From a powerful Alawite family in Syria, Loubna Mrie trusted the Assad regime – until witnessing its violent crackdown led her to defy loyalty and secretly film the uprising.

In 2011, 20‑year‑old Loubna Mrie was an English literature student from a high-profile Alawite family, the same minority sect as the Assads who had ruled Syria for decades. For most of her life, loyalty felt like survival. Loubna had grown up believing the Assad regime protected her community, and that dissent was unthinkable. But as the Arab Spring reached Syria, Loubna became curious and secretly went to an anti-government protest in Damascus. Unable even to chant against the president she’d been taught to revere, Loubna’s loyalties collapsed when security forces opened fire on the unarmed demonstrators. Narrowly escaping, Loubna’s decision to side with the uprising brought her into open conflict with her family – especially her father, whose wealth and power had defined her life. Yet with her mother’s encouragement, Loubna stepped into a world she’d been kept apart from: Damascus’ underground activist networks. There, among Syrians from all sects, she began using her Alawite identity as a shield – to slip through government checkpoints, smuggle medical aid, and protect friends who would otherwise be at risk. Loubna also picked up a camera, learning to film the revolution from within, convinced that showing the world what was happening might help change it.

Loubna shares her story over two episodes. In this first episode, she describes her journey from a loyalist upbringing to becoming one of the unlikely young revolutionaries who documented Syria’s uprising. In part two, the same identity that once protected her would soon become a threat when she is mistaken for a spy.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

An ordinary couple foiled the country's biggest drugs deal, all by doing a good deed. It involves a boat, a fake funeral at sea and the criminal underworld's least able seamen.

That ordinary couple of 35 years, Ed and Heather we're calling them to protect their identities, lived a quiet life in the far north of New Zealand. Ed is Māori and a well-respected mechanic and fisherman; Heather's the sort of person who offers help without thinking twice. So when a group of men turned up close by at 90 Mile Beach in 2016 asking for their help to launch their boat to spread their brother's ashes at sea, Ed and Heather did the neighbourly thing and mucked in. They had no idea what they were stepping into.

What followed over the next five days felt almost like a farce. This motley crew's boat and their skipper weren't cut out for sea-faring at all and after many failed attempts, engines blown, and flared tempers, Ed and Heather were left wondering if the story the men had told them was a little fishy.

Whilst they saw the funny side of it, something much darker lay behind the men's actions and when Ed makes a discovery, he and Heather have to stay outwardly calm or risk the men finding out.

Presenter: Asya Fouks

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

Rob Smethurst bought a bankrupt football club while his life was unravelling – then they went on to make football history and save him in the process.

Entrepreneur Rob Smethurst never planned to become the owner of a football club. In the grip of alcohol addiction, and on a four-day drinking binge, he bought Macclesfield FC – a bankrupt small-town club, way down in the rankings with a crumbling football stadium.

This is Rob’s remarkable personal story behind the headlines: about addiction, self-destruction, and the moment he realised he was losing control of his life. But buying Macclesfield wasn’t just a reckless act – it became a strange kind of lifeline, giving him purpose, responsibility, and a reason to start facing his demons and ultimately recover. This is a story about how a life was saved, football history was made and a little-town team was reborn.

If you, or someone you know, have been affected by addiction, there is help available, speak to a health professional, or search online for an organisation that offers support.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

Colm Tóibín is a celebrated Irish writer, but as a child words didn't come easily. Navigating grief as a boy when his father died, he developed a stammer. Instead of talking, Colm watched and listened, collecting stories that wove their way into his novels. He's won a string of awards and been nominated for the prestigious Booker Prize three times. His novel Brooklyn was made into a movie starring Saoirse Ronan and was up for several Oscars. He finds it hilarious that although he was invited to the event he had to be ushered in through a back door – the red carpet is apparently not for novelists. Beyond his writing, Colm was a vocal campaigner for the legalisation of same-sex marriage in Ireland. He’s also breaking taboos by speaking openly about testicular cancer and highlighting some of the comedy moments from those bleak times.

His latest book is called A Long Winter.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

Willis Chimano is one of Kenya’s biggest pop stars. With the boyband Sauti Sol, he’s won a string of awards and even danced with President Barack Obama. But behind the success, Chimano had a secret: being gay in a country where gay sex is criminalised and people who identify as LGBT+ can experience violence and harassment. Since his childhood, Chimano had been hiding his sexuality but then in 2018 he was outed. Suddenly his career stood its toughest test as he was caught in a media frenzy and dealing with exposure that threatened to derail his entire life - and his relationship with his conservative family. But Chimano emerged from the storm as role model for LGBT+ people, becoming Kenya’s most famous openly gay singer.

His memoir is called Heavy is the Crown.

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

When she was 14, Krystal Evans survived a lethal house fire. Years later, to come to terms with what she’d experienced, she turned it into a stand-up show.

The women in Krystal's family have always been funny, she says; her mother was no exception. But as well as being hilarious she also struggled with mental illness, and life in Krystal’s childhood was chaotic. With very little money, the family would move from place to place, Krystal would miss months of school and often be left to take care of her younger sister alone. When Krystal was 14, chaos turned to tragedy when a fire engulfed their mobile home in Washington State. Not everyone survived. Krystal buried the experience and tried to move on with her life, but years later, while working as a comedian, she decided to confront her memories of the fire – by turning them into a hit stand-up show: The Hottest Girl at Burn Camp.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

Joanne Briggs had always thought of her dad as a bit of a superhero. But he was hiding a dark secret.

She only saw him a couple of times a year during her childhood in the UK, but that was because Professor Michael Briggs was off travelling the world being a very important scientist. Or at least that was the story she grew up to believe. It was only in 1986, when Joanne was 23, that she first got a glimpse of who he really was. The Sunday Times newspaper exposed him as a scientific fraud, leaving his reputation in tatters. Two months later, he was dead. Joanne chose to close the door on this mysterious and destructive period of her life. But 34 years later it unexpectedly reopened, and led her on a journey through multiple lies and deception, towards a better understanding of the man she thought she knew. Joanne Briggs has written a book about her father: The Scientist Who Wasn't There.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

Fatima Whitbread grew up in a UK children’s home. She found both a mother and a coach in one person – going on to break the javelin world record and become an Olympic medallist.

Fatima had once written to Margaret that her dream was to be ‘the best javelin thrower in the world.’ Years later, she made that a reality with a record-breaking throw at the 1986 European Athletics Championships, followed by gold at the World Championships. She is also a two-time Olympic medallist.

Today, Fatima Whitbread is using her own experiences to campaign for children in care through her charity, Fatima’s UK Campaign.

Please be aware, this episode contains references to child sexual abuse.

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

When Ijeoma Uchegbu arrived back in the UK as a single mum of three young children she soon found herself living in a homeless shelter; now she is a pioneer in the field of nanoparticles in medicine.

Ijeoma Uchegbu has dedicated her career to studying pharmaceutical nanoscience, seeking out ways to carry medicines to parts of the body that are notoriously hard to reach. But as a schoolgirl in the UK her aspirations were to work in a shop and earn enough to go dancing at weekends. It was when her Nigerian father took her back to his home country, aged 13, that she discovered a passion for science and a burning ambition.

Ijeoma went to university at 16, married and started a family of her own but when her marriage failed, desperate to do a PhD she moved back to the UK. By now Ijeoma was a single mum-of-three. The family had one suitcase, no coats, and just £500 to start a new life. It was a battle to keep the family afloat, fed, and safe. But Ijeoma is a fighter; soon she had a job in a lab and a home and a few years later she found love again.

Ijeoma co-founded a pharmaceutical company with her new husband. They are currently developing eyedrops to treat blindness and a nasal spray to target pain which she hopes will go some way to addressing the opioid crisis. She was given a damehood earlier this year and is a champion of race equality, and it turns out she also has a talent for stand-up comedy.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.

Swedish youth worker Nicolas Lunabba had one strict rule: never get attached to the kids you help. Then 13-year-old Elijah moved in — and turned his mentor’s flat into a home.

In Malmö, Sweden, where poverty and violence shaped young lives, detachment was Nicolas' survival strategy.

Then he met Elijah, an eight year old with a mohawk, a basketball under his arm, and a fearless, sometimes dangerous streak. They bonded over basketball and five years later, Elijah arrived at Nicolas’ flat and made a home on his sofa. He borrowed his clothes, asked him to read aloud from a 3,600-page novel, and slowly cracked the emotional armour of a man who had spent years keeping people at arm’s length. What began as mentorship became an unconventional and powerful bond that changed both their lives in extraordinary ways.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. 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. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.