting out further and further as the day went on. As the hours progressed, my Goodness, it's extraordinary. So, Austin, what was going through your mind when you realized that the kayak was damaged? You're going to have to swim. What Even I can't imagine what went through your mind at that point. Well, the kayak actually started taking in water when I first got in it. You know, I started rowing back, but I kept on falling in. And for a while, I got back up and I kept on going, and I thought all was great. I thought I was gonna make it. And then suddenly the boat goes sideways and it flips me off and the paddle goes out, and I just see the paddle just going away. So I swear I saw something in the water which frightened me a lot. So I was clinging on to this capsized kayak. And then I decided to leave the kayak because it was getting really, you know, dangerous. Now it's getting a bit late. I've been out here for a couple hours. I was thinking about, obviously, mum, Beau, and Grace. I could see them. I could see the figures in the water go smaller and smaller until you couldn't see them anymore. But I was also thinking about my friends and my girlfriend. You know, I have a really good bunch of friends that, you know, I called when I got to the hospital. You know, they've had such good support, and I know just a lot of things went through my mind. Happy thoughts. I think that kept me going. Yeah, so much going through my mind. I was really scared. As the day progressed and there was no. No vessels and nothing seemed to be coming to save us. Is when I went, if he hasn't made it, what have I done? Have I the wrong decision? What's happened to him? And is anyone going to come and save my other two? Because they've got no food, they've got no water. It's getting colder. It's about to get dark, and the waves were getting very high. So it was very much get to that point where we're on our own. This is. This is going to be over. And I had assumed that Austin may not have made it. So that was an absolute perfect ending to have all three of them and happy and sore, but no injuries. Austin, when did you realize that you had saved their lives, that your mum and Beau and Grace were alive? I remember the moment exactly, but I couldn't jump up and down because I had fluids. But these doctors ran and they were shouting, they were cheering. They were. I didn't think I was a hero. I just thought, oh, man. I just called Trooper Zero. That's really all I did. Like, that was my mindset and, you know, all these hospital, like, staff calling me hero and everything. Yeah, it was a moment I'll never forget. Wow. Well, that was Austin and Joanna Appleby speaking with Kasha Madeira here in London. One man's been recognized by his community for organizing friendly football matches for more than four decades. Leo Gotsman is also the goalkeeper and he's 82. His fellow players say he's an inspiration. He's got so much experience, his positioning is incredible and so he's difficult to score past. I think he's a brilliant keeper. He really commands his goal. I really enjoy the competitive spirit, but also the camaraderie that we've built up over all these years. Leo is an inspiration. I don't know any other football game where they've got a goalkeeper who's not only that age but also has been playing for 40 odd years. Leo is a very passionate and reliable person and he's a role model for all of us. Leo says he first fell in love with football near the start of his life. I played football at school and then I stopped playing Till I was 35 years of age and I've been playing six a side football ever since. I arrange the bookings, I collect the subscriptions from all the players, I wash the kit and I just make sure that everybody's happy that's playing. 25 years ago I had a heart attack and I stopped for about two or three months. But I love the game so much I just had to continue. I think I'm worth my place in the team. I'm still agile and I'm still making saves. And when I get to the stage where I think I'm letting the side down, I will retire. Leo Gottsman. Coming up in this podcast. Without him, probably our parents would never have played it. We would never have got involved. And yeah, I'm sure him and Granny were very proud to see us doing well on the world stage. How one man's decision to build the world's first hotel ice rink could lead to Winter Olympic medals for his grandsons. If you're an H VAC technician and a call comes in, Grainger knows that you need a partner that helps you find the right product fast and hassle free. And you know that when the first problem of the day is a clanking blower motor, there's no need to break a sweat. With Grainger's easy to use website and product details, you're confident you'll soon have everything humming right along. Call 1-800-GRAINGER Click grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. If you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Grainger for reordering. With on time restocks, your team will have the cut resistant gloves they need at the start of their shift and you can end your day knowing they've got safety well in hand. Call 1-800-GRAINGER Click grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. If you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Grainger for auto reordering. With on time restocks, your team will have the cut resistant gloves they need at the start of their shift and you can end your day knowing they've got safety well in hand. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. If journalism is the first draft of history, what happens if that draft is flawed? In 1999, four Russian apartment buildings were bombed, hundreds killed. But even now we still don't know for sure who did it. It's a mystery that sparked chilling theories. I'm Helena Merryman and in a new BBC series, I'm talking to the reporters who first covered this story. What did they miss the first time the History Bureau Putin and the apartment bombs. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. To Ethiopia now, where the first female mayor of Addis Ababa has pledged to make it the best city in Africa to be a mother and raise a child. The city's population has more than doubled in the last six years and that's led to more overcrowding, more pollution and a shortage of outdoor space where children can play. The mayor, Adani Abebe has pledged to bring in some fresh solutions by the end of this year, including a bold promise to create thousands of plays, playgrounds and already a simple plan to close hundreds of streets to traffic every Sunday appears to have made a difference to families. Hide and seek and tag and some running around games. They wake me up. I ride my scooters, I play football with my friends. Our neighborhood have enough space for the children to run. It brings me so much joy just to spend this time together. Their social life comes alive. I play with them, I watch how they interact and I see them becoming part of something bigger. It is fun for them but honestly, it is just as much for me. I have made new friends here myself. But the most beautiful thing is watching the children say goodbye. They don't just say bye, they say, we will meet you here again next week. They are already planning their next Sunday together. This program is a source of immense joy for our community. Usually there is simply nowhere for sports or for children to just be kids. Honestly, just being here and seeing the joy in their eyes, it makes me very happy. I have met many new friends here today. On a normal day, everyone is rushing, but here we stop, we talk. It is building a stronger community on Sunday at a time we'll be watching to see how the mayor's pledges might come to life in the coming months. My colleague Myra Anubi also spoke to Karima Grant from the Van Leer foundation, which works on early years development in more than 80 countries. She explained how they help city officials see things from a child's perspective. We've used things as simple as a periscope to move city leaders around cities to see a city from the perspective of, of a 3 year old. 95cm. When I do workshops, I ask people, get on, you know, get down, kneel down to 95 cm. Bunch of mayors and leaders on their knees. Even better, we've had mayors and their teams moving through cities with strollers and with a rice bag, you know, like a five kilo rice bag in a stroller. So that again, as I said, they're able to expand, experience the journey. What is it like when you have to cross the street? They're not always stoplights. So of course many parents are not pushing their kids in strollers. They're carrying this baby on their back. What is it like to dodge in and out of traffic with the baby on your back? Honestly, I've seen this. It's really scary. It's absolutely scary. And it's scary for us even as drivers because you don't see the young children. And my understanding of what's happening in Addis is that this doesn't just affect closing streets, it's affecting every ministry being able to consider exactly how their work impacts children. There's just a cross section of people who've come together and who are working together, understanding that that's the most important time for human development. 0 to 3 and really saying, okay, how do we work together? How do we coordinate to make sure that children who were born in the city of Addis have what they need to thrive, to become the kind of adults we want for Ethiopia and for Africa Growing cities, Karima, also come with other challenges. Whether it's water, sanitation, housing. Skeptics might think, why not invest in that instead of investing in 3 year old children and, you know, closing streets? What would you say to that? So there's this wonderful gentleman named James Heckman who many, many years ago won a Nobel Prize in economics around the idea of understanding that for every dollar invested in early childhood, you have a 6 to $17 return. We're talking about young people now, but we're also talking about the youngest continent 20 years from now. Right? So when we're making investments, yes, we want to make investments around sanitation, yes, we want to make investments in housing. So I think it's not one or the other, but every place where we see cities are battling again. Taking an early childhood lens helps them to also provide for stronger futures for all of its citizens. It's never easy, but sometimes it's possible. Karama Grant and you can hear more about efforts to make cities more family friendly on People fixing the world wherever you get your podcasts. Next to a man who's become known as India's seed warrior. For three decades, Dibal Deb has made it his mission to conserve almost one and a half thousand different types of Indian rice, many of which were thought to have been lost. He grows the rice on his farm and he also donates seeds to other farmers free of charge. Dibal Deb told Joe Fidgeon from the BBC's Outlook program why he feels so strongly about protecting these rare species. In India alone, there used to be 110,000 varieties of rice existing. But more than 90% of this diversity is lost from the farmers fields all over the world. Most of the people actually eat just a handful of varieties of rice. So one instant in a one single pest outbreak or a disease outbreak will push this entire species to extinction. For our own food security all over the world, we have to take care of this genetic diversity as much as possible. This is what triggered my interest and commitment toward saving the life's diversity. I thought that if I wait for some conscious expertise for conservation, then it might be too late. We already had lost 90% of this diversity. You decided that this was so important that you were going to quit your job at the WWF and you were going to pursue this and find a way to conserve rice. What did your colleagues make of that decision? Almost everyone said I was stupid. I was completely dumb, idiot. I only had academic degrees but no intelligence. So that was the major impression of my seniors. But my, my mother, by that Time I had lost my father, but my mother was always in support. She said, whatever he decides is the best. It was quite rewarding because after the descent of this project, I collected 140 varieties of rice, extremely rare, not recorded anywhere. Some of these were mentioned in some ancient literature, ancient Bengali literature, but never nobody saw them. But I never planned to cultivate them and become a farmer myself. So I donated this stock of these 140 rice varieties to the state government's rice research station. But they refused to take this. So then, then I set up a seed bank where farmers would come whoever needs some kind of special variety of seed, like an aromatic rice variety, small grain, long grain, red grain, all of these aromatic ones, plus the climate resilient varieties like a variety which is drought tolerant, a variety that is salt tolerant, and so on. And farmers are actually really in need of them. So I set up the seed bank and so that people from different parts of the country can come over and exchange the seed. So it's important to you, is it, that the seed be exchanged that no money is changing hands? Exactly. That whole idea was to revert to the ancient tradition which was prevalent all over the world. None of the farmers ever bought seeds. All the farmers all over the world, on all lived continents used to exchange seeds. They collected their seeds either from their ancestors or from their neighbors and friends. Hundreds and hundreds of varieties open exchange people to people. In 2009, for example, after two cyclones devastated overnight, 10,000 hectare of land overnight became out of production. We rescued about 14 families of farmers by giving them 14 varieties of rice which could save their food security of those families. India's seed warrior, Duval Dib. And last. The Winter Olympics has just got underway in Italy, and one sport that often proves popular with viewers is curling. If you've never seen it, curling involves one team member releasing a heavy granite stone so it can slide along the ice while their teammates sweep in front of the stone to warm the ice and guide it towards a target. And one of the favorites for a curling medal. Scotland owe their skills to one man's decision to build the world's first ice rink in a hotel more than 50 years ago. The BBC's Laurie Carnan has been to the town of Stranra to find out more. Hamilton McMillan, known as Hammy, bought the hotel with his wife Janet back in 1961. But it was a pioneering business move in 1970 that turned this hotel into one of a kind. I've got a collection of stones and annuals and lots of books. Yeah. Gail Monroe was just four years old when her dad made the bold move. This was a meeting point. After a day's curling at Air or in Glasgow, the curlers would say, hami, we wouldn't need to go away if you would just build as an ice rink. And six months later, we have an ice rink. And over the past 56 years, it has produced European world and Olympic champions. Now chasing a gold medal at the Winter Games in Italy are Hamme's two grandsons, Grant Hardy and Hami Jr, alongside fellow Stranrar local Bobby Lammy. They're part of Team Mowatt, and Hammy knows it's a chance made possible because of his grandfather. It was amazing what mine and Grant's grandfather did for the community, for Strindrar. Rugby and football, like your main kind of sports, and then curling's a close second or third in Strandrar, so it's amazing. And the community that's down there is just fantastic. The third, Hami macmillan is hoping to go one better than the silver medal that Team Mewit picked up in Beijing four years ago. And being currently ranked number one in the world, Grant's mum, Fiona, is clear on the goal. They want the gold medal. They just missed out the last time, and there's only one medal they want, that's the gold. The hotel itself has a cosy and homely feel that Bobby Lammy's mum, Katie, says helped to shape their careers. This wasn't just somewhere our boys came and curled, but it was like a home from home, really. The hotel is unapologetically committed to curling. Even the ice bucket in the bar is shaped like a curling stone. There's curling memorabilia everywhere, and the plethora of trophies packed into the cabinet are gleaming as much as the ice itself. But Hammy's mum, Lorna, thinks there's room for one more. Winning gold at the Olympics this year would just be the pinnacle. It would be the most amazing thing for us all. But any medal would be amazing, too. Grant would love to be an Olympic champion, not just for himself, but for his family, who have given so much to the sport. Unfortunately, our grandfather is not here anymore, but he was aware of the impact he had on curlers in the region. The amount of curlers go away and have success in the world stage and come back and thank him every time. And without him probably building the ice, drinking chinois, our parents would never have played it. We would never have got involved. And, yeah, I'm sure him and Granny were very proud to see us doing well on the world stage. And it'll also be nice to have our granny out there and Katina supporting us. Grant Hardy ending that report by Laurie Carnahan. And that's all from the Happy Pod for now. If you have a story to to share, we'd love to hear from you. As ever, the address is global podcastbc.co.uk this edition was mixed by Allison Purcell Davis. The producers were Holly Gibbs, Tamson Selby and Rachel Bulkley. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Celia Hatton. Until next time. Goodbye. If journalism is the first draft of history, what happens if that draft is flawed? In 1999, four Russian apartment buildings were bombed, hundreds killed. But even now, we still don't know for sure who did it. It's a mystery that sparked chilling theories. I'm Helena Merriman, and in a new BBC series, I'm talking to the reporters who first covered this story. What did they missed the first time? The History Bureau, Putin and the apartment bombs. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.