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The Documentary: Detours: Eighteen Greeks a week

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Detours 3: Eighteen Greeks a week

18/09/2019 GMT

Eighteen Greeks a week

Detours

BBC World Service - The Documentary, Detours, Eighteen Greeks a week

Dead bodies travel along mountain passes for cremation in another country

Follow the dead bodies that travel along mountain passes in northern Greece for cremation in another country.

In Greece, the Orthodox Church bans cremations for believers. There are no crematoriums in the country. So for those who want to be cremated the alternative is a 13-hour journey to neighbouring Bulgaria, where cremations can take place. Portia Crowe follows the trail of the dead bodies – 18 each week – that travel along the mountain passes in northern Greece for cremation in another country. Hosted by Academy Award-winning documentary film-maker Asif Kapadia (Amy, Senna, Diego Maradona), this is the third episode in a five-part series from BBC World Service in collaboration with Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute. Detours takes us off the main roads of our lives, following people who didn’t end up where they expected.

Producer: Portia Crowe

The Documentary: Detours

Over five episodes we meet five communities on journeys away from the lives they expected.

For our second collaboration with Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute, the BBC World Service presents a new radio and podcast documentary series Detours.
 
Detours take us off main roads onto the indirect routes, and are journeys which often end up at different destinations to the ones we expect. A detour offers the unexpected, an opportunity for reflection, or encounters which make us laugh, or are exciting, or even tragic.

Over five episodes we meet five communities on journeys away from the lives they expected in Greece, India, Macedonia, Latin America and Asia.

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