Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Does nobody speak their mind in the South of England?

Episode Date: June 20, 2023

Jane and Fi glide through today's episode, touching on all the important bits - from the decline of local newspapers to the waning tradition of thank you cards and the skills of map reading.In today's Big Interview, we spoke to Afua Hirsch, a journalist and creative - she's written a book on race, identity and belonging and she also runs a fashion business.  Now, she is presenting a three part TV programme about the upsurge in creativity across Africa - it’s called ‘Africa Rising’. The series seeks to amplify the cultural renaissance happening around the continent.If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] our Instagram! @JaneandFiAssistant Producer: Khadijah HasanTimes Radio Producer: Kate Lee Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

you're listening to off air and we're very glad to have you thank you very much for being there and thank you again for all the fantastic emails this is from ali who says uh just listening to your pod with whispering bob what memories that brought back i too jane was at the teardrop explodes gig at the floralal Hall in Southport. Jane's reminiscences took me right back. Sitting on stained upholstery, not quite believing that a band of such magnitude would have heard of Southport, let alone agreed to have performed there. My chums and I spent most of the gig gazing in adoration at Julian Cope

as he flung himself around the stage in wild abandon. As wonderful as the evening was, it actually doesn't top my best gig chart. The year before, I'd been to see U2 at the Royal Court in Liverpool. That was pure chaos. And just after that, the Boomtown Rats at the Empire, where I met the band and got a peck on the cheek from Bob Geldof, something I still dine out on. Incidentally, I'm a few months younger than Jane, and my first job after studying on the NCTJ course in journalism at Preston Poly, which I once heard described as the only further education

establishment to sound like a sanitary product, was the only further education establishment to sound like a sanitary product. What was its name? Preston Polley. Yeah I kind of see what she is. Yes, Preston Polley. Anyway, oh yeah of course, yes, was at the Crosby Herald. Now that won't mean anything to you, Fi, but the Crosby Herald was our local newspaper. Do you know what, I dialled out minutes ago. No, it was just, Crosby Herald was our local newspaper in Crosby. I dialed out minutes ago. No, it was just, Crosby Herald, I'm really, when I go back to Crosby, I still really miss the Crosby

Herald because it was an absolute delight. It had photographs of every single mayoral engagement carried out by the mayor and mayoress of Sefton. It took you behind the scenes at every veg show, trade guild-type evenings.

Well, those local papers are fantastic. They're just amazing. And actually, just to beat you at your own game, because I know that you love to deride GLR with its smoking room of Britpop joy at the time at which you were doing semen prices in BBC Hereford and Worcester. The stock prices.

I'm so sorry, the stock prices. But the Hampshire Chronicle didn't have a front page because the front page was the cattle prices and the market prices for all of the agricultural stuff going down in Hampshire. And then that was always the front page. That was always the front page. And then the news came on page three. It's not that important, is it? No, but I always remember, you know,

I wonder when they stopped doing that, actually. It would have been quite a sign of the times, wouldn't it? The loss of the local newspaper is one of the great tragedies, actually, I think, of relatively recent... What's up with the loss of local radio? Yes, they're both vying for that. Ali, thank you so much for this email. She says,

My mother saw The Beatles when they supported Helen Shapiro at the Odeon Cinema in Southport. In her words, they weren't up to much. This from a woman whose limited vinyl collection included The Barren Nights

and those awful 70s compilations not by the real artist. Do you remember those? I do remember those because they were 99p. They were 99p. Yeah, and they did all the current hits, but it was by a bunch of session crooners, wasn't it? Yeah.

They were called Top of the Pops, weren't they? I think they were. They're called Top of the Pops. I mean, trademark-wise, they couldn't have been called Top of the Pops. What were they called? Somebody will know. Anyway, it's Jane and Fee at Times.Radio, if you know. I'd almost forgotten they existed. Thank you, Ali, very much. Do you't have been called Top of the Tops. What were they called? Somebody will know. Anyway, it's Jane and Fee at Times.Radio, if you know. I'd almost forgotten they existed. Thank you, Ali, very much. Do you think they were called Pop of the Tops?

Well, they could have been. Something like that. They really could have been. Oh, look, Billy Idol, he's aged very well. Oh, has he? Let's have a look. Yeah, this is actually, this is a photograph published in Vancouver. And we welcome Vancouver and all our listeners in Canada. He's looking amazing.

He's still got the peroxide top. Oh, wow, he's not looking too bad at all. No. He's been playing at the Cruel World Festival in Pasadena, it says. Yep. Perhaps the hair is a little less buoyant than it used to be. No, but he looks great and he still hasn't put his proper shirt on. No.

Never had a proper shirt. God love him. Just had a chest under his gilet. well he could get away yeah can i just say uh massive apologies to rosie so i kind of sight read an email that rosie had sent in and got something completely wrong and it's really important that i get this right i've just listened to your recent episode thank you for mentioning elizabeth.org but just to say it's actually been set up by nick and nancy in light of nick's cancer diagnosis and they wanted to do something to support children who've lost a parent or have a parent with a terminal illness because losing a parent shouldn't mean losing a childhood

and rosie has done that very fantastically southern england thing of apologizing herself when actually it's not your fault rosie it's my fault so i'm sorry about that because i got that completely the wrong way around and it's important to get that the right way around but it doesn't mean that we won't be trying to get somebody from elizabeth.org on the program to talk about it because actually that's just as important isn't it it is um it is quite a southern england thing that and actually you just reminded me of the house of commons yesterday when that woman the mp supporting Boris Johnson said, I think she said, I'm from Grimsby and I speak as I find. And then Jess Phillips, as a retort, said, well, I'm from Birmingham and I also speak.

And I just want to know where in the country is it only the south of England where nobody speaks their mind? is it only the south of England where nobody speaks their mind? Could somebody have stood up and said, I'm from Tunbridge Wells and here we're very careful not to say anything that we really mean or feel? No, so that's very unfair. But I think the trope of some parts of the south of the country and maybe the south-west of the country as well is just to apologise before speaking your mind

and if anybody else does make an absolute howler you take it on yourself to make them feel better and I don't think there's anything wrong with doing that actually but it has turned into a bit of uh I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm so sorry no I'm sorry no I'm so sorry thank you thank you but I'm sorry do you when somebody when you somebody does something really lovely and you send a thank you card and then they thank you for sending the card. Yeah, and you don't know where to stop. I mean, where does it... By the way, I think sending a thank you card,

I'm trying to drum it into my offspring. It's such a simple thing, but so few of us do it. I don't do it enough. I know I don't. So I think you've hit on something there because in the younger generation, A, they think nothing of just sending a text, sometimes just with an emoji, and that seems to do it for them. But I think you're right, that kind of the imprimatur

of if someone's done something nice, you can't just accept it, you have to actually say it. It just doesn't seem to have stuck at all. No. And I don't think that's a very good thing, Jane. So we've talked about the decline in local newspapers, local radio and general standards. It's like we're old biddies.

Not at all. No. Talking across the garden fence. It wasn't like it used to be, Jane. I'm clearly not an old biddy because at the weekend I went to a festival. And because of that, I've got this fabulous email. You went to a festival that imported hay bales and served champagne in a tent. Only in the VIP area.

Anyway, I just wanted to, I got this fabulous email. So it just, you just never know who's listening. It's from Greg Hollister. I'm a 40 year old Welshman from Cardiff. And I've been a fan of your podcast from the start, as is my lovely wife, Yvette. I have never in my lovely wife, Yvette. I have never in my life written to anything before. But I was waiting to collect my kids from school and heard you mention that you'd been to the Black Deer Festival and seen Bonnie Raitt. I am the keyboard player of the band Cardinal Black, and we played the main stage

on Saturday, just before Bonnie and the Amazing Teske Brothers. I agree that Bonnie was mesmerising. For a band only one year old, we were blown away by the support we got and the privilege of sharing the stage with Bonnie. We had flown in at 3am that morning from a festival we played in Switzerland the night before. Like you, I was slightly hazy by the evening and also needed to stand still. Greg then slightly ruins everything for himself

by saying, although we've never met, I kind of got a kick out of knowing Aunty Jane was there. the evening and also needed to stand still. Greg then slightly ruins everything for himself by saying although we've never met I kind of got a kick out of knowing Auntie Jane was there. Right Greg you were on my list of possible sending a thank you card too but you've just left it. Thank you so much for that and I heard Cardinal Black and you were fabulous particularly can I just say the first track you played if If you could be bothered, Greg, just emailing again, just naming that track, and then I'll make sure I pay for it because I loved it. So isn't that amazing? That was Greg from the Cardinal Black Band.

I really like them. Seek them out. Now, this one comes in from Kate, and I can't believe how many people want to talk about their Cindy's. Barbie has been eviscerated from the conversation. She's dead to us. We started by talking about Barbie, because there's the new Barbie remake film coming out, isn't there? But it turns out that everyone had a Cindy.

Well, didn't somebody else mention Pippa, which I think was another doll I had. Was that the Pippa Parkin thing? Have I got that right or not? I don't know. Anyway, there are so many dolls that nobody has really considered enough. Your chat about Action Man and Cindy's effeminate boyfriend, Paul, brought back memories.

Well, we don't... No, hang on. Why has he been dubbed effeminate? I don't know. I don't know because the Cindy that we had definitely didn't have a boyfriend. Lordy. Lordy, lordy no. Anyway, Cindy's effeminate boyfriend, Paul, brought back happy memories of working at Hasbro, their manufacturer, in 1993 forward slash 1994.

Right. Brilliant. Quite a stint. Action Man was relaunched in 1993, and there were long and intense meetings trying to decide if the size of his smooth mound, that's got capital letters, should be increased. I can't remember the outcome, just the hilarity amongst the sampling team that I was part of at the thought of the boardroom packed with suited and booted male executives discussing how large

to make AM's member. Also worth noting that Paul wasn't considered for a mound increase. The relaunch introduced four new butch and manly action man figures. One version had a means to record audio on it and a string tugged from between his muscly shoulder blades would play the recordings. Now, I do vaguely remember that. So you could get him to say all sorts of things.

Yes, and then you pulled this thing from behind his back and he would just repeat it within the play section. So you could get him to say smut? Well, you could. I mean, nobody would do that. Mainly, I think we got him to just say some words in Latin for us, Jane. Oh, God. I have clear memories of one of the tech team replacing AM's deep, gravelly voice with a recording of Harry Enfield's flat cap self-righteous character who would say only me.

You don't want to do it like that. Sadly, I don't think it went into production. My two dogs and I love listening to you then because they hear the podcast music and know it's time for a walk. And me because it's like going on a walk with two lovely chattering friends with love from Kate. That is brilliant. So imagine having to have a serious meeting at a serious place where you do serious work about whether or not a smooth mound should be increased. I'd like to have seen the agenda. How is that described? You know, when you're a kid and you imagine that you'll be really important one day and you might bustle into a meeting yeah and that's what the meeting would be about yeah you never think you'll

bustle into that meeting do you um this is a public service and i'm not going to read the name of the listener who is incredibly grateful and it's a really lovely email thank you uh for the advice if you just find yourself really urgently needing a wee, a contributor suggested a week or two ago now that pumpkin seeds and cranberries might help if you have this urgent need to go to the loo. And our correspondent says, I've always had a weak bladder, even as a child, and it was made worse by having an enormous baby vaginally. I'm 55 and things have been getting worse year by year, with this year seeing me step up from ordinary sanitary towels to full-on incontinence pads, which actually has really got me down. When I heard this tip on the podcast, I was just catching up with you last week, I went straight out and I bought a large pack of both cranberries and pumpkin seeds and resolved to just think, well, I'll try it for three months.

I didn't need to give it that long. The following day, I noticed that the pad had stayed completely dry and has been dry ever since. I mean, I can't really explain why this has happened. I'm absolutely delighted for our correspondent that this has been the case. She goes on to say, I can now see a future without feeling upset and ashamed. And I wanted you to know, and your contributor, that it's really changed my life. Well, that would. And that's really, really amazing.

So that was off the back of a conversation and feature we'd done about recurrent UTIs, wasn't it? Yeah. Where we'd talked about cranberries. And because in the office, we'd had a conversation that in all seriousness we were we were trying to work out why you wouldn't use cranberries in a topical way. Why drinking cranberry juice would be better than putting cranberries.

Daubing it. Yep around yourself and somebody had written in to say that's something about the way that they changed the, I think it was just the thickening of certain cells. So anyway, that's just amazing if it's worked. Yep. And obviously stick with it. And that can't possibly be doing you any harm either. So just keep going with it. I wouldn't have thought it could do any harm. Cranberries and pumpkin seeds. They must be good for you in all kinds of ways.

Yeah, really, really hope that carries on working for you and thank you very much. And please do feel free to email us about the more difficult areas of life. We will never use your name, even if you haven't asked us not to use it. We often won't use it if we just think it might not be the best. But it's janeandfee at times.radio

and as you'll know if you listen regularly, pretty much nothing is off limits here. This is about care and we've had a number of emails after the after the interview yesterday with Emily Kenway. It's from a listener who says my mum had dementia and was vulnerable. I've got two brothers who live 200 miles away. So caring for mum was down to me and I regarded it as a privilege. I did, however, have to change my working hours and I wasn't always around at home for my husband and near adult boys. Caring became more difficult as mum, although having dementia,

was a proud and private person and she never discussed going to the loo. Anything like that was just unmentionable. I was in an impossible position and nothing prepared me for the hurdles ahead to get help and eventually get her a place in a care home. I got so desperate and I think this is a real window into somebody's life. I got so desperate that I put mum to bed one evening and then I went knocking on the doors of care homes nearby. They couldn't answer the phone because they are so busy. I did get lucky. The manager answered the door of a lovely old-fashioned establishment and I think my expression said it all. I did get lucky. The manager answered the door of a lovely old-fashioned establishment and I think my expression said it all. I was invited in, got a care plan done there and then

and mum moved in that evening. She was there for over two years and I was able to visit every day. This was four years ago I should say, pre-pandemic. Things are much harder now. I know several friends struggling with elderly parents. It does need to be talked about much more. Please bring it right to the top of the agenda. There is no one size fits all answer. Thank you for talking about it, says that listener. Well, we will continue to talk about it because you're right, it is so important. Absolutely. This one intrigued both of us as well. It's on the same kind of topic, but you'll see as I read it out that it's something that really isn't discussed. Early onset dementia is the title. You've asked to remain anonymous. And as Jane says, that's always totally fine by us.

Our youngest son is 55. He was admitted to hospital in March 2022 with confusion and pneumonia. He was kept sedated on a ventilator for three weeks and after another three weeks was diagnosed with significant cognitive and mobility issues. And despite our pleas, he was discharged alone to his flat with a care package to support him. It was immediately clear that something was wrong. He'd called 30 to 40 times a day, each time forgetting he'd spoken with us five minutes earlier. Over the next six months, he repeatedly presented himself to A&E with confusion. They'd rehydrate him and either discharge him or allow him to self-discharge. But finally, in February this year, they recognised that there was something wrong

and issued a DOL, that's a denial of liberty order, so that he couldn't leave. They eventually found a residential care home for under 65s and he moved there in March for a period of assessment. He suffers from confabulations, new word for me too, that he's believing things to be true even though there's no basis in reality. And these include, number one, he's coming to live with us. Number two, we're buying a flat for him to move to. And number three, the best yet, we have private health care to cover his costs. We've had heartbreaking and upsetting conversations

that all of these things can't happen. We're 80 and 72 respectively. That's very distressing. And there's no way that we can take on his care. I've spoken to Dementia UK and Alzheimer's who are very supportive, but it seems this is just something we're going to have to live with as we age. And I find that absolutely heartbreaking, Jane, to be 80 and 72 and to be dealing with your son,

who is suffering from something that perhaps you know in your darkest dreams you imagined it would be the other way around is so difficult and I've never heard that situation being discussed so we'd like to carry on talking about that to anybody else who might have the same kind of experiences who can just offer oh I don't know a little bit of support sometimes just knowing that somebody else is going through the same thing can be a little bit of brightness in some very dark days but i'm so sorry this has happened to you and i mean i can feel all of the love in that email as well and thank goodness that you are there for your son and thank you for bothering to get in touch with us. Yes, lots of love to you because that is about as tough as it gets, I think, as situations go.

This is interesting, an insight from a listener in France. She starts by saying, following on from your discussion about suitcases on wheels. It was a good one, Jane. It was. My daughters couldn't get their heads around trying to navigate without GPS. Jane? It was. My daughters couldn't get their heads around trying to navigate without GPS. We went to a new beach at the weekend and heavily relied on GPS to help us find our way around the town. My daughter, age 16, was trying to understand how you could follow a map if you were driving. And this is, I'm really glad you mentioned this because this, so I'm always saying to my kids,

you cannot rely on the technology that exists at the moment. Anything could happen in the future. You may have to read a map and also you may have to know the names of roads. It's no good just saying, oh, I'll look it up on Waze. And it'll get, what if there is no Waze anymore? Do you not, you're looking perplexed, you're like a 16-year-old. No, I was just thinking actually that my kids at primary school did some really serious orienteering exercises. Did they do Duke of Edinburgh?

One of them's done Duke of Edinburgh. We'll pass very quickly over that. But the orienteering was a very deliberate learning skill for kids who were going to have their heads buried in phones. And actually, I think it might be one of those things Jane I get I totally get where you're coming from but when I was a teenager I didn't know the names of any roads either I mean I knew what a map looked like but I never used one I used to just set off actually even when I was doing my radio training part of the radio reporter, you had to go to three

different radio stations. Deliberately, they chose places that you had no connection with. So you were really thrown in at the deepest. It's the school of hard knocks, this, isn't it? And so, in the morning meeting, first day in Hull, you just got sent somewhere. You just had to find your way. Did you go to Hull? I did.

How on earth did you make yourself understood there? Very clearly and very easily. We are so prejudiced sometimes. But don't you think it might have something to do with the teen and the young adult as much as it is to do with technology sweeping over us? Possibly. Anyway, the listener goes on to say, we live in France and I work as a carer

and also look after my husband who's disabled but not elderly. The care system in France encourages people to stay in their own homes for as long as possible rather than moving people to nursing homes. The government provides financial assistance but it is means tested if you stay at home. But if you move to a nursing home, your children are required to pay if you can't. So if you care for somebody in your family, social services determine how many hours you work and they pay four euros an hour to cover your time. Gosh, I'll be looking up Emily's book as it sounds like a very interesting and important read. I'm also looking forward to hearing Fi

talk to Wendy Mitchell next week. Thanks again, says that listener who's making a life in France. And I didn't realise that the French system sounds, I'm not sure whether that's any improvement on our own, to be perfectly honest. But isn't it better because it is recognising that families might want to stay together a bit more? But she says here the government provides financial assistance if you stay at home.

If you move to a nursing home, your children have to pay if you can't. So... OK, so maybe, no, that's not so great. No, that isn't so great. Anyway, that's really interesting. Thank you. And we did ask yesterday for people living abroad to let us know how things are, so please do tell us. And Wendy Mitchell is on the programme on Monday

with, I think it's her third book, isn't it? One Last Thing, How to Live with the End in Mind. And she's remarkable. If you don't know who she is, she has had a diagnosis of dementia for quite some time. She was diagnosed when she was 58. And decided to just do remarkable things and talk about it very openly. And she's written two books. And she's a brilliant voice. So looking forward to talking to her on Monday. Jane's off next week. She's got a week's holiday. National holiday.

They'll be bunting all over the place. I think many motorways will be closed. Oh, I hope they are. And then I can enjoy another of my drives. Wouldn't that be so spooky if you found yourself all by yourself on the M62?

Oh, your chance would be a fine thing. I mean, of course, I don't like to boast, but I do usually take the M6 toll if I'm going north. If you're a regular user of the... Just throw your money away. Goodbye, poor people. Sit in traffic. Higher class of driver on the M6 toll. Last one for now about Coldplay comes from Pamela,

who's listening to us in Auckland, New Zealand. When they toured here years ago, I was flattered to be asked to accompany my 20-something daughter to the concert. Quite incidentally, I bought the tickets. We stood in the centre of the stadium and at one point the band members ran around the perimeter between us and the tiered seating.

I wriggled close to the rope and when Chris ran past, reached out and scooped a finger full of sweat off his bare shoulder, which I then smeared onto my daughter's cheek. To her complete disgust and my complete surprise, because I'd been having a great time and was swept up in the moment as I thought she was too. She hasn't forgotten. I still really like Coldplay. I can't speak for my daughter. Well, Pam... She doesn't like her daughter. No. That's terrible. Her daughter might not listen to Coldplay as much.

But I can understand that. I mean, it's quite strange. But it's a little bit like our producer, Rosie, who managed to have a very, very close selfie taken with Sir Rod Stewart. Yes, I noticed that. Last week. Yeah. and she felt that she

couldn't wash and I very much felt that if I stood very very very close to her that I would never wash again myself. Right well that reminds me of that story about pants, men's pants. There was a newspaper today about the guy who didn't wash his pants. Yeah so tell us that story very briefly and then shall we go into our text? It was quite a long, it was a very long feature in one of our leading newspapers about people who don't wash their clothes very often. And one of the contributors was, perhaps he was using a fake name, but he gave his name as Tim, software engineer, who just doesn't,

he works from home and thank God for that because he just doesn't wash his clothes anymore and can make a pair of pants last a week. That's horrible. I mean, he claims to be doing wonders for the environment, but I'm not sure he's doing a great deal for the atmosphere at home, I wouldn't have thought. Anyway, I don't want to meet Tim on a Friday. We don't know when he changes his pants.

Perhaps Friday is the best day to meet him. Get in touch, Tim. Jane and Fee at Times Drunk Radio. Tell us which day you make the crucial change. No, don't. No, don't. No, don't. Please don't. Right, in today's big interview, we spoke to Afua Hirsch,

who is a journalist and a creator. She's done loads of things, actually. She is a fully qualified lawyer. She then turned to journalism. She was the social affairs editor at Sky. She's also worked at The Guardian. She's written a book on race, identity and belonging. She also runs an amazing fashion business, Seeker. The dresses are totally gorgeous.

Now she's presenting a three-part programme about the upsurge in creativity across Africa. It's called Africa Rising and the series seeks to amplify the cultural renaissance happening around the continent. She's very interesting actually because she's one of those people, Jane, if she sees something a little bit wrong in the world, she doesn't moan about it. She just goes, right, how can I get involved and try and fix it? So when she realised she wasn't able to find things on television about Africa that didn't come from a slightly kind of, let's look at it through the prism of our own history tick. She thought, right, well, I'm just going to go and make them. So she set up a production company and did it.

That is where we started the interview. Yes, I did set out to make a series showcasing the art and creativity of the African continent because it did affect me so personally growing up that we experience Africa, I think, in Britain, consuming the news media in particular, through such a specific filter. It really was when I was growing up, at least in the 80s and 90s, and well into the noughties, I would describe it as a single narrative. And that narrative was misery, suffering, war, conflict, corruption, it was just this kind of heart of darkness. And that's not a neutral narrative. It comes from a really complex history of colonialism and projecting all of these

ideas that I think served Britain, that Africa was this place, this place of natural wealth, or this place of human labour, or this place of primitive culture and as someone of African heritage it made me feel ashamed of my Africanness growing up um I remember when I was a teenager lying and saying I was Jamaican heritage because that was just much more socially acceptable than to admit to being African in the 90s so for me actually knowing the African continent has been a real journey, personally and professionally, of travelling, working, researching, learning, self-educating, and as a journalist, really exploring some of the incredibly breathtaking range of cultures in Africa. So as I've advanced, I guess, as a journalist and storyteller, I've really

wanted to use the platform and the resources I have to share that story with others. So that is the story behind this series. It was the story that I wished I could have witnessed when I was growing up. Is it easy to set up a production company and approach television and say, this is me, I'm going to do this? To be very honest, I sometimes describe the world of TV production as the Wild West, because it feels like anything goes. It's hard to create something in a space where there aren't clearly defined precedents, rules, expectations, but there are also opportunities because you actually can start something and have quite limitless ambition for it. So I started my production company out of necessity because I was talent on documentaries I made,

which for people who don't work in TV doesn't by any means mean I was the most talented person involved. It just means that I was on screen. My job was to kind of show up and present on camera. And as a journalist and somebody who's profoundly curious about everything, I was always going to get involved in the interviews and the writing and the research and setting things up. So I started to realise that I was, if you watch my programmes, you would have thought that I was involved in shaping them from the ground up, but really that wasn't my role. And so it felt a little dishonest since I'm so involved in all aspects of programmes I make. I think people want that kind of authenticity and ownership and responsibility as well, because it's great that I

can now take more credit for my programs. But it also means I have to take more responsibility if things go wrong. And when you're working on a production like this, things do go wrong. It's so many moving parts. And, you know, for all the really positive stories we found about art and creativity on the African continent, it's still a challenging place to work and we sought to be really honest about that this isn't pro-africa propaganda i don't think how you correct decades of misrepresenting the african continent is by misrepresenting it in a different way i think you do it by telling the truth and that's what i set out to do in all my work i'm feel rather bad now, but I've got to ask this question. What was the worst thing that happened to you

while you were making the series? There were lots of challenges. When we were filming in South Africa, it was really important to us to tell a story about surfing because I don't think most people don't know that surfing is a really ascendant sport across the African continent.

Southern Africa, West Africa, and countries like Sierra Leone and Senegal. There's a huge surf scene. I find that really interesting, not necessarily from a sport point of view, but from a culture and societal point of view, because there's a whole kind of youth culture and aesthetic that is very African, but also very recognizably surf. And I think it's quite exciting. So I was really into telling that story. And girls are really underrepresented in surfing. It's still quite a male sport on the African continent. So we found this incredible young woman

who is a champion surfer and has got the most promising future ahead who comes from a township in Durban. I mean, when she was born, black people weren't physically allowed on the beaches. So the trajectory that she's been on and people like her so it was really exciting to film with her and of course when we get to Durban there was a massive sewage spill which meant we couldn't step foot in the ocean or the

whole production wouldn't have been insured and we tried to find another beach that wasn't affected and there we've got instead a blue bottle jellyfish infestation. So we also couldn't swim there. So you don't see me actually in the ocean surfing in this film. And more importantly, her, because she is a really good surfer. Okay, let's talk about all of the joy in the series because it is a really, really joyful series.

I started by watching the one in Morocco and I was so struck by the female artists who you meet there there who are working in what is still largely a traditional Muslim country but they are really pushing boundaries around sex sexuality and intimacy aren't they? They really are and I think that's the story that I found in Morocco is of a place that really is still quite a conservative country. I think tourists actually really sheltered from it. I've been to Morocco as a tourist quite a few times.

It's actually the most popular tourist destination on the whole African continent, which I hadn't realized until we made this. And only going this time, working with Moroccans, talking to people in different parts of the country, talking to people in different parts of the country, did I realise how strict the laws are around things like sex outside of marriage, same-sex relationships, nudity. You can be arrested for not being dressed properly as a Moroccan woman.

As a tourist, you can go around in a bikini. And I think that's often hidden. So on the one hand, it is still a very conservative country that has rules that very disproportionately affect women. On the other hand, there is an undeniable generation of women who are really pushing against that in very creative ways. I was very struck by the artist who's working almost in cartoon form. And she's actually depicting quite explicitly, lots of sexual acts. And she said a lot of parents are very grateful to her

and are actually giving this book and her artworks to their kids to explain sex to them. And you suddenly realise just how little must be in their education and language about things that we really take for granted now. She is really incredible. Zainab Fosiki, she's, as you say, a graphic novelist. And she creates images that explore shame.

Shame is kind of her subject. Because growing up, she had a lot of brothers, was the only girl, and felt that they were permitted a kind of freedom, positivity about their bodies and identities and dreams that she wasn't. So she uses her art to explore shame and to write about and create images of sex and the female body in a way that is very unapologetic and celebratory.

And it's actually become, as you said, an important tool for parents who want to educate their children and who want to have those conversations with their children about sex and consent and self-respect but have found that they need some kind of like guide or tool to help those conversations and I found her work really useful but at the same time we met her in her home she lives a very discreet life she's very mindful of her security and she has to be because

she has been threatened in the past. But she also said that she feels a huge change, that she wouldn't have been able to come on a TV programme and talk about her work in the recent past and now she feels that she is protected by the number of people who really support her in

Morocco as well as outside. We're talking to journalist and creative Afua Hirsch today. Now, the series is a very, very joyful portrayal of Africa's creativity at the moment. And it's a real kind of, it's a real visual onslaught. And one of the places that she goes to is the studio of the Nigerian artist Mamanike. I asked her to tell us a little bit more about what you find in that space. It's a treasure trove. It's the most unbelievable gallery that you go into. And there's this courtyard filled with these bronze sculptures, kind of the size of elephants, I mean, but really intricate. And then you go in and at first you

think you're in a normal gallery, but it just keeps going. It's like new rooms and floors just keep unfolding and it is packed to the brim with breathtaking art, multimedia art, recycled art, painting, sculpture, jewellery. And Mamanike is, I i think an octogenarian now who her story is just incredible she got married she was married off by her father at i think 13 years old one of many wives and she decided to teach all of her co-wives how to make adire this traditional nigerian print and then she marched them all to lagos as this kind of like crew wearing their Adira. And she said, if we wear it, you know, it will market it. And people came and bought it from them. And over the years, she's become this sensation.

So her whole DNA is creating opportunities for younger artists to be able to showcase their art, find markets and increase their skill set. So she's now an institution in Nigeria. And she's just the most remarkable woman. She's kind of seven feet tall because of the Adira that's wrapped around her head. And she's just a really endlessly fascinating woman. Her husband was there when we got to the studio. She insisted on giving us lunch.

We were on a really tight filming schedule. And it was one of those where you want to say, that's really lovely, but we don't have time. And then you try and say something along those lines. You have time. The look that she gives you, you know you're sitting down and having lunch. And then we met her husband and we asked how they'd met.

Because not the man she married when she was very young. And she said, oh, he was the police inspector. I was arrested on a protest and he was the police inspector in charge of the district. And you think, well, how is that an opportunity for a romantic encounter? She's full of surprises. But her gallery is really special

and it's a kind of slice of the diversity of art in nigeria because it's such a diverse country i think more than a thousand languages spoken um so many ethnic groups so many cultures so many traditions so many religions and languages and so many generations of artists and it's overwhelming in its scale but also its brilliance. And I would have loved to have spent a whole week in her gallery. I thought the Nigeria programme was so interesting because apart from anything else, if you just wanted to watch it on a visual level, it made you realise how much influence Nigeria has had

on the clothes that we wear, on the music that we're listening to at the moment. It is astonishing. But this is one of the drivers for this series i think because not only do we have this really imbalanced view of the african continent because we get such a negative uh narrative about it in the media but it's also so extremely far from the truth which is that the african continent has given us so much global mainstream culture if you look at the music forms hip-hop jazz afro now afro beats which is now

merging with those american forms that were originally inspired by african cultures in america if you look at fashion how many designers are inspired by traditional african If you look at fashion, how many designers are inspired by traditional African ideas, prints, designs, themes, jewellery, shapes and silhouettes. If you look at spices, food, if you look at literature, if you look at poetry, wherever you look in the arts, Africa has been innovating for millennia and it's been shaping global culture. And that has been so, I think, unjustly under-recognized. And, you know, talk about cultural appropriation, it's a whole other subject. But I think the reason that it's so fraught when

it comes to the African continent is not because Africans don't want other people to share or innovate or imitate even their designs. It's just that they've been so undercredited for what they've created that it only feeds into that existing inequality. So this is my small attempt to make an intervention addressing that inequality and to say, if you like this art, understand where it comes from and see who's creating it and how that's changing. Because apart from anything,

they're just amazing stories. They're such compelling stories. And they're stories you probably haven't seen before because I've spent so much time on the African continent and I learned so much making this series. I can't let you go without asking you about Gary Lineker. What a leap we've made there. It is. I can't imagine the connection.

You recently tweeted, and it was around the time of Gary Lineker, What a leap we've made there. It is. I can't imagine the connection. It is. You recently tweeted, and it was around the time of Gary Lineker getting into trouble with his comments, making political comments and being censured by the BBC for that. And you did tweet, the whole Gary Lineker story is motivating me

to tell all the stories about BBC impartiality fail that I've been quietly repressing for the past few years. Is there anything you'd like to tell us? You have to invite me back another time. So I get frustrated with the BBC sometimes. And I've been quite public about that on occasion, more than occasion. But the issue I have is that

we're in such a specific political climate right now in the UK that I feel like if you attack the BBC you are feeding into an anti-public service broadcasting agenda that is being pushed by the political right I passionately believe in public service broadcasting now that I've got my own company and I talk to streamers and other broadcasters all the time, it's only deepened my appreciation of public service broadcasting because the commercial drivers of other outlets will never allow them to take some of the risks that the BBC, for example, or Channel 4 do. of the new and less well-known ideas to take a risk and um that's crucially important both in a democracy but also to create more diversity of output and representation in the in the industry so i whenever i critique the bbc i do so from a place of love because i want it to improve so that it can survive um and that frustration does sometimes threaten to boil over. So I was really, I didn't think the BBC handled the Gary Lineker situation well.

What do you think they should have done? I think they should have taken it as an opportunity to have a much deeper look about what impartiality means now which is evolving and is becoming more complicated. And I don't think the BBC have actually done the internal work they need to on understanding what impartiality means now, how it affects people differently

and how it applies to people in different positions because Gary Lineker is not present on the Today programme. And if he was, I think that would have been a different conversation. And it feels as if the rules are not being applied fairly, in my opinion. And I also I think like a lot of people am very concerned about the perceived lack of, well, the perceived interference from government with the BBC. I think that's so dangerous. And you know, like I used to be a lawyer, perceived interference from government with the BBC. I think that's so dangerous. And you know,

like I used to be a lawyer, the perception of bias is the problem in itself. Even if there is no bias, if people perceive it, that becomes a problem. So when there is a perception of bias, you need to be very clear about being transparent and addressing it. And so we've had various scandals that have made people have legitimate concerns about how independently the BBC is of a government that has been openly hostile to the BBC. My fear is that the BBC might internalise that hostility, you know, start to self censor, start to make decisions that they hope will keep them in favour of a government that has very specific political views. And that's not the role of the BBC, the BBC is to be here for all of us. So that sums up the motive underlying my critique of the BBC. The BBC is to be here for all of us. So that sums up the motive underlying my critique of the BBC. Gary came to my screening of the series and loved it. That's a happy ending. That is a happy ending. Well, I presume after all of that, I mean, he wouldn't have objected to you

tweeting that, you know, and putting his name in it anyway, because it's largely the position that he seems to hold himself. Yeah, yeah. I think he came out pretty well from that hold and really stuck to his guns, which I think is really admirable, you know. I mean, I have a very different life from him. He's a national treasure.

And, you know, he reaches a kind of demographic that would not naturally follow me. And I think for someone in his position to say the things he says requires a huge amount of courage. And I think it's really valuable when someone in his position does take a stand. Afua Hirsch, and the programme is called Africa Rising. There are three episodes available on the BBC iPlayer.

I think you watched a Morocco one as well. Yes, I saw Morocco. And it's a trip that takes you to places you don't see on your lovely boutique hotel weekend in Marrakesh, if you've been fortunate enough to have one. Yes, and the other two are South Africa and Nigeria. And they're just lovely, really, really lovely. Put your feet up, watch something beautiful,

learn something new take yourself out of yourself programs so all hail that and um we do offer you variety and tomorrow's guest is peter andre and who have we got on thursday oh i can't remember no i can't remember either what have we got on thursday that's not, is it? Let's just don't include this bit. And on Thursday, we've got super, super saw-away best-selling crime writer Karen Slaughter. Well, that is the palace of varieties that is the Off Air podcast and Times Radio show.

Yeah. The name of our Times Radio show is... Jane and Fee. Yes, and it starts at 3 o'clock p.m., British summertime, Monday to Thursday on Times Radio o'clock p.m., British summertime, Monday to Thursday on Times Radio. Get the app. It's completely free,

so you could actually listen to us cocking up live on a radio station four days a week. Yep, welcome to our life. Jane and Fee at Times.Radio, if you'd like to email the podcast, we read every single email. We've got an email special coming up

in a couple of weeks' time because we cannot get through the bulk of your wisdom and joy every day. Sounded very sincere. Well, one of us has to. Good night. Good evening. Well done for getting to the end of another episode of Off Air with Jane Garvey and Fee Glover. Our Times Radio producer is Rosie Cutler

and the podcast executive producer is Henry Tribe. And don't forget, there is even more of us every afternoon on Times Radio. It's Monday to Thursday, three till five. You can pop us on when you're pottering around the house or heading out in the car on the school run or running a bank. Thank you for joining us and we hope you can join us again on Off Air very soon. Don't be so silly. Running a bank? I know ladies don't do that. A lady listener. I'm sorry.