Lives Less Ordinary
Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.
Each episode a guest shares their most dramatic, moving, personal story. Listen for unbelievable twists, mysteries uncovered, and inspiring journeys - spanning the entire human experience.
Our guests come from every corner of the globe: from Burundi to Beverly Hills, New Zealand to North Korea, Rajasthan to Rio. And their stories can be about anything: tales of survival, humour, resilience and intrigue. From the mind-blowing account of the Japanese man trapped in his own reality TV show, to the Swedish women rescued from lions by a tin of spam. It’s life’s wild side, in stereo.
Lives Less Ordinary is brought to you by the team behind Outlook, the home of true life storytelling on BBC World Service radio for nearly 60 years.
Got a story to tell? Send an email to [email protected] or message us via WhatsApp: 0044 330 678 2784
You can read our privacy notice here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/5YD3hBqmw26B8WMHt6GkQxG/lives-less-ordinary-privacy-notice
- Update frequency
- every 6 days
- Average duration
- 39 minutes
- Episodes
- 186
- Years Active
- 2022 - 2025
Exposing Silicon Valley's multimillion dollar fraud
Erika Cheung went from a trailer park to a top tech company job, but something was off.
She knew how to work hard, growing up in a one-bedroom trailer, she dreamed of pursuing her passion for science …
My grandmother walked the rabbit-proof fence
Maria's grandmother was forcibly taken by Australian officials, but made a daring escape.
As children Maria Pilkington's mother and grandmother were both among the Stolen Generation, removed from thei…
How to talk to guerillas
Leyner Palacios grew up around volatile armed groups, so he learned to negotiate with them.
He comes from a remote forested area called Bojaya, where clusters of small villages are spread along isolat…
Behind the locked door
The Austrian house where a doctor experimented on children.
Evy Mages grew up in and out of foster care in 1970s and 80s Austria. But even when she started a new life in the US, she was haunted by tra…
I cycled across Africa for a place at my dream university
A handwritten map is all Mamadou Barry had to guide him from Guinea to Egypt.
At the age of 24 he had reached a crossroads in his life. Having failed his final year secondary school exams five times i…
Going cold turkey in a Bangkok prison
A life shaped by addiction.
Australian Holly Deane-Johns had a complicated childhood. Her parents ran an escort agency from their home, and heroin addiction later took over the whole family. She was f…
The Pacific odyssey of a runaway rebel
Ruth Shaw spent years on ships and islands, trying to outrun her past.
She left her home in New Zealand as a young woman, driven away by a traumatic attack that would shape her life for years to come.…
Fugees Family: the football team who became my life
The extraordinary coach who started a football team but built something much bigger.
One day when Luma Mufleh was driving home to Atlanta, Georgia, she came across a group of barefoot boys playing foo…
My dad was Britain's 'most wanted'
Without realising it, Nick Reynolds had been living his childhood on the run.
Early one morning in 1968 he answered his front door, completely oblivious to the whirlwind about to be unleashed on his f…
Trapped in an icy hell: my 72 day mountain escape
After crashing high in the Andes, Nando Parrado had to go to the extreme to get out.
In 1972, when the plane carrying 22 year old Uruguayan Nando Parrado and his rugby team came down deep in the Andes…
A Libyan kidnapping and the words that brought us together
Lucy Sexton was making a TV series about hostages when her father Joe was abducted
Lucy and her father Joe Sexton are American journalists. In 2021 Lucy was working on the TV series ‘Hostages’ when he…
Discovering my mother was a Vietnamese rock'n'roll star
A chance email led Hannah Ha to uncover her mother Tam’s forgotten musical legacy.
Hannah knew her mother could sing. When she took the stage at karaoke, she always stole the show. But when a chance e…
Searching for the last man in the forest
Jair Candor tracks down remote Amazonian tribes in order to protect them from outsiders.
One tribe, the Piripkura has just one member left who’s living nomadically, deep in the rainforest. It’s Jair’s…
Hunting for icons in the underworld, part 2
Tasoula Hadjitofi tricked a notorious art smuggler to recover Cyprus' holiest relics
When war split Tasoula's home country of Cyprus in two in 1974 she had to leave home, never to return. Years later,…
Hunting for icons in the underworld, part 1
Tasoula Hadjitofi uncovered a shady network looting her country's most sacred relics
In 1974 Tasoula's country, Cyprus, was torn in two by war. Distraught and unable to return home she ended up in the…
Love in the time of revolution, part 2
Pepe and Lucía: the bonfire of young love, a long separation, and rise to presidency.
The guerrilla lovers finally meet and fall for each other, but their joy is shortlived, they’re soon arrested agai…
Love in the time of revolution, part 1
Pepe and Lucía: the guerrilla lovers who became the leaders of Uruguay
When they were younger, José Pepe Mujica and Lucía Topolansky separately joined a left-wing insurgency set on overthrowing the co…
An author, his cellmate, and a new beginning
When award-winning author Alex Wheatle was sentenced to nine months in prison at the age of 18, he thought his life was over.
Alex had been born in London to Jamaican parents, but grew up in care in …
Scams and poetry in Moscow’s underbelly
Eric Ngalle is now a poet and academic in the Welsh capital of Cardiff, but it's his experiences as a people-trafficked teenager that inspire much of his work. When he was 17, he found himself broke …
Introducing Amazing Sport Stories
Sport but not as you know it. A brand new sports storytelling podcast.
Imagine being stranded in the “death zone” on one of the world’s highest mountains. How about running 200 miles in a dark tunnel?…