OnSpec/Pandemic • Alone but not Lonely
Whether you live across the street, or across the Atlantic, for many of us social distancing now means you cannot meet in person. Your family, your friends, that person you wanted to date…everything is on hold. But across the world we are finding new ways of bridging the distances. Margaux Benn and Menel Raach bring...
OnSpec/Pandemic • Face to Face with the Virus
What’s it like to have COVID19 in Turkey? Hilaneh Mahmoudi, a freelance photographer in Istanbul, spent weeks trying to not catch it, but one day the tell tale symptoms began. This is her audio diary, told to host Fariba Nawa, of what it’s like to have the virus, and the struggle to keep those living...
OnSpec/Pandemic • Faith Interrupted
You might think you’re further away from the world, but in many ways the pandemic is bringing us together. We begin with the religious, those who turn to faith and collective prayer in times of hardship. But they are not supposed to gather anymore in mosques, churches or synagogues. The entire concept of communal support...
OnSpec/07 – Treasure Hunters
Journalist Margaux Benn ventures to the remote province of Nimroz, Afghanistan and follows the tracks of ancient artefacts, from the desert straddling Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan, to a shop in the capital Kabul. Some could be antiquities ending up on a shelf among fakes, then illegally taken to Dubai and sold at a high price.
OnSpec/06 – Rupi’s Journey
Oscar Durand brings you the story of a Bolivian street musician in Istanbul, who like the rest of us, wonders where the years have gone and what he will do with his life. Oscar, a Peruvian and former engineer, found a common bond with Rupi on speaking Spanish and the meaning of life. (Rupi’s name...
OnSpec/05 – The ISIS Conundrum
As the world grapples with how to serve justice to thousands of foreign ISIS affiliates captured in Syria and Iraq, Australian journalist Tessa Fox travels to northeast Syria to meet the Australians accused of being affiliated with the group.
OnSpec/04 – The Badlands – Pakistan’s Tribal Areas
Umar Farooq reports on how Pakistan’s tribal areas, once proud of their fierce independence, are ready to join Pakistan proper, and how youth there worked to end a century-old collective punishment law. Locals where caught between US drones, the Taliban, and the Pakistani military. This is the untold story of the war on terror, and...
OnSpec/03 – Truffle Terror: The Iraqis Risking Their Lives in Pursuit of a Desert Delicacy
Pesha Magid travels to Anbar to bring you the story of how, and why, locals are risking kidnapping by ISIS to hunt for desert truffles. A rare but beloved delicacy in Iraq, this was the best year for them since the 1990s. The biggest of the truffles grow far out in the remotest regions of...
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