The week's good news: Jan. 18, 2024

Passenger celebrates baby's first flight by crocheting her a special hat

Romey Levine came home with a souvenir from her first vacation that will always remind her and her parents of the kindness of strangers. Romey is five months old, and spent part of the holidays in Mexico. Her parents Kelly and Jake were nervous about how she would do on the airplane, but while flying home to New Jersey, Romey was calm and fascinated by Meegan Rubin, who was sitting across the aisle. Rubin was crocheting, and with her hands "moving a million miles an hour ... Romey was just obsessed with it," Kelly told Good Morning America. Rubin noticed that Romey was watching her, and noted that the yarn she was using also matched the baby's outfit. With an hour left on the flight, Rubin finished her project and got to work making Romey a beanie. "I couldn't help it," Rubin said. She surprised the Levines with the hat once they landed. "We thought, 'What a cool way to just do something nice for a stranger,' and in turn, light up everyone else's mood," Kelly said. "It was such a selfless act."

This man has revived a language experts thought was extinct

Blas Jaime has made it his mission to keep Chaná, a language spoken by Indigenous people in Argentina and Uruguay, alive. While growing up in Argentina, he spoke Chaná with his mother, a memory keeper for the Chaná community. Because of discrimination, she told her son not to share their stories or speak the language, and it wasn't until around two decades ago that Jaime, now 89, publicly declared that he knew Chaná. The last known record of Chaná was written in 1815, when a priest jotted down hundreds of words that he learned from three Chaná men in Uruguay, and experts thought the language was extinct. Jaime has worked with a linguist to put together a Chaná dictionary of about 1,000 words, and taught his daughter, Evangelina Jaime, the language. Evangelina is now teaching Chaná to others, including her son. "She knows more than me," Jaime told The New York Times. "We won't lose Chaná."

Cape Verde declared malaria free

Cape Verde has reached a milestone not seen in sub-Saharan Africa in 50 years. The World Health Organization declared that Cape Verde, an island nation off the coast of West Africa, has not reported any locally-transmitted cases of malaria in three years. This is due to the country "strengthening its health systems and increasing access to diagnosis and treatment of all cases," BBC News said. In 2022, more than 580,000 people in Africa died of malaria, a mosquito-borne disease. Cape Verde has nine inhabited islands, and health officials stepped up monitoring of how malaria was moving between them. Countries on mainland Africa like Nigeria and Tanzania have busy borders, so it is harder to keep tabs on malaria cases, but Cape Verde's eradication "gives us hope that with existing tools, as well as new ones including vaccines, we can dare to dream of a malaria-free world," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said. Before Cape Verde's success, the last country in sub-Saharan Africa to be declared malaria-free was Mauritius in 1973.

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Blind long-distance runner raises $38,000 by running the span of Japan

Over the last decade, Gary Leung has racked up thousands of miles running in races around the world, setting records along the way. About 15 years ago, the Hong Kong resident lost complete vision in both his eyes. Leung was depressed, but soon found that long-distance running gave him confidence and the boost he needed. He earned his long-distance running coach license and became the first blind person to finish the 62-mile Antarctic Ice Marathon. He recently organized and completed the 40-day Dark Run 2023 in Japan, where he ran from the south of Japan all the way to the north. This was a charity run, and he raised $38,000 for Make-A-Wish Hong Kong. "Although a lot of people may say, 'Wow, you ran the span of Japan, you're so impressive,' I'm actually not," Leung told CNN. "The most impressive are these children. I wanted to show them that we all have our obstacles, but we must face them head-on and with bravery. When they're faced with theirs — many of them suffer from worse difficulties — they can see it's possible to overcome."

Hockey team fans donate 74,599 stuffed animals during charity event

Supporters of the Hershey Bears hockey team in Hershey, Pennsylvania, came out in full force to break a world record. Every year, fans gather for the Hershey Bears Teddy Bear Toss, where they throw stuffed animals down to the ice. The plush toys are then donated to local charities. In early January, the toss took place during the Bears' match against the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, and after Bears player Bogdan Trineyev scored a goal in the second period, stuffed animals began to rain down. It was "incredible" to see, Bears Captain Dylan McIlrath told WHTM, adding that it's "awesome" to see how many people participate every year. The Bears announced that for 2024, a world record 74,599 stuffed animals were tossed. It's estimated that since the first event in 2001, nearly 390,000 stuffed animals have been collected.