{"podcast":{"title":"The Documentary Podcast","slug":"the-documentary-podcast-487670","podcast_index_feed_id":487670,"rss_url":"https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/p02nq0lx.rss","website_url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02nq0lx","image_url":"http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/3000x3000/p0kxnkls.jpg","author":"BBC","episode_count":2000,"summary":"Hear the voices at the heart of global stories. Where curious minds can uncover hidden truths and make sense of the world. The best of documentary storytelling from the BBC World Service. From conflict in the Middle East to the advance of AI, to the front line of the climate emergency, we go beyond the headlines. Each week we dive into the minds of the world’s most creative people, take personal journeys into spirituality and connect people from across the globe to share how news stories are shaping their lives.","last_synced_at":"2026-07-24T10:20:39.856026+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670"},"episode":{"title":"When Shiraz calls","slug":"when-shiraz-calls","published_at":"2026-05-21T00:30:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670/when-shiraz-calls","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670","url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0nmdh8d","audio_url":"http://open.live.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/6/redir/version/2.0/mediaset/audio-nondrm-download-rss-low/proto/http/vpid/p0nmdgxy.mp3","summary":"A personal account of day-to-day life in Iran told through the conversations of two Iranian sisters – one in the UK, the other in the Iranian city of Shiraz. Since the outbreak of war at the end of February, a near total internet blackout and a shutdown of international phone lines by the Iranian authorities has meant limited information has got out of the country. But the sisters have made recordings of their conversations which have been shared with the BBC. They discuss when the bombs land, the destruction of places they love and the realities of an economy that’s being brought to its knees. They struggle to sleep at night. Salaries don’t come through. It’s a roller coaster of emotions. But there are also moments of calm and comfort, a spot of dark humour and the scent of hyacinths.","meta_description":"A personal account of day-to-day life in Iran told through the conversations of two Iranian sisters – one in the UK, the other in the Iranian city of Shir…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":1703,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-documentary-podcast-487670/episodes/when-shiraz-calls/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670/when-shiraz-calls.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}