Category: Family

Japan: New Ways To Grow Old

When it comes to old people, Japan is a world leader. More than a quarter of its population is over the age of 65 and it currently has 66,000 centenarians, more than any other country. In this 2 part series Toshiko Katayose and Aki Maruyama Leggett explore some of the innovative ways in which Japanese people are adapting to living longer and consider what lessons other countries might learn from Japan’s super-ageing society. (2 x 27′)

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

First broadcast BBC World Service Feb 2018

Radio Choice: The Daily Mail, The Times and the Sunday Times

Sugar, Saris and Green Bananas

1.Sugar in my blood  London-born journalist Lainy Malkani delves into her family’s roots and discovers the rich but bitter-sweet history of Indian indentured labourers on Caribbean sugar plantations.

2.Indo-Guyanese and proud Prompted by her mother’s death, Lainy explores what migrating to Britain from the sugar plantations of Guyana meant for her family.

(2 x 28′)

Hearing ear

First broadcast September 2015 BBC Radio 4

Contributors include: Peter Fraser, Professor Clem Seecheran,  Victor Jeevan Sookaram and Raymond Rahiman

Producer: Mukti Jain Campion

Radio choice: The Mail on Sunday, The Sunday Telegraph, the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph

Chinese in Britain

cibA landmark series in which Anna Chen explores the early history of the Chinese presence in Britain (10 x 14′)

First broadcast April – May 2007    BBC Radio 4

Readings by David Tse Ka-shing

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

  1. The First Chinese VIPs: the earliest recorded Chinese to arrive in Britain
  2. The Creation of Chinatown: the myth and reality
  3. From Ship to Shore: experiences of Chinese seamen in Britain
  4. Steam and Starch: life in a Chinese laundry
  5. Educated in Britain: the history of Chinese students
  6. Feet unbound: pioneering Chinese Women in Britain
  7. Mixed Blessings: growing up half Chinese
  8. Artistic Pursuits: stepping out on Britain’s cultural landscape
  9. Screen Beginnings: the first British Chinese screen actors
  10. Peking Duck and Chips: early Chinese restaurants

Each episode sounded effortless only because it had been crafted with such supreme care.  – Gillian Reynolds, The Daily Telegraph

Visit the BBC series website

Original interviews have been archived with the British Library  accession number C1353

Radio Choice: The Guardian, The Sunday Times, The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Scotsman, Time Out, Daily Mail, The Independent 

Radio 4  Pick of the Week

Creative Forces

 

cfComedian Dawn French is the daughter of an RAF technician. Actress Juliet Stevenson’s father was a British Army Officer. In conversation with Fiona Lindsay (herself a Navy child) they explore how their highly nomadic childhoods may have shaped their adult careers. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast November 2013   BBC Radio 4

Producer Chris Eldon Lee

 

Radio Choice: The Radio Times,  The Daily Telegraph,  The Independent, The Times, The Daily Mail

The War Widows of Afghanistan

 

BBC Radio 4 BBC World ServiceLisa and Jacqui live in Britain. Tajbibi and Marzia live in Afghanistan. All four women have lost their husbands in the war against the Taliban. As the deadline for NATO troop withdrawal approaches, Zarghuna Kargar hears their moving stories of love, loss and survival. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast July 2014   BBC Radio 4 & BBC World Service

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

One of the most gripping programmes I have heard in years. – Lesley Abdela

 

The interweaving of the experience of Afghan and British widows, with each commenting on the similarities and contrast in each other’s experiences, was masterful. – Peter Horrocks, Director BBC World Service

 

Radio Choice: The Daily Mail & The Sunday Telegraph

Hearing ear

 

The Flight of Tiny Feet

 

totfIn early 1942 the Japanese invaded Burma, forcing fifty thousand refugees to embark on a 1000-mile trek to India, mostly on foot. Overcome by the effects of disease and monsoon, more than half of them died. Stephen Brookes, Evan Edwardes and Yolande Rodda, three children who had once been at kindergarten together, did survive the arduous journey. Now in their seventies, they recall their harrowing experience through children’s eyes. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast January 2003  BBC Radio 4

Producer Chris Eldon Lee

Remarkable and moving – WH, The Guardian

 

Radio Choice: The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, Daily Mail, The Independent on Sunday, The Times, The Sunday Telegraph

Radio 4 Pick of the Week

From Telford to the Stream of Dragons

 

ftsdThe journey of a lifetime as Hsiao-Ying Tseng travels from Shropshire to south China to visit the two sisters she has never met. Her moving story reveals one human legacy of the Communist victory of 1949 when thousands of Chinese fled to Taiwan, leaving loved ones behind forever. (1 x 28′)

First broadcast Oct 2001   BBC Radio 4

Producer Chris Eldon Lee

Radio 4 Pick of the Week

Grandmothers’ Footsteps

gfTwo travel documentaries in which Mukti Jain Campion accompanies her children back to the childhood homes of their two grandmothers – a rural village in India and a remote crofting community in the Scottish Highlands – and discovers that the two women have more in common than just grandchildren. (2 x 28′)

First broadcast November 1997 BBC Radio 4

Original Music by Nick Sargent

Producers Mukti Jain Campion & Chris Eldon Lee

Two documentaries of the kind radio does well: contrasting social histories told by people who have lived them. The moving spirit in more ways than one is the producer Mukti Jain Campion – Peter Barnard, The Times

Radio Choice: The Times, The Independent, The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Sunday Times, The Evening Standard, Radio Times

Radio 4 Pick of the Week

Keeping it in the Family

 

kitfWhat is it like to be the child of a politician  and how does family life in a political household prepare you for a future in politics? Political journalist Julia Langdon talks to some of the 25 current Members of Parliament who are themselves the children of politicians. (3 x 14′)

First broadcast November 2003 BBC Radio 4

Producer Mukti Jain Campion

Radio 4 Pick of the Week

Parents Too

 

Jon NutmanMukti Jain Campion talks to disabled parents about their experiences of raising children. The first four features follow a day in the life of four different disabled parents around the UK. The final two features present some of the pioneering advances made by disabled parents in California, birthplace of the Disability Rights Movement and home to a high concentration of independent living disabled people. (6 x 10′)

First broadcast November 1996 BBC Radio 4

Producer Mukti Jain Campion