Every Friday, 100,000 people get a little good news delivered to their inboxes… and this week’s newsletter was packed with stories worth sharing again.
South Africa (05 September 2026) – A restaurant burned down in Durban this week. A family watched decades of memories disappear into flames, a beloved parrot was lost and one of the city’s long-standing institutions was left gutted. There is no “good things” spin for that part of the story and there shouldn’t be.
But then people started helping.
In the middle of the Delfi Greek Taverna fire, a Durban chef named Ayakha Godlwana saw someone trapped inside, took off his shirt, soaked himself in water, and ran into the burning building. He had no firefighting experience beyond a few YouTube videos but he went in anyway, risking his own life to save another. Then, once she was safe, he left before anyone even knew his name.
Durban went looking for him. We went looking for him. And eventually, we found him. But Ayakha was only the beginning of what happened next. As the scale of the devastation became clear, the community began rallying around the Teranes family. People offered help and a crowdfunding campaign started growing as South Africans from far beyond Durban reached out to support a family many had never met.
It made me think about my favourite quote, something Fred Rogers famously said when talking about frightening moments, “Always look for the helpers”.
The helpers are always there.
We cannot always choose what happens around us but we get to choose what we do when it happens. And every week, I get to watch South Africans make that choice over and over again. The helpers are everywhere! That is really what Good Things Guy has always been about.
11 Years of Good News on Your Screens and in Your Inbox
Our Good Things Guy newsletter has been part of the platform since we started. It’s been sent every Friday for 11 years… and today it goes out to around 100,000 subscribers.
Every week, our team publishes around 110 stories (about the helpers), which means squeezing everything we do into one newsletter would require a very large cup of coffee and an unreasonable amount of scrolling. Instead, we choose 15 stories from the week that was… the moments that made us smile, laugh, cry, cheer or remember why there is still so much good happening around us.
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These are just a few of the stories we loved this week.
Who Knew the World Could Love a Hippo This Much?
Bumpy is back, he is considerably bigger than when we first met him, and apparently fame has gone straight to his head because our favourite little hippo has now upgraded himself to poolside accommodation.
The orphaned calf captured millions of hearts earlier this year after being rescued in Kenya and taken into the care of the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. His earliest days were filled with bottle feeds, blankets and round-the-clock care after an unimaginable start to life but the Bumpy we are watching today is a very different little hippo.
A new video of him splashing around his pool clocked up more than 800,000 views in just two days (it is now sitting on almost 1 million views), with the Trust explaining, “Bumpy is a real showman. He seems to understand the effect he has on us and delights in it“.
You can watch that video and get the full article here.
After 46 Years, Mr Ndlela Gets the Farewell He Deserves
How do you say thank you for 46 years? Howick Preparatory School decided a card and a retirement cake wouldn’t cut it when Mr Howard Ndlela retired after serving the school since 1981.
Mr Ndlela joined the school when he was just 18 and became part of its fabric, working over the decades as a caretaker, chef, cleaner, cobbler and so much more. Generations of learners knew him as uMalume, the man forever singing “Hallelujah” with a huge smile on his face.
So the school made one of his lifelong dreams come true by taking him on his very first aeroplane flight. They renamed the original school building The Howard Ndlela Centre in his honour, and then learners gathered for “Howard’s Final Walk of Honour”, applauding as he walked through the school one last time.
It is such a beautiful story. Giving back to someone who has given so much of themselves. Read it here.
Of Course Someone Made an Airlink Game
South Africans (and many around the world) were handed one of the biggest internet talking points of the week when two Airlink jets flew over Cape Town’s DHL Stadium ahead of the Springboks versus All Blacks clash last Saturday.
The footage went global. Everyone had an opinion. The debates started. The memes arrived. And then, just two days later, somebody built a game.
Flappy Link puts you behind the controls of a tiny passenger plane flying over Cape Town, where the objective is to get as close to the stadium as possible without crashing. There is a clearance measurement, a leaderboard and one beautifully ridiculous instruction: “LOW IS GOOD”.
The planes won’t be flying over the Joburg game today, due to the rainy weather… but you can still play Flappy Link! Watch out the Hadedas.
SPAR Hero of the Week: A Matriculant Jumps In to Help Save a Life
An ordinary Monday afternoon at the mouth of Durban’s Umgeni River became a life-or-death rescue when a man was caught by the incoming spring tide and swept upriver.
Security officers raised the alarm, fisherman Roland Theron called the NSRI, car guard Njabulu Zondi flagged down local paddler Tony Botes headed onto the water to reach the struggling man. Then 18-year-old Clifton School matriculant Cole Nienhuser saw what was happening. Cole, an experienced paddler with former lifeguarding experience, jumped into the water and joined the rescue, eventually using a lifeguard technique to help swim the man through deeper water and towards safety.
It is an incredible story. Helpers everywhere. Read it here.
This Week’s Kids’ Storybook: The Car Guard Who Became Grandpa’s Friend
This week’s Kids’ Storybook feature retells a beautiful South African story for our younger readers.
Samantha and her grandfather Gavin regularly visited the same shopping centre, where they became friends with a cheerful car guard named Guy. He would greet Gavin with “Hello, Gramps!”, and when Samantha did not have cash for a tip, she would occasionally bring Guy a loaf of bread or a cold drink instead. Those little exchanges slowly became a friendship.
Then Gavin became ill and landed in hospital. When Samantha next arrived at the shopping centre alone, Guy immediately noticed that “Gramps” was missing. A few days later, Guy and his wife went to visit Gavin in hospital!!!!
Kindness is not measured by how much money you have. It is measured by how much heart you give away. You can get the full Kids Storybook story here.
Our OnePlan Pawsitive Story: Two Missing Dogs Make It Home
A hijacking in Bryanston last week could have ended very differently for two beloved dogs who were still inside the vehicle when it was stolen. The dogs were eventually abandoned in Wynberg, an industrial area near Sandton, where 24/7 Security Services officer Atang Nyanintsimbi spotted them wandering around as he started his evening shift.
He took photographs and posted them to a local WhatsApp group, where a cluster manager connected them to the hijacking reported earlier that day. By then the dogs had moved on, so Officer Nyanintsimbi went back out and searched until he found them again. They were frightened and difficult to approach, so K9 handlers Keenan Stewart and Ethyn Pretorius joined the rescue, spending close to an hour patiently gaining their trust. One of the dogs is deaf and eventually climbed onto an officer’s lap, where she stayed until her owner arrived.
Hijackings don’t usually have happy endings. This one did. Read the full story here.
And that was just a little taste of all the good things we reported on this week. You can get all our good things by visiting www.goodthingsguy.com.
The bad news will always demand our attention. Good news asks something different of us… that we pay attention to what happens next. Look at who arrives. Look at who helps. Look at who donates, searches, rescues, visits, comforts, notices or just refuses to walk away.
Fred Rogers was right… look for the helpers… you will always find them.
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