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Outlook: Troubled Life of Champion Diver

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Diver Blake Aldridge (credit Dean Treml)

20/10/2016 GMT

Troubled Life of Champion Diver

BBC World Service - Outlook, Troubled Life of Champion Diver

Diver Blake Aldridge was at the top of his game when his diving partner was killed.

Although it looked as though his diving days were over - Blake swapped the pool for open water and is now one of the world's top cliff divers

Blake Aldridge represented Great Britain in the synchronised diving at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. But, after losing his best friend and diving partner in a tragic accident and later being dropped from the British team - it looked as though Blake's diving days were over. That was until he swapped the pool for open water. He tells Matthew Bannister how he's become one of the world's top cliff divers. 

At the start of the year Karim Muluga was a school teacher in eastern Uganda. But Karim's life took an unexpected turn.  His local lake was suffering from an invasion of water hyacinth and the livelihoods of the local fishermen were under threat.  So Karim decided he had to do something about it. 

Zucchero is an Italian blues singer who has sold fifty million albums worldwide. 
He's worked with major international stars like Bryan Adams, Eric Clapton, Miles Davis and BB King.  His new CD , Black Cat, features a song called Streets of Surrender which he wrote with Bono of U2  in tribute to those who died in the shootings at the Bataclan club in Paris in November 2015.  Zucchero tells Outlook's Nicki Paxman how the blues infused his Italian childhood.

When Beyan Kota was a child in Liberia, he had problems with the sight in one of his eyes.  But when he was 15 he lost the sight in his other eye after a horrible accident he had while felling trees. Since then he has fought hard to get himself an education.  He's set up the country's first organisation to champion the rights of visually impaired people - the Liberian Christian Association for the Blind.

Image: Blake Aldridge
Credit: Dean Treml

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