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Outlook Mixtape: A lost cello and a mother and child reunion

When Delimar Vera was stolen from her family home as a baby, her mother鈥檚 plan to get her back all hung on a strand of hair. Plus, a lost cello, and woolly spider monkeys.

On the night of December 15th, 1997, a fire broke out in the home of Luz Cuevas and Pedro Vera, a couple living in Philadelphia with their two young sons and their ten-day-old daughter, Delimar. She was asleep upstairs. In the aftermath, no trace of baby Delimar was found 鈥 presumed dead. But in circumstances almost too extraordinary to believe, Delimar was alive and being raised only 20 kilometres or so across town. She had been renamed Aaliyah, and lived with Carolyn, a woman she thought was her mother.

Born under the rule of Libyan dictator Colonel Gaddafi, the novelist Hisham Matar spent much of his childhood in hiding. Hisham鈥檚 family had been forced to flee when threats were made against his father, a prominent critic of the regime. Now four decades on, he reflects on how the turbulence of his upbringing has shaped his life and work.

There used to be half a million Northern Woolly Spider Monkeys 鈥 or Muriqui 鈥 in Brazil. But today just 900 are left. Reporter Gibby Zobel travelled to a nature reserve in the state of Minas Gerais to find out more about the monkeys and the man who devoted his life to protecting them. This interview was first broadcast in 2020.

When Christine Walevska was given a rare, one-eight-size Bernardel cello at the age of eight, she fell in love with it immediately and it set her on a path to become an internationally renowned concert cellist. The tiny cello, given to her by her father, had an intriguing label on the inside鈥 it said, 鈥淧our la petite Comtesse Marie 1934鈥. This label would prove crucial after the cello was stolen from Christine鈥檚 father鈥檚 shop in 1978. It led 鈥 36 years later 鈥 to Christine receiving an email from the Breshears family in California. They had been searching for a rare child-sized cello for their gifted daughter Starla and had finally found one. Was it Christine鈥檚 beloved Bernardel? The story of a rare cello, its theft and how it shaped the dreams of two talented girls. This was first broadcast in 2020.

Presenter: Asya Fouks

Get in touch: outlook@bbc.com or WhatsApp +44 330 678 2707

(Photo: Cassette tape. Credit: Getty Images)

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