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Outlook

Factual: Life Stories

True stories of ordinary people and the extraordinary events that have shaped their lives

True stories of ordinary people and the extraordinary events that have shaped their lives.

Outlook: Soprano Who Had Two Lung Transplants

Charity Tillemann-Dick

10/06/2013

Soprano Who Had Two Lung Transplants

BBC World Service - Outlook, Soprano Who Had Two Lung Transplants

The American soprano who never gave up singing despite having two double lung transplants

American opera singer Charity Tillemann-Dick tells Matthew Bannister how she refused to let two double lung transplants get in the way of her singing.

Opera singer Charity Tillemann-Dick, aged 29, has performed in opera houses and concert halls across the United States, Europe and Asia. But the amazing thing is that she has achieved her success despite not one, but two double lung transplants - without which she would have died. She tells Matthew Bannister how she refused to let two double lung transplants get in the way of her singing.

The BBC's Arturo Wallace travels to the Colombian town of Bocas de Satinga, where he meets an undertaker called Angel Segundo Hernandez. Angel has spent the last ten years retrieving dead bodies he finds in the local river: they are the victims of the long running conflict between the Colombian authorities, paramilitaries and drug cartels. 

And, what is the secret of the high flying Emanuel brothers? One became Chief of Staff at the White House, another is a top Hollywood agent and the third is one of the world's leading oncologists. Matthew Bannister asked the oldest brother, Ezekiel J. Emanuel, to explain their success.

Thirty-one-year-old Asta Philpot was born with arthrogryposis, a condition which means that whilst his body can feel things, he is physically restrained and can move very little. In 2007, Asta and two companions, one who is blind and the other also in a wheelchair, set off on a road trip which ended up in a brothel in Spain, where they aimed to lose their virginity. 

On Witness, as the British government agrees to pay compensation to Kenyans tortured under colonial rule following the Mau Mau rebellion, we hear from the Harvard professor whose research played a key role in bringing about the settlement.

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