Category : World
Service
Date : 17.05.2004
Printable version
They come
from countries as far apart as Cameroon and Japan, Jamiaca and Latvia
and they cover topics which range from the mechanical beauty of the
guillotine to the selling of young girls.
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This week, for the first time in its history, Â鶹ԼÅÄ World
Service's daily magazine programme Outlook is entirely devoted to ideas
and stories from listeners.
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They can be heard on Outlook every day from Monday
17 through to Friday 21 May.
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"The idea was for listeners to tell their story,
point us towards somebody interesting or look into an issue which concerned
them and we would send out local reporters to help the listeners bring
their stories to life," says producer Neil McCarthy.
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"We were looking for the biggest possible mix of
issues and that's what our listeners have given us.
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"They are stories that would have been difficult
for us to stumble upon ourselves."
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One of the first was from Thika in Kenya. Reuben Gitahi
described a particularly frightening night train ride out of Nairobi.
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Incidents of sexual harassment on the unlit train have
led female passengers to call for women-only carriages and some lights.
He went along with a microphone to show what he meant.
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A listener from a village in Jamaica, who asked to be
anonymous, was concerned about the welfare of girls at a strip club
near where she lives.
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Men were turning up and taking the girls, some of them
young teenagers, to work in other go-go bars seemingly without their
consent. She asked Outlook to look into it.
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West Africans who've got as far as North Africa and
Europe wrote about the frustrations of life in Africa and the difficulty
of deciding whether to stay or just get out.
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We hear from a University of Nigeria student whose lecturers
are on strike; a Ghanaian who struck out for Europe, managed to get
across the Sahara desert only to get stuck in Tripoli; and Alice, a
Ugandan woman who is disillusioned with life in Belgium.
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Volunteer Gina Kornblitch takes us round the trauma
unit of a parrot sanctuary in northern Holland. There are 3,500 birds
here and they speak many different languages.
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Thomas Kantha, a South African living in Japan, hunts
for abandoned wheelchairs, repairs them and sends them to South Africa
where they are badly needed.
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We hear from him and spend a day in Durban with one
of the happy recipients Michael Basi. Michael lost the use of his legs
at age five and knew nothing about wheelchairs till adulthood. Now,
with his red, racing chair, he can go to work and play sport.
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Another Kenyan listener contacted Outlook with news
of the notorious "night-runners" of his village, naked witchdoctors
who show up in the early hours, cast spells on households and take the
people they have bewitched off to the cemetery.
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Together with the Outlook reporter he conducts a night
vigil to investigate.
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Other stories:
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the couple in Quebec who welcome ships into port by
playing the relevant national anthem and raising the flag of the country;
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the tiny island of Kiribati, which
is sending athletes to the Olympics for the first time this year;
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the difference portable water
has made to a small village in the Cameroon;
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the effects of the worst drought
ever to hit Kerala in India;
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a Chilean musician in Germany plagued by the maddening
racket made by crows outside his window when he's trying to compose.
He's sure they are telling him to "work", "work",
"work";
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should working animals in India be entitled to pensions?
We speak to Cheetah's handler.
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Notes to Editors
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Outlook is broadcast from noon to 12.45pm, UK time (11.00-11.45am
GMT).
