Outlook Mixtape: The tip-off, a seagull, and a lover’s escape

When FT journalist Dan McCrum got a tip-off about a booming German tech company, he was immediately intrigued. In the space of just a few years, Wirecard had come from nowhere to overtake established German financial giants on the stock market. But as McCrum dug deeper, he encountered a story stranger and more dangerous than he had imagined.

Luzmila Carpio learned to sing by imitating songbirds. Born in 1949 in the Quechua-Aymara community of Qala Qala in Bolivia she wanted to use her music to be a voice for indigenous people. Her chance came aged 11 when by accident she found her way into a radio audition.

Before he became a world-famous novelist, Bernhard Schlink had a life straight out of a romance-thriller. As a West German student of 19 he fell in love with a woman from East Germany at a propaganda festival. Unable to be together across the divide, they hatched a plan to help her escape, but to do it he’d have to rely on the mafia and evade the clutches of the all-seeing Stasi.

Presenter: India Rakusen
Producer: Edgar Maddicott

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(Photo: Cassette tape. Credit: Getty Images)