Woman's Hour - 8th Grade, Jing-Jing Lee, Mozambique floods

Episode Date: April 29, 2019

Bo Burnham's film Eight Grade has just been released in the UK and explores the challenges of being a young teenager in the age of social media. Is it a coming of age film for our time? Jane speaks to film critic Rhianna Dhillon.While Storm Hannah hit the UK over the weekend, Cyclone Kenneth has unleashed flooding on Mozambique causing widespread destruction barely a month after a previous cyclone killed hundreds and devastated large areas. Cate Turton heads-up the UK’s Department for International Development and is based in Mozambique. What has been the impact of the recent flooding in Mozambique and the response? She also talks to Jane about her life and what has taken her into international humanitarian work. It is 40 years this Friday since the UK elected its first woman Prime Minister on May 3rd 1979. Woman’s Hour marks this pivotal moment with a week of programming. The late Margaret Thatcher remains a deeply controversial and divisive figure and Woman's Hour will explore her importance as a female leader; focusing on the woman and her impact on women’s lives. Today Jane Garvey looks at how the Woman’s Hour archive captured this moment in time. Jing-Jing Lee on her debut novel, How We Disappeared. Based partly on her own traumatic family history, Jing tells the story of one woman’s survival in occupied Singapore and a child's quest to solve a family mysteryPresenter: Jane Garvey Producer: Caroline DonneInterviewed Guest: Rhianna Dhillon Interviewed Guest: Cate Turton Interviewed Guest: Jing-Jing Lee

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2. And of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hi, this is Jane Garvey and this is the Woman's Hour podcast, Monday 29th April 2019. 40 years ago this week, you may not even have been alive, but that was the week Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister. We've been dipping into our archive to find out what Woman's Hour sounded like in 1979 and I can tell you, that section of the programme features Jenny Murray saying Pony Club in a way that she wouldn't

these days. Eighth Grade is a new film, saw it on Saturday. We're asking today whether it's the film that really does finally nail adolescence on celluloid. And how did a man of 28 appear to understand the world of a 13-year-old girl so well? It's a male director. He is only 28. Name's Bo Burnham. He's a YouTuber. Anyway, you can hear what our reviewers thought of the film on this Woman's Hour podcast. But we started with a new study which shows that obese children are more likely to suffer emotional problems. This is a study by researchers at Liverpool University which looked at 17,000 children.

It's being presented this morning to the European Congress on Obesity in Glasgow. I talked to one of the lead researchers, Dr Charlotte Hardman, who's a senior psychology lecturer at Liverpool Uni, and to Aisling Piggott, who's a dietician and a spokesperson for the British Association of Dieticians. I asked Charlotte first, was it really 17,000 children that the study looked at? Yes, it was. So we used a large cohort called the Millennium Cohort Study.

So this is a population-based cohort from the UK. It's of 19,000 children who were born between 2000 and 2002. And they've been followed up ever since with very detailed measurements. And this is a really fantastic resource because it enables us to get very detailed information about how children are developing over these key time periods. And what did you find out? So we were interested in the association between emotional symptoms so things

like anxiety and depression and also obesity and our specific question was how are these two health outcomes associated with each other and how might they develop over the adolescent the early childhood to early adolescent time period and I, the main thing that we found was that obesity and mental health problems were more likely to be associated as children got older. So from the age of seven through to 14, we saw stronger associations between having obesity and also having a mental health problem. But we didn't see this earlier in childhood. And this was the same for girls and boys? Yes it was which was perhaps quite surprising we found that levels of obesity and

mental health problems were higher in girls particularly in adolescents but we didn't see a difference in how obesity and emotional symptoms were associated with each other between boys and girls. Now this is based on BMI, is it? It is, yeah. Some people take issue with BMI, don't they? Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, no measure is going to be perfect. It was objectively measured,

so this isn't self-reported by parents or anything like that, which I think, you know, we would have concerns about. These are objective measurements, but how that's actually translated into whether a child has obesity or not can be a little bit contentious. I would just always say that, I guess, with BMI, it is a measure that can be taken quite easily from large numbers of children.

So if we wanted to use a more intensive measure, we'd probably have smaller numbers of children. So I think it's that trade-off between sort of how invasive the measure is versus actually having a large representative population, which is what we do have in our study. Now, the key question really is the one that's almost certainly impossible to answer. Are children unhappy because they're overweight? Are they overweight because they're unhappy? So I think, I mean, we didn't actually assess the reasons for the association in our study.

But what we did find was that the relationship between them that emerges from the ages of seven onwards appears to be bidirectional. So what that means is there's an association between having obesity and later emotional problems. But there's also, it works the other way, emotional problems predicted later obesity. So it suggests that they are entwined and that actually they might exacerbate each other. So, for example, we know that children who have obesity unfortunately do experience quite a lot of negative attitudes due to their weight. They can be teased or bullied and they might also, as they get older, start to internalise these negative views. And this can affect self-esteem and be associated with greater depression. or bullied and they might also as they get older start to internalise these negative views and this can affect self-esteem and be associated with greater depression and then when people are

depressed they sometimes can deal with this by eating unhealthy foods and then that can be associated with weight gain so I think there's lots of reasons why actually the relationship is bi-directional. Yeah let's bring our dietit in, Aisling Piggott, spokesperson for the British Association of Dietitians. Aisling, what do you make of this? I think this is really powerful research in terms of numbers. But actually, when you think about the facts, it's hardly surprising when we live in such an obesogenic world where, you know, gaining weight is so easy, yet leanness and thinness is glorified. That's such a mismatch for these young people coming out in society. Well, of course it is. I mean, I just wonder whether you have any idea whether children who are overweight are eating more food or eating more of the food made available to them?

Are they eating more so-called bad foods? Are their parents or their carers giving them the wrong foods? What do you think about all this? I think the important thing to note is there is no one answer. It's a complex myriad of causes. So absolutely, food is much more freely available in terms of quantities than ever before plus our ultra processed or highly processed foods are much more available plus we're a lot less active than previous generations and then we've also got this complex relationship with food that is emerging and children are exposed to so much more stress and anxiety, which, as this research suggests, fits in and feeds into weight gain and obesity.

Yeah, we know that nourishing foods are sometimes, well, frankly, more expensive than the stuff that you can easily access. And, of course, there'll be kids coming home from school who will go and get chicken because mum's out at work won't be back till seven o'clock later maybe even in some cases it's very hard to pin any sort of blame on on households like that isn't it really? I think what we know from from other studies as well is that poverty and socio-economic status is associated with poorer food choices and therefore risk of obesity and absolutely what we have to be very careful when we talk about childhood obesity is we don't start pinning and blaming individual parents or parenting styles. It's about a whole system approach, which includes education as well as making access to foods much more available

and much cheaper in terms of healthy foods. Aisling, in your professional experience, does every parent or carer recognise that their child is obese? Absolutely not. Unfortunately, you know, we're built to think our children are amazing. Plus, particularly mothers, but not always, we've got this innate kind of sense of feeling like we need to nourish and feed our child.

And sometimes that can stop us from seeing what you know the problems that are arising and very often most parents of children who are overweight will fail to recognize it's only children who are very overweight or obese where parents will actually recognize there's a problem and it's also very very difficult as a parent to know how to approach this subject subject when you have older children entering adolescence. This is a very, very dicey time. And Charlotte, I don't know if you've been there yourself, but saying anything, particularly to somebody in their young teenage years about their appearance. We're about to discuss the film Eighth Grade, which is all about the deep discomfort of

adolescence. How on earth do you go about starting these conversations? Yeah, and I mean, I think anyone who is a parent will kind of really identify with this. It's an incredibly difficult and sensitive subject to broach. I think what our research really emphasises is that these conversations about weight really have to be treated very sensitively because our research is suggesting that you know as children get older and if they do have problems with their weight it's also likely that they will

be experiencing concurrent emotional problems so the two are interlinked and I think that's just something for everyone to take on board is is how sensitive this is It's not just about eating less and exercising more. We have to take the wider emotional context into account as well. Ashley? And I would completely mirror that view. I think anecdotally, from my experience, I've often seen children referred to see a dietitian because they're overweight. And whilst waiting to see a dietitian, they'll actually end up gaining more weight,

mostly because it's not been addressed in a sensitive and appropriate manner and the child has felt bad about themselves and that's led to exacerbating a problem which was already a big deal for them. Thank you both very much. Aisling Piggott, a dietitian, and you also heard from Dr Charlotte Hardman, who's a senior psychology lecturer at Liverpool University and about to discuss her research at that Obesity Congress in Glasgow during the course of this week.

In fact, she's doing that this morning. So we wish her the best of luck with the presentation. If you've got any thoughts on that, at BBC Women's Hour on Twitter or Instagram, or you can email the programme, of course, via the website, and we can include some of your thoughts in the podcast, which will be available later. So to the film I mentioned, Eighth Grade, which is a film by an American YouTuber called Bo Burnham.

He's a man, 28. Eighth Grade's just been released in the UK and it's effectively about navigating young teenage lives in the age of social media. The film critic Rhianna Dillon is here. Welcome to the programme, Rhianna. Hi. And student Steph Campbell writes for Warwick University newspaper The Boar. Welcome to you too, Steph. You've both seen Eighth Grade over the weekend, like me. Yes. Yeah, I've seen it a couple of times, actually, because the first time was so excruciating. I kind of watched it through my fingers. I thought I'd go and see it again. I mean, it's billed as a comedy drama. I didn't find a lot to laugh at if I'm honest really.

Did you not? The first time honestly I thought it was one of the most painful things I've ever had to, it was like watching a horror film the kind of the responses that it listed in me because we all know what it's like to be that very very awkward teenager, whether you're a teenage girl or a boy, I feel like everybody has

been through the experience that the girl in this, goes through at some point we ought to point out that Kayla is living with her dad we don't know much about her mum other than that she has left which is only referred to towards the end of the film I thought the mother was dead but apparently not everybody's sure about that what did you think think about that, Steph? So, yeah, the mother's not present from the beginning. I thought it was very much a case of she died. Because, like you say, I can't imagine a mother leaving their child that early on in their life. When she was a baby, which is what the dad refers to. Which is what the dad says.

But, no, finding out that she's left, particularly as a child, yeah, I can only think that she must have either died or left under very strange circumstances. We should say that Kayla is 13 in the course of the film. She's about to leave what is in America middle school and about to go to high school. She is somewhat geeky and there's nothing wrong with that because I imagine the three of us around the table would also say we'd been geeky as 13. Oh yes, still are. Yeah, and I still am am I am that person she is not one of the cool kids but she makes these YouTube videos

where she gives Rihanna all kinds of fantastic advice about confidence none of which she's able to follow herself well I don't know I disagree actually because there are moments she talks about putting yourself out there and there is a scene where you're watching her in slow motion, it's like car crash TV,

walk towards a room full of her peers doing karaoke. And she takes the mic, you know, she's not really asked to, but she takes it because she needs to have that moment. She really kind of grasps that opportunity. Oh, that scene, I proper cringe because you don't hear her sing. Thank God. Well, I was very concerned. I was worried about that opportunity. Oh, that scene. I proper cringe because you don't hear her sing. Thank God. Well, I was very concerned because I was like, what if she's really bad?

Is this going to be worse? To demystify this for the many people listening who won't have seen this film, here's a very short clip. This is Kayla's hapless, but I think well-meaning dad, Mark, with Kayla,

played brilliantly by Elsie Fisher. They are in a car together. Can you not look like that, please? What? Like what? Just like the way you're looking. Looking at the road? You can look at the road, Dad. I obviously didn't mean that.

Just like, don't be weird and quiet while you do it. Sorry. Hey, how was the shadow thing? No, you were being quiet, which is fine. Just like, don't be weird and quiet. Cause like, I look over at you and I think you're about to drive us into a tree or something, and then I get really freaked out and then I can't text my friends. So just like, be quiet and drive. And don't look weird and sad. Please.

Okay. That's worse. Who'd be a parent of a teenager? I think the dad's doing a half-decent job. Well, more than that, actually. Bo Burnham, who's the director, is a man, and I've got a great quote from him here. He is slightly defending today's teenagers, and he said,

they are forced by a culture they did not create to be conscious of themselves at every moment. That's true, isn't it? Today's teenagers are prisoners of social media. But it's not a world they actually invented, Rhiannon. No, you're right. And I think they make this point in the film that Kayla gets Snapchat when she's 10 or 9 or 10.

Can you imagine, especially being the parent of a 9 or 10-year-old and having all those possible images, you see the pressure that she's under as well. They talk about sending nudes to each other at this age of 13. And to get the attention of the boy that she likes, she kind of pretends that she has all these new pictures of herself. When did you get Snapchat? Oh, I was a bit older than the sort of conglomerate.

I was 16, I think, when I got Snapchat. But I was saying earlier, I was a bit older than the sort of conglomerate I was 16 I think when I got snapchat but I was saying earlier I was a young leader at guides so I was very much older among all these younger girls and I didn't have a smartphone until I was a lot older so I didn't have a smartphone until I was about 18 which I was mocked for by these 13 year old girls these 13 year olds used to make fun of me yeah like it was all joking like they weren't bullying me but I used to go like oh have you got no no friends I was like oh okay but I have to say um for me this was the first time I'd seen a genuine representation of phone addiction on screen because I don't want to pick on you particularly um Steph but you have

been on your phone ever since you walked into this studio this morning I've got want to pick on you particularly, Steph, but you have been on your phone ever since you walked into this studio this morning. I've got all my notes on my phone. You don't need your notes, but that is not untypical of your generation. Yeah, of course. And I winced a lot, but in recognition in this film that every time a teenager is on screen,

they are almost certainly looking at another screen. I would say very much like in defense of my generation and the younger generation it's a broad scope now you know like i used to work in cafes and it's parents who are addicted to their phones like they've got a two-year-old in front of them who's you know no conversation so i remember lack of eye contact exactly i remember one time sitting i i was working and this dad had a young child. It was just the two of them. And the dad was playing Farmville on his phone, ignoring the child. A good point.

A good point. Well made, tragically. Yeah. Yeah, really important. I'm glad you said that. It's a broad thing. What do we make then of the fact that this man has made this film? A truly cringe-inducing film.

I think a very realistic portrayal of being a dorky teenage girl. What do you think? I think it's an incredible feat that a man has made this film. I'll be honest, I was really quite disappointed that it was a man that had to make this film because it should have been made by a woman just because it so taps into how we... Can you imagine Fleabag being written by a man?

No, it wouldn't work. Somehow this does, so i think fantastic well done to bo burnham for this but it is kind of frustrating that it takes a man to write a female experience although understandably people are saying it's a universal experience not just a female one but i do think there is an element of you know when you see elsie fisher kind of taking on kayla she hunches over her body you know she's so aware of her breasts she wants to hide them at all costs it's she covers up so much and I think that is much more a female experience of course than a boys part part of me when I was watching this film does have to wonder because I went in

being like a moderate fan of his work in particular but um why didn't he do this from the male perspective so a lot of um you know coming ofage films are very much female-centred. So part of me did wonder, why aren't we seeing a boy go through this awkward adolescent phase? I'm kind of glad it wasn't, though. I was just in Jonah Hill's mid-90s, which again taps into that whole idea of being, not really knowing where you are in the world.

And so putting the two side by side was really interesting, and I think that Bo Burnham actually does capture what it's like to be a teenager Oh definitely yeah. Absolutely a teenage girl. It's weird isn't it? It's painfully accurate. It's so painful but he never really puts words in her mouth I don't think He doesn't have to. The first couple

of minutes were her impending arrival at the horrible girls pool party and then when she gets there and she just cringes in the bathroom changing It broke my heart. It broke too, I have to say. Joan on Twitter says, I recommend taking a teenager with you to eighth grade if you can. Watching the reactions of my 17 year old to the film added much to my enjoyment. And Chris says this is important, actually.

I heard a very positive review of this on the Radio 4 show Saturday Review. And I thought my 14 year old daughter would love to see it. But it's got a 15 certificate. So she can't. It is a 15, and that's because of sexual references in the film. And I should say as well, nothing sexual occurs, although there is a worrying moment when you think, Rihanna, that it might. Yes, and it's really uncomfortable, actually, because you're seeing a very vulnerable girl alone with a boy, a much older boy. And it's really upsetting to think that older boys would be interested in this sort of pre-adolescent girl you know it's just really it's awful to watch but

what's really quite um empowering is her ability to say no and it's a real struggle for her to get it out but she does say no and i think that's so important to see that on screen again it's a really heartbreaking moment though after she says no she apologises profusely to him for saying no. And you're like, wow, that's quite heartbreaking again that she's had to apologise for, you know, protecting herself, her own body. But again, it's so real. Exactly. Yeah. Like it's very much, you know, teenager, if you've ever been a teenager or you'd like to know about teenagers, try to go and see Eighth Grade. Not perfect, but it is a really interesting slice of adolescent life in the 21st century. And you end up being hugely sympathetic to teenagers, which, if you live with any, can sometimes be quite trying.

Also, I was thinking earlier, where is the definitive British school film that isn't set in a public school, which isn't the majority experience? Any ideas on that, let me know please, at BBC Women's Hour on Twitter. We get too much American high school, not enough of the British experience. Thank you both very much, really enjoyed it. Thank you Steph, thank you Rhiannon. And our cyclone

Kenneth has caused terrible flooding in the East African country of Mozambique and this barely a month after a previous cyclone killed hundreds and devastated huge areas. Kate Turton is the head of the Department for International Development's Mozambique operation. The latest report from the UN does suggest the situation in the country is worse than originally thought. I talked to Kate earlier and asked her if this was what she is seeing. We're facing a really difficult situation. As many of your listeners will know, we had Cyclone Idai which

hit Mozambique in March, where we had around 1.8 million people affected by that cyclone. And then last Thursday night, another cyclone hit the northern province of Mozambique. What we know at the moment is that that cyclone devastated three to four districts on the coast. We've got aerial pictures of total devastation. And then the three or four days of rainfall since then has led to widespread flooding. So a really desperate situation,

a country that's been hit by two cyclones. So what's happening on the ground as far as you know? We have teams deployed from the government,, the United Nations and from the UK. So at the moment we've got rapid assessment going on of what's needed. We also have already shelter and food distributions going out. Luckily, this time around, learning the lessons from the previous cyclone, large numbers of people were evacuated from the areas that were hit. So we've seen the lower number of deaths as people took refuge in centres,

but total devastation of the communities that they left behind. When the previous cyclone struck, Kate, we did talk on Woman's Hour to Fergal Keane, the BBC's correspondent, and he pointed out that women and girls can be disproportionately adversely affected in situations like this. What would you say about that? Absolutely. I think women and with their multiple roles that they play as heads of households, as obviously mothers to children, but also the work that they do to support their households, all of that is more challenging under these circumstances. The other issue we often find is that households will often be separated.

Women and children will often move to refuges or relocation sites, leaving their husbands behind. So a set of challenges there around meeting the needs of their households, finding access to clean water, and safety challenges as well as when women are living alone. And as you said, particularly young women, of which there are a large number in Mozambique because of the structure of the population here. And what will happen to the young women? Do they stop going to school or is it simply not a priority to get them educated? Many women and young girls, an increasing number of young girls are going to school, although many still struggle. So it's a huge challenge when your schools are washed away. So, yes, young girls and all children will lose access to education, lose access to those social networks that they rely on as well.

So a huge challenge. One of the things we have been doing with women and girls in those recovery sites and those accommodation centres is giving them access to what we call hygiene kits, which basically contains very simple things like reusable sanitary pads, soap, toothbrush, a torch, some material, which can give them that dignity that they often lose in these difficult situations. And actually, things like that, which seem absolute common sense, they're relatively new, aren't they? In the past, women and girls would have been expected just to muddle through. Absolutely. And if you can imagine being a young woman in an overcrowded accommodation centre where, you know,

toilets, showers are very limited, where there's a total lack of privacy, and managing those unique challenges that come from being a woman and young girl, just getting access to those basic things can make a huge difference, obviously physically, but also psychologically. It's a fantastic experience to see the relief on people's faces when you're able to distribute those very, very basic commodities. Of course, there are some people in Britain who do question the amount of taxpayers

money that is spent on overseas aid. You're there, you're witness to events like this. How do you answer those people who do point to the very real struggles that many people in Britain are facing? And they would say, I'd rather my money went to people suffering at home? Yeah, no, I think we're very aware of that. And I guess the answer from our side is we're dealing with the most basic needs that a person can have, just literally access to shelter, food and water. And as the UK, we play a leading role actually in terms of that international development, in terms of making sure that money, taxpayers' money, really does get by the goods that get directly to those people

that desperately need it. The UK has a reputation for being a generous international player, an outward-looking player. I think if you look at the amount of money that people contributed to the Disasters Emergency Committee appeal, I think it was around £30 million in the end that UK people contributed. I think for me, that's a signal that people do care and do really want to help those in most desperate need. And I think that's what I work with. Obviously, climate change is a hot topic in Britain at the moment. What you're living through in Mozambique, that's it, isn't it? Some very vulnerable people are being hugely adversely affected by it. This is the sharp end. I think there's no doubt that these unpredictable weather patterns are leading to these kind of disasters. And the people in Mozambique are those

least able to deal with those. They live on a lot of agriculture, they have a huge long coastline, and people have nothing. So I think if we were to suffer a shock in the UK, we would always have our potential bank account, our job still left, even if some of our property was destroyed. But when these people lose their house, they lose everything in it, they lose their farmland, they're left with nothing. So I think we see the sharp end of climate change. Yeah, it's an extremely concerning situation that we will potentially see more repetition of these events as we go forward. I know your children are with you, aren't they? Which it's quite an education for them.

I imagine they'll have some very passionate feelings themselves about what's going on. I have two girls. One is 12 and one is nine. They've lived overseas most of their lives. Before we lived here, we lived in Sudan and Ethiopia. I think it makes them into empathetic, compassionate children, I think, very aware of what's going on in the world around them, experiencing huge challenges, but also insights into amazing situations and amazing people. I put it to you, Kate, there are easier ways for you to make a living in the nicest possible way. What are you doing there? I grew up in a situation where I saw people making a real difference.

I have a mentally handicapped sister with quite severe special needs. I think I grew up seeing how people around our family supported us, obviously supported by a network of volunteers and an amazing amount of support we received as a family. And I think that probably sort of alerted me maybe even when I was younger to the things that you can do that can have an impact and help others. That's Kate Turton, who works for the Department for International Development in Mozambique.

Now, tomorrow on the programme, we're talking about the skin condition, rosacea. So if that's something you have to live with, I hope you can listen tomorrow. We'll also talk, I'm told, about party bags. Well, I dealt with party bags by not providing party bags, but there may be an alternative way of going about that. So if it's something that's cropping up in your life, make sure you are with us at some point tomorrow at least, starting, of course, just after the news at 10.

Loads of you tweeting about films that feature a proper portrayal of British school life. Gregory's Girl is the one that's cropped up a lot, but, you know, that was 1981. Starred Dee Hepburn, Claire Grogan and John Gordon Sinclair, of course. Other people mentioning Kez. Yes, remember that? And a more recent one set in Wales, I'm told, a film called Submarine, which I gather I definitely should make the effort to see.

So I'll try to do exactly that. Thanks to everybody who's been tweeting away about that. Now, it's 40 years on Friday since the UK elected Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, May the 3rd, 1979. Now, Margaret Thatcher, still a divisive figure, deeply admired by many, loathed with a passion by others. This week, during the course of the week, we'll be exploring the symbolic importance of Margaret Thatcher as a female leader, focusing on the woman and her impact

on women's lives. What did Woman's Hour sound like then in 1979? Well, we've been delving into the archive. You're about to hear a class of 1949 school reunion, the young Jenny Murray at an agricultural show with the show jumper Caroline Bradley, Shirley Conran, the author of Superwoman, Thelma Holt, the executive director of the Roundhouse Theatre in London, and first up, from 1979, the voice of Agnes Curran, Britain's first woman governor of a men's prison. Obviously, there's a very onerous responsibility on me, the first woman. I carry this responsibility very, very heavily because one can always be the last. I am not out to try to prove that a woman can do a man's job. That is not my style. I just want to prove that I can do this job adequately and well and given the support

of my staff and I know I have that, I'm sure we'll do very well here together. That's the character of the woman and it's all the more impressive when you realise that the person behind those bold statements is small, slim, 58 years old, silver-haired and a grandmother. But Agnes Kern is also intelligent, confident and knows her job. After all, that's why she was selected as governor of Dungavel prison. And Dungavel is no soft option. It may look like the country house it once was, but inside the perimeter fence there are over a hundred prisoners,

many of them serving long sentences for serious crimes. are 46 lifers there at the moment all stuff that i've never dealt with before and yes i do find that an enormous challenge um i wouldn't like to face it alone we're not a collective but i work with an extremely young staff quite a lot of them are women aren't they the majority are within is that because you're a feminist i'm not a feminist no it's accidental um when i left the open space and i brought celia with me and i brought my box office majority are within it. Is that because you're a feminist? I'm not a feminist, no, it's accidental. When I left the open space, and I brought Celia with me, and I brought my box office manager with me, but the admin at the Roundhouse, which is very thinned down now, we've absorbed a lot of jobs, it's a great favourite word of me, absorb, if somebody leaves, you absorb the job, you don't replace them. We only have two men upstairs at all, one in accounts and one in the admin.

Everybody else is female, and they're all young. I find they have more stamina. That's interesting. A superwoman is not, in my opinion, a woman who can do everything or who tries to do everything. I think these sort of people are a pain in the neck. A superwoman is somebody who specifically doesn't try to do too much who knows her own limitations and sticks within them and that sue is much more difficult than

it sounds these days i think when we're all under so much pressure life has got so much more difficult and complicated in the last 10 years and i think one really has to sort of take a grip on it and decide what you want to do and what you don't want to do well like other major agricultural shows the royal bath and west attracts its fair share of international show jumpers in anyone's book it's a demanding career to choose but if you make it to the top as in any other business then the rewards are great caroline bradley is one such person and she's competing in the top classclass competition at this very moment. However, she came to see us this morning,

and we invited along to meet her five members of the Pony Club, who celebrate their Golden Jubilee this year. As a professional, do you regret not being able to take part, say, in the Olympic Games? Not at all. I don't mind not doing that. We had the World Championships last year, and that's pressure enough I don't envy people who have to do the Olympics one little bit

one of the most attractive things about Scarborough is that it's not just a seaside resort two miles out of the town centre, the Yorkshire Moors begin. There are wonderful drives through the rolling countryside and up and down the coast. This particularly attracts the older generation, but recently the town has begun consciously to try to attract more young people to balance the traditional very young and very old visitors.

Discotheques and nightclubs have opened, but still the late teens and early twenties are very much in a minority but certainly the holiday makers I've been meeting in Scarborough seem to be having a good time particularly at the children's pleasure park a mile out of the town you know there's so much we've only had a few days and tried to put everything in donkey rides Peas own park there's everything this miniature train it's super really lovely for kids. Can you foresee in 20 years' time the next generation, albeit your family or other families, carrying on this sort of group?

Well, I don't really think so, because I think the girls and boys that leave school now seem to have a much they seem to want to get away from their background. I've always had this impression, and I feel myself that I want my family to get away from, I don't want them to stay at home, whereas we all stayed at home. I think people are, let's face it, more mobile nowadays. It'd probably be very unusual to get as large a number staying in their home territory as we have. I doubt very much too if they would, as Pat said, there's definitely a feeling just now that one wants to break away from old traditions and

family background and spread your wings, which perhaps we felt, but there just wasn't the opportunity to do it in our day. Well, that was a class of 1949 reunion back in 1979, if that makes sense. And I love the bit of Jenny Murray enjoying herself with the Pony Club, the agricultural show. In 1979, I was still at school. That's not a boast. It's Lord knows I'm trying to boast about. It's just a fact. I was 14 and I've got my fantastic 1979 diary here. And on election day, May the 3rd, 1979, I have written it's general election day and Janet's birthday. I bought her a Kate Bush record. Wow. There were school elections, which is terribly exciting. But by Friday, May the 4th, 1979, I have written in some detail about the election results.

This was obviously just in case nobody else recorded the fact that it was left to a nerdy schoolgirl in Liverpool to do exactly that. And I record breathlessly here that I stayed up until 4.10 a.m. exclamation mark, listening to the election results. Supposed to be a close run thing, I put. But after Conn gained some key marginals, it was almost all over. Well, you can tell why I'm not Laura Kunzberg, can't you? Because there were signs back in 1979 that that was never going to happen. Teenage Diaries, always absolutely golden. So we're going to discuss Margaret Thatcher and her legacy throughout the course of this week. Were you conflicted on that May morning 40 years ago? Maybe you didn't support

her policies, but you were secretly a little bit surprised, elated maybe, happy at the election of a female leader. Or perhaps you've been a lifelong supporter of a woman who changed the way things were done in this country. Whatever your views, we want to get a real cross-section on the show

and across the network this week, please. So email the programme via our website, bbc.co.uk slash womanshour. Now to a wonderful new novel called How We Disappeared. The author is Jingjing Li, and I find it incredible, actually, Jing, that this is your debut novel. It's astonishing and it's incredibly moving and based at least partly on your own family's history, isn't it? Thank you so much. I'm really pleased to hear that you enjoyed reading it.

Tell me a little bit about your family. And it's not entirely about your family, but about why you felt compelled to write this book. I started writing the book because I was interested in talking about Singapore during the occupation through the eyes of Singapore during the occupation, through the eyes of local people, in particular the women. I had written a short story about a woman I called Cardboard Lady,

a 75-year-old woman who had lived through the war and harbored secrets about having been a comfort woman. And that story stayed with me so much that I couldn't stop thinking about her. So in the end, I felt I had to write about her. Now comfort woman means what exactly? It's a really horrible euphemism for prostitutes in Japan, translated from the Japanese. But it has come, these slaves, to mean sex slaves. And that's what they were. These were women who were taken and made to be sex slaves for the Japanese.

Yes, these women were sometimes tricked, sometimes sold by their families into sexual slavery. Sometimes, as with Wang Di in the book, the main character in the book, just forcefully taken by Japanese troops in occupied territories. And these were women who, in their lifetime, on the whole, never got the chance to tell their story, did they?

No, they didn't. You have to think about the fact that in those days, people just did not talk about things like that. Of course, the subject of rape has come very much to the forefront these days. There's a lot more activism towards talking about rape. But in those days, to have been raped would have been akin to telling people that you were an adulterer, basically, that you were not so much a victim as a participant in the acts. And how much or how little did you know about your own family's wartime experiences? I had very little idea beyond what my parents would talk about.

They were born just a few years after the war and they grew up listening to stories about how poor they were, how little people had to eat during the war, how horrible the rations were. But beyond that, no, there was no talk about the war very much. It was only during the writing of the book, in the later stages of writing the book, that I realised that my family had a much bigger story hidden away, which had been hidden away for decades. And this is your father's family, wasn't it? It was my father's family. What happened was my grandmother's father was living in a village where Japanese

were, there was a battle. This is called the Battle of Bukit Timah Hill. And this took place over the course of, I think, a day and a half. The British troops were busy defending Bukit Timah Hill, which the Japanese had decided was a really important place to capture. So the Japanese troops were beaten back. In revenge for having had their own troops killed, the Japanese invaded a village, which was my great-grandfather's village. When they did so, they massacred most of the people living in the village. And when you Google Battle of Bukit Timah Hill,

you see that as just one line. It's almost just a tiny footnote at the end of the Wikipedia page. Yeah, well, it might be a footnote on Wikipedia, but of course it dictated the course of your family's history, didn't it? Yes, it did. At the time, my grandmother and her older sister were living in a village away from their home village because they had been married off

as many women had been during and before the war because rumours had gone around that the Japanese troops were taking women. So my grandmother had been married off in haste, leaving my great-grandfather and his family living in their original village in Bukit Timah. So when the massacre happened, the only living survivor was my great-grandfather, and he watched his entire family being killed by the Japanese.

Now, I know this novel is not actually about your family, but I wonder, is your father proud of the fact that you've written the book, that you have used some of his family's experiences? That's a difficult question to answer because he doesn't read. And I'm not sure he loves the fact that I talk about the family in such an open way. It's not to say that he minds it very much. He would just rather not be participant to it, I think. So it's still, these scars have not healed, have they?

Is it shame? I think it's about trying to deny that the worst has happened to your family because the worst did happen. The novelist Jingjing Li, with just a glimpse into some of the family history that inspired her to write her novel, How We Disappeared, which is out now.

Now, to your thoughts on everything else in the programme today. Trudy says, I was a very overweight child with glasses, mad curly hair and a lonely child emotional problems, you better believe it she says. Rosa when my son was about 12 he became

quite pudgy but then he had a growth spurt and at 14 he was a skinny beanpole. I'm glad now I didn't make a fuss about it From Ashera, don't forget that mental health medication can make children very lethargic and tired and that of course makes them From Ashera, Let's keep the focus on no blame and wider system issues like poverty, hardship and food industry profits. Now to the subject of Eighth Grade, which is a film I appreciate most of you will not have seen.

It is out certainly in cinemas in London now. If you have teenagers, it might be worth going to see Eighth Grade if it turns up near you. Although you can't always be certain with films like this because I saw it in the arty cinema at my main mega cinema, if you see what I mean. It had been slightly put upstairs because Avengers Endgame was taking up every other screen. So it may not be that easy to see Eighth Grade, which I think is a shame because it is definitely worth seeing.

Some desperately squirmy moments, though, really quite horrendous at times here's an interesting email from a listener who lives in the states but is is a british a british person abroad uh stephanie i saw the film last year um when it came out in the states and it still resonates with me says stephanie i think it should be compulsory viewing for parents and teachers as it's such an insight into kids in middle schools in the States, also referred to here as junior high. This is the school they go to before they embark on their four years of high school. It's long been seen as a kind of stepping stone period, not quite kids but also not quite real teens. But this film shows how wrong this is. It's such a tumultuous time and

the advent of smartphones has made childhoods documented in a way that no one has seen before. I think that's absolutely right. And in this film, every child's face in almost every scene is illuminated by their smartphone because they're just gawping at it. I don't know whether American schools ban smartphone use, but not judging by this film, they don't. Everybody's got one all the time. Stephanie says, rightly or wrongly, we didn't allow our kids, who are now 21, 18, 15 and 13, phones until they started high school at 14 and 15. And we had far less hassle with their friendship groups, phone addiction, anxiety and mood swings because of this. Now when our kids' moods go from good to bad in an instant, I know it's probably got nothing to do

with a decision we've made or a bad batch of muffins I've made, but because they've received word via WhatsApp or on a DM that someone has said something about them or there is a rumour or something has triggered their fear of missing out. Whereas I grew up with lots of school friends, our drama was face-to-face in the playground with he-said, she-said gossip and petty arguments sometimes holding on overnight, of course we couldn't use the house phone at night, until the next day at school. Now kids use DMs to sort problems and direct their anger, screenshots that can share allegations in minutes, and documentation, albeit without kids' consent, of a bad break of acne or a lame outfit

or a so-called rumour going viral. It is, quite frankly, tougher to be a teen now than at any other point. I think, Stephanie, you might well be right. This from Maya. I just wanted to say it shouldn't be assumed that a woman never leaves their children. Well, this is in reference to what had happened to Kayla's mum in eighth grade. Maya says, my father brought me up on his own after my mum walked out when I was two. Yes, it is more regular for father figures to be absent,

but it isn't always that way. And from Mark, I brought my daughter up as a single dad. My daughter's mother did walk out when she was 11 months old. This film sounds like all the experiences we went through and I can't wait to see it. My daughter is now a confident, happy 23-year-old woman with a good career in recruitment. And from Kit, a discussion about eighth grade today. I thought it was sexist to repeatedly state that it was extraordinary that this film was made by a man.

Many men are as capable as many women to empathise with teenage angst. Get rid of this stereotyping, Woman's Hour. Kit, I think it was really in reference to the fact that we were, if anything, slightly irked that a man had done this rather brilliant film about a teenage girl's experience. Also worth saying we do know it's slightly harder for women to get films made. I mean, there's just no getting away from that. Something we have discussed

on the programme before. But I take your point. On the issue of Mozambique, Sarah says Jane using the phrase hot topic at the moment about climate change is ridiculous. What a ridiculous way to refer to the fact that people are finally beginning to listen to the advice of scientists and environmentalists, forcing the BBC to report such views. Well, I think the BBC has been

discussing climate change at some length and in some detail for quite some time. I don't think it's something that the BBC has just started discussing. From Joanna, I was 11 when Margaret Thatcher was elected prime minister. For me at that time, the fact it was a woman meant so much more than the politics, even though I was born into a staunch Labour working class household in Salford. As a feminist, although not labelled as such then, it felt really important that this major historical event had occurred. This is my guilty secret. No one knows I felt this way. Within a couple of years, I was far more politically

aware and active. We had the Falklands, the major threat of nuclear war, her relationship with Ronald Reagan. I did not mourn when she died, says Johanna. Caroline, I was away at finishing school in Switzerland when Margaret Thatcher won the election. Yes, really. I was 17 and I remember the morning after Margaret Thatcher's win, our headmaster rang the bell to tell us the news. We all cheered.

I'm not sure if we cheered because she was a woman or because the Conservatives got in. Well, I'm saying nothing about that, Caroline, but thank you very much indeed for your email. I hope you enjoyed the breathless excerpt from my teenage diary. I should say it's not all politics in my teenage diary from 1979 because on the 30th of April, I note,

haven't bitten my nails for years and years, well, a week. Somebody I won't name is still in Southport Infirmary with her nose, so I should stop laughing about the incident because clearly it's not funny. What happened there? We'll never know, I fear, but clearly something was afoot or a nose. Right, we're here tomorrow with talk of party bags. I can't wait either. That's the programme and the podcast. Oi, you.

While you're here, have a listen to this, would you? An environmental thriller for BBC Sounds. I'm so sorry. Meet Pan. Oh, I did. She lives a few centuries from now, after a data crash that wiped out most records of life. So when she finds an old recording of a rainforest,

she has no idea what it is. Forest 404. Nine part thriller, nine part talk, nine part soundscape. Starring Pearl Mackie, Tanya Moody and Pippa Haywood. With theme music by Bonobo. Subscribe now on BBC Sounds. Subscribe now. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts.

I'm Sarah Treleaven and for over a year I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this?

What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.