Welcome to another list of great Feel Good Friday stories!
1. Here’s the impact just one amazing teacher can have: A guy in Sacramento named Jamil Jan Kochai came to the U.S. as a kid and didn’t speak English. But his second-grade teacher somehow taught him to read and write in a single year. And for two decades, he’s been trying to track her down to say thanks. He knew her name was Mrs. Lung, but didn’t know her first name. So he recently wrote an article about it for LitHub.com, which her husband happened to see. So they finally connected over the phone but couldn’t get together because the pandemic was still raging. They finally just met up in person last month though. Once Jamil learned to write, he fell in love with it, and now he’s a published AUTHOR. His most recent book came out in July. So he had a book signing, and Mrs. Lung showed up to it to surprise him.
2. A guy from Ohio named Brad Ryan has spent the last seven years taking his grandmother to every national park. Her name is Joy, and she’s 92. They’ve been to 62 of 63 parks. Their last one is the National Park of American Samoa.
3. A 44-year-old single dad from Ohio is going viral after he planned a trip to an amusement park with his daughter and her friend . . . and posted a TikTok video trying to find a date. He posted another one later, and it looks like he found one.
4. A kennel in Alabama filled up with chemical fumes on Monday and had to be evacuated. But all 26 dogs inside made it out. Half had to be taken to the roof to get out of the fumes, and firefighters used a ladder truck to save them.
5. A baby stopped breathing on a Spirit Airlines flight last Thursday . . . but thankfully a nurse named Tamara Panzino sprang into action. She was able to get the baby to breathe again, and the passengers gave her a standing ovation. It’s unclear what happened . . . but the nurse gave the baby oxygen, did chest compressions, and massaged the baby’s legs and chest. And it worked. Tamara later said, “When you have to step forward and do what’s right, you do it. It was just a happy story, and it made me feel really good.”
6. Princeton University has announced a new financial aid program: It’s now FREE for students whose parents earn less than $100,000 per year. According to the school, over 25% of their undergraduates, or 1,500 students, will now receive aid that covers the full cost of tuition and room and board.
7. An Amazon driver on Long Island, New York saved seven people from a house fire last weekend. He was finishing his route when he saw flames. So he ran through the front door and found them all inside with no idea there was a fire. They didn’t speak good English, so they were confused at first. But he got them to leave out a back door. So everyone’s okay, including a woman and her baby.
8. An 84-year-old woman in Houston wandered off and was missing for two days this week, but she’s okay. It turned out that her dog, Maximus . . . who she’d only adopted a week earlier . . . stayed by her side the entire time.
9. The founder of the clothing chain Patagonia just donated his ENTIRE COMPANY to charity this week to help fight climate change. It’s worth around $3 billion. His wife and two adult kids were also in on the decision.
Comments