The Conversation

Parina Subba Limbu first tried drugs as a teenager. Expelled from nine schools, she eventually ran away from home. After a decade of escalating addiction, and many disastrous love affairs with other addicts, Parina finally got help to get clean, and now runs Dristi Nepal, a charity she founded to care for drug-addicted women in Kathmandu, a group she says who are harshly judged by her society.

Melinda Ferguson, who grew up in Apartheid-era South Africa, started stealing her mother's brandy aged 10, and was soon experimenting with drugs. In 1993 she tried heroin, which led to a downward spiral that saw her losing her kids, and selling her body for the next hit. Melinda's journey to recovery began in 1999, and has since published two addiction memoirs, Smacked and Crashed.

[Picture: Parina Subba Limbu (Left) and Melinda Ferguson(Right)

Karen Igho Rakos was joint winner of Big Brother Africa in 2011, and was the first Nigerian woman to win the competition. The reality star claims she was "one of the most hated" people on the planet when she entered the house because of her bold personality, but says viewers fell in love with her "good heart". Karen won $200,000, but reveals that dealing with fame has been tough.

Alexandra Zazzi hit the reality TV scene when the concept was still in its infancy. She won Sweden's Expedition Robinson, also known as Survivor in 1998, winning $17,000. Alexandra says that back then no one knew the power of this type of television, and that it could catapult contestants to instant fame; for her it was about the challenge of living on a desert island and having to find her own food and shelter.

(L) Karen Igho Rakos. Credit: JD Barnes.

Maureen Nzioki is a private investigator based in Nairobi in Kenya, a country where this industry is well established. She says she never feels guilty for trailing a suspected cheating spouse, because she is only following instructions from their husband or wife, whose trust they have broken. Although Maureen loves her job, it has made her cynical about relationships, and she now finds it hard to trust any potential partner.

Akriti Khatri runs her own private detective firm in Delhi, and after a decade in the business puts her success down to a combination of confidence, chattiness and patience. Critics say agencies like Akriti's are unregulated, employ illegal surveillance techniques and routinely invade people's privacy, but she says she is providing a useful service, preventing bad marriages from ever taking place, and catching cheats in love and business.

(Picture: Private Detectives Maureen Nzioki [Left] and Akriti Khatri [Right])

Growing up in an Israeli kibbutz taught choreographer Jasmin Vardimon all about group dynamics, but she came to dancing relatively late, aged 14. Now artistic director of the Jasmin Vardimon Dance Company in the UK, her visually stunning and exciting performances are inspired by universal themes such as brutality and justice, filtered through the personal experience of her and her dancers. Jasmin says that leading a production is like bringing up a child - at a key point you need to be able to let go and trust the dancers to do their best.

Aditi Mangaldas was trained in the classical Indian dance form of kathak from the age of five. Her Aditi Mangaldas Dance Company, Drishtikon Dance Foundation, now performs all over the world. With its fast footwork and rhythmic complexity, kathak gives Aditi a sense of feeling timeless, of being bound to the ground. She believes that there is room for the dance form to evolve and in some of her productions fuses kathak with contemporary dance. Aditi still performs on stage, and on those days says she has to become just one of the company.

(L) Aditi Mangaldas. Credit: Dinesh Khanna

As a child, Ameera Ahmad Harouda wanted to be the first female Palestinian fighter pilot, but as an adult she became a pioneer in the news field instead; starting work as Gaza's first female news fixer in 2005. Ameera's work begins when the violence escalates, and she's now the 'go to' person for many international journalists who need to hire a fixer to help them get into Gaza and gain access to stories and people.

Al Jazeera camera woman Alina Gracheva grew up in the former Soviet state of Moldova. She's covered some of the biggest news stories in recent history - the war in Chechnya, the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq, but it was the Beslan school siege in 2004, that had the biggest effect on her. Alina says that instead of focussing on the bombs and bullets, camera women can give a different perspective, "they are more likely to notice a mother in the corner, or a child with dirty fingers".

[Picture: Ameera Ahmad Harouda (Left) and Alina Gracheva (Right)]

Subadhra Devi Rai started her nursing career in a busy intensive care unit of a hospital in Singapore. She has also dedicated her life to working with those in desperate need in countries where her skills are in short supply, including Thailand, Nigeria and Laos. Subadhra, who's now a senior lecturer in health studies, recently won the Florence Nightingale International Foundation's International Achievement Award.

Rose Kiwanuka isn't saving lives but helping patients as they die, she was Uganda's first palliative care nurse in the early 1990s. Rose, who is the national coordinator of the Palliative Care Association, has the momentous task of making patients and their families, in urban and rural communities, as comfortable as possible about death.

(L) Rose Kiwanuka, Palliative Care Nurse, Uganda. Picture Credit: Alan Hofmanis

'You can never tell what type of person is getting into your car' says Iris Javed who has been driving a taxi in New York City for over twenty-two years, 'and once they're in your car you have to deal with it'. Iris, who drove an 18-wheel truck before scaling down to a taxi, has had her fair share of drunk and troublesome passengers - and even one who got into her car completely naked.

Karin Holmström has been driving a taxi in Stockholm for twenty years. She says driving is only a tiny part of the job - 'you more or less have to be a mother, a priest and a psychologist'. She's doled out relationship advice and consoled the lonely and although she welcomes all kinds of passengers, Karin has one hard and fast rule about fast food - 'they will never eat hamburgers and hotdogs in my car. I'm not a restaurant!'

(Picture: Iris Javed (Left) and Karin Holmström (Right - Credit: Stockholm Taxis)

Cori Schumacher was surfing before she was born - her mother, also a professional surfer, carried on surfing while she was pregnant. Cori got her first board when she was five and was competing by eight. She quickly came to love the sport and her dedication led her to become a three-time world champion. However, she came to have reservations about aspects of surf culture and the pressure placed on female athletes to be attractive and thin. She now campaigns to raise the status of women's surfing and to make surf culture more inclusive.

Ishita Malaviya grew up in Mumbai where there was very little surf culture. Many Indians, she says, have a fear of the sea. Ishita first learnt to surf at university. She and her boyfriend saved up to buy a second-hand board which they shared - one of them would practise in the waves while the other cheered from the beach. Now Ishita has been recognised as India's first female professional surfer. She runs a school where she 'spreads the stoke of surfing' to other Indians.

(Photo: (Left) Cori Schumacher. Credit: Maria Cerda. (Right) Ishita Malaviya. Credit: The Shaka Surf Club)

Norma Foster from Scotland discovered karate in her teens when her male friends began taking classes and using Japanese words that were strange to her. She decided to start learning herself but when it came to competitions she found herself the only woman in the room. She wasn't deterred and after spending eight years in Tokyo studying karate she now has a sixth degree black belt. Norma became the first female referee at the World Karate Federation, but her career was not without obstacles: on one occasion a competition was shut down because a member of the referee committee claimed that women were not allowed to judge male athletes. Now she wants to increase the number of women referees at all levels of the sport.

Natália Falavigna from Brazil knew she wanted to be an Olympic athlete from the age of four. She tried several sports before finding taekwondo. When her teacher told her he could make her a world champion she realised she'd found what she wanted to do for the rest of her life. She enjoys the 'explosive' nature of taekwondo which involves high-energy kicking and spinning, and the challenge of mastering her emotions during a fight. In 2004 she achieved her dream of competing in the Olympics, coming fourth place. Then in 2008 she won bronze at the Summer Olympics, becoming the first Brazilian to win an Olympic medal in taekwondo.

Picture: Norma Foster (Right) and Natália Falavigna (Left)

To celebrate the programme's first birthday, Kim Chakanetsa is at Parktown High School for Girls in Johannesburg, bringing 22 students who are in their final year and about to set out into the world, together with two dynamic southern African women who share a passion for connecting people through technology.

Khosi Zwane-Siguqa is Head of Content for the communications app WeChat Africa. She dropped out of a law degree to become a community journalist, a move her father was not happy about - but she says she has made him proud by going on to have a stellar career, becoming the youngest ever editor of South Africa's iconic Drum magazine. Her move into tech came recently, and she is now using her story-telling skills to create engaging and relevant content for one of Africa's newest digital platforms. She says her approach to content is all about community, and she is passionate about finding African solutions to African problems through technology.

Emma Kaye is founder and CEO of Bozza, an online platform that links local artists and musicians with a global audience, and enables communities to tell their stories from the inside out. A serial entrepreneur, Emma says she and risk have always been good friends - she jumps in, and only does the things she loves. After trail-blazing in South African films and animation, she realised that the next big screen in Africa was going to be the mobile phone, so went into developing apps and content. Frustrated by how few story-tellers were getting exposure, she did something about it, and her platform is now helping 10,000 artists across Africa to be their own boss.

The girls about to finish high school share their hopes and ideas for their futures, ask searching questions and seek advice from Khosi and Emma, on how to grow their confidence and achieve their dreams.

Picture: Kim Chakanetsa with Emma Kaye, Khosi Zwane-Siguqa and pupils at Parktown High School for Girls, Johannesburg, South Africa