--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- Asma Khalid: This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. America is changing and so is the world. But what's happening in America isn't just a cause of global upheaval. It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere.
--:-- Tristan Redman: I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, DC. I'm Tristan Redman in London. And this is The Global Story. Every weekday, we'll bring you a story from this intersection where the world and America meet.
--:-- Asma Khalid: Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Alan Smith: My name is Zach Nelson. And I'm Cambria Nelson. And you're listening to The Happy Pod. On the BBC World Service.
--:-- Alan Smith: Hello, it's Alan Smith with you for half an hour or so of uplifting stories from around the world. This is The Happy Pod from the BBC World Service.
--:-- Alan Smith: and in this edition how one couple's love of outdoor adventures inspired an invention that helped hundreds of people.
--:-- Zach Nelson: So just riding the rig has opened my world and yeah I love it. Seeing people out and enjoying life and the outdoors that's super satisfying.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: Why you're never too old to succeed at something new.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: Live in Laura came to me and said my dad you're gonna go on TikTok. I said you're gonna go what?
--:-- Zach Nelson: Or too young to inspire others.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: I was so scared of falling from so high up.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: I need some time to step back and reflect.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: Plus, we've Italy's top dog. She likes to cuddle, but she loves to run and to have fun on her favourite beach.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: When she's in the rain, she's like, look at me.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: The whippet who secured the country's first ever win at the world's biggest dog show.
--:-- Alan Smith: To start, though, a question. I wonder how good you are at identifying sounds.
--:-- Alan Smith: One of the things that makes me happy is collecting sounds on my phone, so just for fun, I thought I'd set you a HappyPod challenge.
--:-- Alan Smith: Can you work out what sound this is? I'll give you three options. Is it A, rain, B, something in a frying pan, or C, static crackles on an old-style radio?
--:-- Alan Smith: I'll tell you the answer and why it makes me happy at the end of the podcast.
--:-- Alan Smith: Our first story is about the extraordinary lengths one man went to for a woman he'd just started dating, something that ended up changing both their lives and helping hundreds of people.
--:-- Zach Nelson: When Zach Nelson met Cambry six years ago, he wanted to share his love of hiking and the great outdoors.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: But the wheelchair she used because of a spinal cord injury wasn't up to going off-road, and they couldn't afford those that were.
--:-- Zach Nelson: So instead, he invented and built something just for her called the rig.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: The couple, who are now married and live in Utah, went on to set up their company, Not A Wheelchair, to try to reduce the costs and delays others face getting custom made mobility equipment.
--:-- Zach Nelson: Zach and Cambry Nelson have been talking to Harry Bly, starting with the moment Cambry tried out the very first version of the rig.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: I was just kind of blown away. Like, I just kept smiling. It was so fun.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: I could go on grass and not have any issues because in my manual wheelchair, I can't get very far on gravel and grass and dirt.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And so it was really fun to just go. I don't know. The first day we went a few miles.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: It just kind of felt like the world reopened because I just got used to the pavement and being in accessible places.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: So just riding the rig has opened my world. And there's just a feeling you get when you feel like, yeah, I love it.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: It's really fun to ride. Getting outside was something that I enjoy doing and I wanted her to come with me.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And so that was the goal to get her outside. But also like the more I got to know Cambry, the more I realized that like everything about accessibility is just super, super expensive.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: Like there was other off-road wheelchairs out there that cost, you know, $10,000 or $20,000.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: But like when you're dating, that's not a good day-date, you know, price point.
--:-- Zach Nelson: So I decided to weld two electric bikes together to make that first prototype.
--:-- Zach Nelson: I don't know. I think Zach is very like practical and logical and he wants everybody to be on the same playing field.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And so I see that being really rewarding. But I think also when we get videos of people enjoying their rigs, like it hits a deeper level that sometimes we forget about the impact it really has on people's lives.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And that's really fun. So the whole thing is just fun for us because like we've sold, you know, hundreds of these active wheelchairs, seeing people out and enjoying life and the outdoors and knowing that they didn't break the bank to get there.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: Like that's super satisfying, I think.
--:-- Harry Bly: Tell me about some of these videos that you've received from customers who've bought your your products.
--:-- Zach Nelson: There's been a lot. I mean, some, one of my favorites is there's, uh, this girl up in Canada actually who bought one and she just goes to like the craziest national parks.
--:-- Zach Nelson: Like there's a video of her, like crossing this rope bridge in one of our off-road wheelchairs.
--:-- Zach Nelson: And like, I never really expected it to be in that kind of extreme scenario.
--:-- Zach Nelson: Um, we also have a kid version and like seeing the little kids just out spinning donuts in the snow is like, sometimes it's surreal because I, I lived with my injury for 15 years.
--:-- Zach Nelson: And just navigating this world, you know, all the ups and downs that come with sustaining a disability and then, and dating and just like all aspects of a disability.
--:-- Zach Nelson: Cause I, I walked for 18 years and then I became a wheelchair user and I just kind of saw the world a little bit more black and white.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: I feel like until I met Zach and it's just been really rewarding to not only like have some of my barriers removed, it's been really rewarding to see it affect other people's lives because I know what it's like being in a wheelchair.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And I, I know how frustrating it is from a lot of different standpoints.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And so just, it's nice to be able to, I guess, share the wealth of Zach's incredible brain and drive and the team that is supporting really a large part of the disabled community, I feel like.
--:-- Zach Nelson: Your company is called Not A Wheelchair. Why is that?
--:-- Cambria Nelson: Well, I think part of the name of Not A Wheelchair came because I would drive it on the trails and people would stop us and be like, what is that?
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And I just think it was kind of fun to be like, well, it's not a wheelchair.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And there was a lot of people that were like, oh, can I get myself one of those? That looks really fun.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And I really enjoyed that about the rig is that it didn't make me like, maybe this is vain, but it didn't make me look more disabled.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And I feel like sometimes there's medical equipment out there that just kind of looks like rickety and old.
--:-- Cambria Nelson: And I feel like our rigs are kind of souped up and fun that it entices more than maybe just the disabled community to want to hop in
--:-- Cambria Nelson: I know I have friends that will hop on one of them with me and it one of their favourite pastimes is to go race rigs around with me.
--:-- Harry Bly: Cambry and Zach Nelson were talking to Harry Bly.
--:-- Alan Smith: Now here's a story that proves it's never too late to follow your dreams or to try something new for that matter.
--:-- Alan Smith: When lifelong singer Edwin Rayner lost his wife of 60 years, he felt there was no reason to carry on performing.
--:-- Alan Smith: That was then. Now, almost a decade on, the 92-year-old's musical renditions have been viewed by millions of people on TikTok.
--:-- Alan Smith: His latest success is this cover of Chapel Roan.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I'm very lucky, aren't I? At my age, I suppose
--:-- Sally Nugent: But then I don't think age comes into it, does it? If you've got ability You should, it doesn't matter how old you are It's not important
--:-- Sally Nugent: You can be like some of the kiddies Going in singing at school or whatever
--:-- Sally Nugent: And then when you get a bit older, like me You still keep singing
--:-- Sally Nugent: And I'm very, very fortunate
--:-- Sally Nugent: Yeah, I'll be 93 on the 31st of March
--:-- Sally Nugent: But I'm so lucky I had a wonderful wife
--:-- Sally Nugent: Unfortunately, I lost my Margaret 10 years ago and I miss her terribly.
--:-- Sally Nugent: She was a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful woman.
--:-- Sally Nugent: And it's because the way she looks after me is that I'm 93 and I can do what I can do.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I can still drive my car and I can still do my housework and I can look after myself.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I've got two wonderful daughters, of course, who are magnificent and help me, and some wonderful grandchildren and two of them.
--:-- Sally Nugent: It's their fault that I'm on TikTok because one day Liv and Laura came to me and said, Grandad, you're going to go on TikTok?
--:-- Sally Nugent: And I said, I'm going to go on what?
--:-- Sally Nugent: And then we heard a TikTok.
--:-- Sally Nugent: Anyway, we put this song on TikTok. I think it was one from the Wizard of Oz, Somewhere Over the Rainbow.
--:-- Sally Nugent: Yeah, we put it on. And we thought, remember, I had a couple of hundred likes on it.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I think we got about six or eight thousand likes, which was unbelievably.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I don't think it was possible.
--:-- Sally Nugent: Anyway, so we went on and I began to put more songs on.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I began to get quite a magnificent following I've got.
--:-- Sally Nugent: What does it mean to you? You said numbers and age doesn't matter, but likes and hits and shares, I mean, it's extraordinary.
--:-- Sally Nugent: Well, it is absolutely extraordinary and there's no doubt about it.
--:-- Sally Nugent: And I get thousands and thousands of comments and I try and read them all.
--:-- Sally Nugent: But it's so gratifying because some of the people that comment on me, were in despair.
--:-- Sally Nugent: And my singing, my songs have brought back life to them.
--:-- Sally Nugent: And it's so pleasing to know I've done this and I can do this.
--:-- Sally Nugent: And I've been a singer and entertainer all my life.
--:-- Sally Nugent: I'm very lucky to be able to do it.
--:-- Sally Nugent: And I thank God that I'm able to do these things.
--:-- Alan Smith: What an inspiring chap. Edwin Rayner speaking to Sally Nugent and John Kay.
--:-- Alan Smith: Now, when it comes to being top dog, winning Crufts really does take some beating.
--:-- Alan Smith: It's the biggest dog show in the world, with more than 18,000 entrants from around the globe.
--:-- Alan Smith: And this year, it's been won by an Italian dog for the first time.
--:-- Alan Smith: Four-year-old Whippet Mucha from Venice was named best in show last weekend.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: She's a sweetheart. She's truly a sweet dog.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: She always wants to be super close to me.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: She likes to cuddle, but she loves to run and to have fun on her favorite beach.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: Also, the other aspect of her personality is that she's very alert and very happy to be shown.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: So when she's in the ring, she's like, look at me.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: It's been an amazing journey.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: It's been fantastic to attend crafts.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: It's been my first time there.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: And the results couldn't be better than this.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: I couldn't believe it, actually.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: So for me, it was like the epitome of my career.
--:-- Giovanni Liguri: It's really hard to describe the emotion you are feeling in that exact moment, but I can guarantee that it is a super nice feeling.
--:-- Alan Smith: Mucha's proud handler, Giovanni Liguri.
--:-- Alan Smith: And Mucha wasn't the only Whippet winning prizes.
--:-- Alan Smith: A one-year-old Whippet Saluki Collie Cross, who was a rescue dog, claimed a top award after judges heard she gave her owner a new lease of life after a traumatic childbirth left her unable to leave the house.
--:-- Alan Smith: Lola, owned by Bex Hall from the south-east of England, won the Scruffs Family Crossbreed of the Year title.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: The judge didn't actually announce Lola straight away.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: She basically said that she thought that the worthy winner was the dog that saved the human because it could have gone completely the other way.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And while she was saying all of this, I was thinking, oh, my gosh, that's me.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I just couldn't believe it.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I felt so overwhelmed.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: James Welbelov Scruff's Cosbury Dog of the Year, Lola and Brix!
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I was just so happy and just so surprised that this little lurcher that nobody wanted could come this far, beat hundreds of dogs in the qualifiers and win.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And you mentioned that the judge said that Lola had saved you.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: Would you mind telling us what Lola did for you?
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: Lola came to me at a really tough time in my life.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I had a three month old son and I'd had a traumatic birth and I didn't feel like I wanted to leave the house.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: Getting Lola just meant that you know I had to leave the house to take her for a walk around the block and then suddenly I was putting things in the diary that I wouldn't have even thought about before and slowly I was getting back to being an actual person an actual human being when just being a mum that sits inside the house all day worrying about everything
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I felt a little bit of me return it was really nice.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And you mentioned there that Lola was a little dog that nobody wanted but it Sounds like her character had such a positive effect on you as well.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: She came. She was this confident little puppy.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And it just gave us like a whole different energy in the house.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: The whole house just sort of came alive, if that makes sense.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: You were always going, oh my gosh, where is she? What's she doing? Oh my gosh.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: What would you say to anyone that's thinking of getting a rescue dog?
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I would definitely say go for it.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: It's the most rewarding thing.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: Essentially, I wanted a pedigree whippet.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I wanted to go to compete at Crufts.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And then this little lurcher came.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And I can't imagine having any other dog.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I can't imagine having a pedigree whippet at all.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: I think it's just really rewarding.
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And a rescue dog is just as good as any pedigree dog
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: What a worthy worthy winner
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: And a big thank you to the judge as well
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: That the way to do it
--:-- Stephanie Prentice: Congratulations to Bex Hall and Lola
--:-- Alan Smith: Bex Hall, whose rescue dog ended up rescuing her.
--:-- Alan Smith: Still to come in this podcast...
--:-- Alan Smith: I always recall his words, that people have a voice inside of them.
--:-- Alan Smith: He gave the world that voice in a way that no one who heard can ever forget.
--:-- Alan Smith: A rather unusual broadcast from King Charles.
--:-- Asma Khalid: America is changing, and so is the world. But what's happening in America isn't just a cause of global upheaval. It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere.
--:-- Tristan Redman: I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C. I'm Tristan Redman in London and this is The Global Story.
--:-- Asma Khalid: Every weekday we'll bring you a story from this intersection, where the world and America meet.
--:-- Asma Khalid: Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Alan Smith: Now to a remarkable story about someone who's overcome her fears and set a new record and she's still only nine years old.
--:-- Alan Smith: Veronica Chick began climbing at the age of five and was soon winning indoor competitions.
--:-- Alan Smith: But after switching to outdoor climbing, she developed a fear of falling and had to take a break.
--:-- Alan Smith: Then she overcame that fear, became the youngest person from Hong Kong to complete a challenging 31 metre route called the China Climb, and won gold at her first national championships.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: When I was small, I saw those monkey bars and then I wanted to climb them.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And then, like, I really like it so much.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And then my grandfather, he brought me to climbing.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And then I like it so much. I like to climb everywhere.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And it's, like, very happy and calm.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And then it's, like, a sense of joy.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: After a year, she started to do competition and she has been reading all the competition
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And all of a sudden she told me she wanted to be an Olympian
--:-- Nishtat Lada: So I started to look into it and then try to find her national coach and all that
--:-- Vivian Wan: What's it like as a mother to watch her go through it?
--:-- Vivian Wan: Do you feel the fear as a mother when you watch her climbing?
--:-- Vivian Wan: Yes, well it's a roller coaster of emotions
--:-- Vivian Wan: I feel scared at the same time I feel very proud
--:-- Vivian Wan: We were like should we continue or not should we give up or not and then performance will surprise you and it makes me feel there is a hope
--:-- Vivian Wan: I told her do you want to give up no okay so I asked her many times shaking her head she does not want to give up
--:-- Vivian Wan: If this is what she wants, we'll go for it.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: I know you then took a little break from climbing, didn't you, last year?
--:-- Nishtat Lada: Why was that? Tell us about that.
--:-- Vivian Wan: I was so scared of falling from so high up.
--:-- Vivian Wan: I need some time to step back and reflect.
--:-- Vivian Wan: It's very scary.
--:-- Vivian Wan: How did you get over what you'd been feeling?
--:-- Vivian Wan: How did you find that strength to go back and resume outdoor climbing?
--:-- Nishtat Lada: My parents took me to Paris to watch the Olympic Games.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: I found my climbing passion again and helped me overcome the fear of falling.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And I know you climbed the very famous China climb, didn't you?
--:-- Nishtat Lada: Which is extraordinary.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: What was that like?
--:-- Vivian Wan: It was like a mix of happiness and disbelief.
--:-- Vivian Wan: It felt surreal to achieve something I had worked so hard for.
--:-- Vivian Wan: And I couldn't believe I was finally standing at the top.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: When she finished trying to climb, I wasn't there.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: Her father called me and she was like, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, what happened?
--:-- Nishtat Lada: I thought she had an accident, you know.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And he was like, she finished!
--:-- Nishtat Lada: I bust into tears and I cannot believe she can finally get it done.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: It was unbelievable.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: You must be so proud of her.
--:-- Vivian Wan: Yes, very proud.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: Each week, either me or my husband take her to training in China and then it's like five to six hours each way on a high-speed train.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: It's a huge commitment.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: And you've already achieved so much.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: What are the big goals for you?
--:-- Nishtat Lada: What would you like to do?
--:-- Vivian Wan: I want to do some harder routes to prove myself that I can do challenging routes and stuff.
--:-- Vivian Wan: My dream is to become an Olympian and inspire other people to, like, climb.
--:-- Vivian Wan: I always tell her, you can be what you want to be.
--:-- Vivian Wan: So no matter what you say you want to be, and I will fully support you.
--:-- Nishtat Lada: Vivian Wan and her daughter, the nine-year-old climbing star Veronica Chick, talking to Sports Hour, which you can find wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
--:-- Alan Smith: Now, here's a fascinating personal story of triumph over adversity.
--:-- Alan Smith: Hannah Studley, who lives in Israel, was attacked and badly injured twice in her early 20s and experienced chronic pain for decades.
--:-- Alan Smith: But then a psychologist suggested she might be able to tackle that pain by changing the way she thought about it.
--:-- Alan Smith: And she says that for her, it worked.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I got very messed up in my head.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I was terrified to leave the house.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I wasn't eating properly.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I wasn't sleeping.
--:-- Hannah Studley: The doctor just kept asking me to tell the story again.
--:-- Hannah Studley: But I remember screaming in my head, thinking, I do that all day at home.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I need you to help me not do that.
--:-- Hannah Studley: So I never went back.
--:-- Hannah Studley: That was the only treatment I ever got.
--:-- Hannah Studley: But you lived for many years with chronic pain.
--:-- Hannah Studley: Yes.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I had chronic pain for about 25 years and so bad that there was a couple of times I was paralyzed and rushed into the emergency room.
--:-- Hannah Studley: It was agony.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I had a walking stick by the time I was 27 years old.
--:-- Hannah Studley: About 10 years ago, I came across a new understanding of how the mind works.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And I went to London to train as a practitioner.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And when I finished the six-month course, all my pain had gone away.
--:-- Hannah Studley: It was amazing.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I learned about it from a friend.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And as soon as I heard that I didn't have to do all these techniques and activities to control my thinking anymore, I fell in love with it.
--:-- Hannah Studley: Because I now see that's why my body was screaming at me because I was constantly trying to fix and change how I felt.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And when I stopped doing that, the pain went away.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And the basic idea for me was that I wasn't broken and didn't need fixing.
--:-- Hannah Studley: Yes, my body had gotten damaged, but really the inner part of me can never be broken
--:-- Hannah Studley: Everything from the pain to being anxious or fearful we feeling that thinking and that what creating our experience
--:-- Hannah Studley: I knew that my pain could go away I thought because of the damage that I had experienced that it would be with me for the rest of my life.
--:-- Hannah Studley: So when I got excited about these ideas, it wasn't to fix the pain, but as my mind slowed down, as I started to understand and I had more and more insights, my body didn't need to scream at me anymore, so the pain went away.
--:-- Hannah Studley: Have you come across a lot of skepticism from traditional psychotherapists and counselors and medical experts?
--:-- Hannah Studley: Yeah, they kind of see me as an amateur.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I work with people with physical issues because that's my experience.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I work with people with trauma and anxiety.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I work with people with all kinds of mental health issues.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And I haven't found any situation where this hasn't been helpful.
--:-- Hannah Studley: It's been amazing.
--:-- Hannah Studley: One of my very first clients had fibromyalgia and she'd had it for five or seven years.
--:-- Hannah Studley: She was in so much pain.
--:-- Hannah Studley: She couldn't sit in a restaurant to eat a meal because the chair was uncomfortable.
--:-- Hannah Studley: Her husband couldn't even give her a hug.
--:-- Hannah Studley: After a few sessions, she started to feel better.
--:-- Hannah Studley: She started to have her own insights.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And by the time we finished our group of sessions, she ended up flying from Germany, where she lived, to Miami for a vacation, a dream holiday.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And she's doing great.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And we're still in touch.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And I know she's still doing wonderfully.
--:-- Hannah Studley: I've seen all kinds of situations where people People feel like their world is very small and things are hopeless.
--:-- Hannah Studley: And when they understand that they were just feeling some really horrible negative thinking and that thought has passed, they're free and their bodies get free too.
--:-- Alan Smith: Hannah Studley, who found a new way to overcome her chronic pain and rebuild her life.
--:-- Alan Smith: Of course, we recommend consulting your doctor before trying any new treatments.
--:-- Alan Smith: Now, if you're looking for some music to make you happy or even get you dancing, how about some royal recommendations?
--:-- Alan Smith: Britain's King Charles has drawn up a list of his favourite tracks from around the Commonwealth and presented them in a special podcast to mark Commonwealth Day.
--:-- Alan Smith: I always recall his words, the people have a voice inside of them.
--:-- Alan Smith: He gave the world that voice in a way that no one who heard can ever forget.
--:-- Will Chalk: Kylie Minogue came to St James's Palace to perform this song in 2012 in advance of the Diamond Jubilee visit to Australia.
--:-- Will Chalk: We had a large reception for Australians in the United Kingdom and as Kylie is an ambassador for my now King's Trust, she very generously agreed to come and perform.
--:-- Will Chalk: The song is The Locomotion and this is music for dancing.
--:-- Will Chalk: Again, it has that infectious energy which makes it, I find, incredibly hard to sit still.
--:-- Will Chalk: This very last song is one of my particular favourites.
--:-- Will Chalk: It is Upside Down by Diana Ross.
--:-- Will Chalk: When I was much younger, it was impossible not to get up and dance when it was played.
--:-- Will Chalk: And I wonder if I can still just manage it.
--:-- Daniela Relf: The programme, called The King's Music Room, made with Apple Music, is thought to be the first time a British monarch has appeared on a podcast.
--:-- Daniela Relf: It was something they very much wanted to do because of its connection to the Commonwealth.
--:-- Daniela Relf: That was the big push for them.
--:-- Daniela Relf: But it is something new in terms of what the king has done before.
--:-- Daniela Relf: Yeah, I think when most of us picture a stereotypical royal, they're probably listening to classical music or a string quartet or something.
--:-- Daniela Relf: Clearly from this programme, that's not the case.
--:-- Daniela Relf: So what does this say about like attempts to modernise the royal family's image?
--:-- Daniela Relf: Look, I think we should first say that, you know, the King is an expert on classical music.
--:-- Daniela Relf: So I think that is probably his comfort zone.
--:-- Daniela Relf: But he does like more modern music, we're told, especially because on all those trips that he does around the world, he is exposed to the music of those countries.
--:-- Daniela Relf: And clearly some of them have had a real impact on him.
--:-- Daniela Relf: But a long list was drawn up where his family, friends, people he worked with were consulted.
--:-- Daniela Relf: That long list was taken up to the king at Sandringham one weekend a few weeks ago where he listened and made his own short list.
--:-- Daniela Relf: And it's interesting what he says during the program about the choices that he has made.
--:-- Daniela Relf: And he talks really movingly about meeting Bob Marley and the impact of meeting him decades ago and subsequently the contact he's had with the Marley family and the visits to Jamaica but that really moved him and it was a voice that he said was hard to forget.
--:-- Daniela Relf: And then you know in more recent times he clearly knows and likes Kylie
--:-- Daniela Relf: I don't think there's any question about that at all.
--:-- Daniela Relf: You know, Kylie Minogue on this programme representing Australia, she's played in front of the King a number of times.
--:-- Daniela Relf: There is this common theme, actually, when you listen to what he says about dancing.
--:-- Daniela Relf: I was going to bring that up because, again, you don't often picture a King dancing, but then does that feed into, is this an effort from Buckingham Palace to kind of, to humanise maybe a bit?
--:-- Daniela Relf: 100%.
--:-- Daniela Relf: I mean, you know, he obviously is an incredibly formal figure in public life.
--:-- Daniela Relf: And I think any attempt there is to reach new audiences, to perhaps take the edges, the formal edges off the king, they will try to do.
--:-- Daniela Relf: It also gets people thinking about the Commonwealth countries and where he is working and where he's visited.
--:-- Daniela Relf: But the dancing thing is a common theme.
--:-- Daniela Relf: Diana Ross, Kylie, it's all there.
--:-- Daniela Relf: Ray, Michael Bublé, Beyonce crazy and love makes the cut as well.
--:-- Daniela Relf: So it's a really eclectic list, very much focused on modern music.
--:-- Alan Smith: That was Daniela Ralph.
--:-- Alan Smith: And that's all from the Happy Pod for now.
--:-- Alan Smith: But just before we go, here's that happy sound I played you at the start.
--:-- Alan Smith: Did you work out what that was?
--:-- Alan Smith: Well, the answer is rain.
--:-- Alan Smith: I recorded it in the Lake District in the northwest corner of England, which is the place that I grew up.
--:-- Alan Smith: So from the very young age, I was taught to love the rain because without it, we wouldn't have the lakes that the region is famous for.
--:-- Alan Smith: I still like the sunshine, mind.
--:-- Alan Smith: And this got us thinking. Is there a sound that makes you happy?
--:-- Alan Smith: If there is, we'd love to hear about it.
--:-- Alan Smith: Why not send us a voice note to tell us about the sound that's special to you?
--:-- Alan Smith: Send it to globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk.
--:-- Alan Smith: And you might like to know that you can now watch some of our interviews on YouTube.
--:-- Alan Smith: Just search for The Happy Pod.
--:-- Alan Smith: This edition was mixed by Nicola Brough, and the producers were Holly Gibbs and Rachel Bulkeley.
--:-- Alan Smith: The editor is Karen Martin.
--:-- Alan Smith: I'm Alan Smith.
--:-- Alan Smith: Until next time, it's goodbye.
--:-- Alan Smith: And this is The Global Story.
--:-- Alan Smith: Every weekday, we'll bring you a story from this intersection, where the world and America meet.
--:-- Alan Smith: Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
