20 years ago today, the Netherlands became the first country to legalize marriage equality
One of the biggest changes in the developed world over the past 20 years has been the expansion of gay rights and the acceptance of the LGBT community. In the U.S., a poll conducted in 2004 found that Americans opposed gay marriage by a margin of 60% to 31%. By 2019, those numbers had flipped…
One of the biggest changes in the developed world over the past 20 years has been the expansion of gay rights and the acceptance of the LGBT community. In the U.S., a poll conducted in 2004 found that Americans opposed gay marriage by a margin of 60% to 31%. By 2019, those numbers had flipped with 61% being pro-gay marriage 31% against.
One of the landmark moments in the fight for gay rights happened twenty years ago to the day, April 1, 2001, when the Netherlands became the first country in the world to legalize gay marriage.
It all began in the mid-’80s when a group of gay rights activists, headed by Henk Krol – then editor-in-chief of the “Gay Krant” – asked the government to allow same-sex couples to marry.
In 1995, the Dutch parliament created a commission to investigate the idea and in 1997, it decided that marriage rights should be extended to same-sex couples.
In September 2000, the final legislation draft was debated in the Dutch Parliament and it passed the House of Representatives by 109 votes to 33 and later, the Senate, by 49 votes to 26.
#OnThisDay in 2001, four same-sex couples?️?tied the knot in Amsterdam's city hall, making history as the Netherlands ?? became the first country to legalise gay marriage? pic.twitter.com/k6WPKoHUHy— Openly ?️? (@Openly) April 1, 2021
At the stroke of midnight on April 1, 2001, the mayor of Amsterdam Job Cohen married four gay couples in a joint ceremony.
“There are two reasons to rejoice,″ Cohen told the newlyweds before pink champagne and pink cake were served. ″You are celebrating your marriage, and you are also celebrating your right to be married.″
Gert Kasteel and Dolf Pasker were among the four couples to be married by the mayor that day. “It is very nice to look back to see how young we were,” he said watching a video of the ceremony.
“I’m very proud that it’s possible,” Kasteel told Reuters. “that we could play a little part of it. We made history.”
Since the Netherlands legalized gay marriage, it has been made legal in 28 countries worldwide as well as the self-governing island of Taiwan.
The Netherlands marked the anniversary by floating a massive inflatable pink cake with candles spouting rainbow flames through Amsterdam’s canals and flying a large gay pride flag from the church next to the Anne Frank House.
“Nearly 30 countries followed the Netherlands so that’s really very nice. Very good for the gay people and for society as a whole, I think because it’s important that everyone in society feels at home,” Pasker said.
Amsterdam’s mayor celebrated the occasion by noting that the gay rights movement has only just begun. “At the same time it is a moment to recognize that the struggle is not yet over; not worldwide, not nationally, but also not in Amsterdam,” Mayor Femke Halsema told The Associated Press.
Gay marriage is still illegal in over 70 countries across the globe. In eight of them, homosexuality is punishable by death.
“If you had told me 20 years ago that today same-sex marriage would be a reality in 29 countries, I would not have believed you,” Jessica Stern, executive director of the global LGBTQ-rights group OutRight Action International.
“The progress has been great, no doubt. But we have a long road ahead,” Stern said.
In a small village in Pwani, a district on Tanzania’s coast, a massive dance party is coming to a close. For the past two hours, locals have paraded through the village streets, singing and beating ngombe drums; now, in a large clearing, a woman named Sheilla motions for everyone to sit facing a large projector screen. A film premiere is about to begin.
It’s an unusual way to kick off a film about gender bias, inequality, early marriage, and other barriers that prevent girls from accessing education in Tanzania. But in Pwani and beyond, local organizations supported by Malala Fund and funded by Pura are finding creative, culturally relevant ways like this one to capture people’s interest.
The film ends and Sheilla, the Communications and Partnership Lead for Media for Development and Advocacy (MEDEA), stands in front of the crowd once again, asking the audience to reflect: What did you think about the film? How did it relate to your own experience? What can we learn?
Sheilla explains that, once the community sees the film, “It brings out conversations within themselves, reflective conversations.” The resonance and immediate action create a ripple effect of change.
MEDEA Screening Audience in Tanzania. Captured by James Roh for Pura
Across Tanzania, gender-based violence often forces adolescent girls out of the classroom. This and other barriers — including child marriage, poverty, conflict, and discrimination — prevent girls from completing their education around the world.
Sheilla and her team are using film and radio programs to address the challenges girls face in their communities. MEDEA’s ultimate goal is to affirm education as a fundamental right for everyone, and to ensure that every member of a community understands how girls’ education contributes to a stronger whole and how to be an ally for their sisters, daughters, granddaughters, friends, nieces, and girlfriends.
Sheilla’s story is one of many that inspired Heart on Fire, a new fragrance from the Pura x Malala Fund Collection that blends the warm, earthy spices of Tanzania with a playful, joyful twist. Here’s how Pura is using scent as a tool to connect the world and inspire action.
A partnership focused on local impact, on a global mission
Pura, a fragrance company that recognizes education as both freedom and a human right, has partnered with Malala Fund since 2022. In order to defend every girl’s right to access and complete 12 years of education, Malala Fund partners with local organizations in countries where the educational barriers are the greatest. They invest in locally-led solutions because they know that those who are closest to the problems are best equipped to solve and build durable solutions, like MEDEA, which works with communities to challenge discrimination against girls and change beliefs about their education.
But local initiatives can thrive and scale more powerfully with global support, which is why Pura is using their own superpower, the power of scent, to connect people around the world with the women and girls in these local communities.
The Pura x Malala Fund Collection incorporates ingredients naturally found in Tanzania, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Brazil: countries where Malala Fund operates to address systemic education barriers. Eight percent of net revenue from the Pura x Malala Fund Collection will be donated to Malala Fund directly, but beyond financial support, the Collection is also a love letter to each unique community, blending notes like lemon, jasmine, cedarwood, and clove to transport people, ignite their senses, and help them draw inspiration and hope from the global movement for girls’ education. Through scent, people can connect to the courage, joy, and tenacity of girls and local leaders, all while uniting in a shared commitment to education: the belief that supporting girls’ rights in one community benefits all of us, everywhere.
You’ve already met Sheilla. Now see how Naiara and Mama Habiba are building unique solutions to ensure every girl can learn freely and dare to dream.
Naiara Leite is reimagining what’s possible in Brazil
Julia with Odara in Brazil. Captured by Luisa Dorr for Pura
In Brazil, where pear trees and coconut plantations cover the Northeastern Coast, girls like ten-year-old Julia experience a different kind of educational barrier than girls in Tanzania. Too often, racial discrimination contributes to high dropout rates among Black, quilombola and Indigenous girls in the country.
“In the logic of Brazilian society, Black people don’t need to study,” says Naiara Leite, Executive Coordinator of Odara, a women-led organization and Malala Fund partner. Bahia, the state where Odara is based, was once one of the largest slave-receiving territories in the Americas, and because of that history, deeply-ingrained, anti-Black prejudice is still widespread. “Our role and the image constructed around us is one of manual labor,” Naiara says.
But education can change that. In 2020, with assistance from a Malala Fund grant, Odara launched its first initiative for improving school completion rates among Black, quilombola, and Indigenous girls: “Ayomidê Odara”. The young girls mentored under the program, including Julia, are known as the Ayomidês. And like the Pura x Malala Fund Collection’s Brazil: Breath of Courage scent, the Ayomidês are fierce, determined, and bursting with energy.
Ayomidês with Odara in Brazil. Captured by Luisa Dorr for Pura
Ayomidês take part in weekly educational sessions where they explore subjects like education and ethnic-racial relations. The girls are encouraged to find their own voices by producing Instagram lives, social media videos, and by participating in public panels. Already, the Ayomidês are rewriting the narrative on what’s possible for Afro-Brazilian girls to achieve. One of the earliest Ayomidês, a young woman named Debora, is now a communications intern. Another former Ayomidê, Francine, works at UNICEF, helping train the next generation of adolescent leaders. And Julia has already set her sights on becoming a math teacher or a model.
“These are generations of Black women who did not have access to a school,” Naiara says. “These are generations of Black women robbed daily of their dreams. And we’re telling them that they could be the generation in their family to write a new story.”
Mama Habiba is reframing the conversation in Nigeria
Centre for Girls' Education, Nigeria. Captured by James Roh for Pura
In Mama Habiba’s home country of Nigeria, the scents of starfruit, ylang ylang and pineapple, all incorporated into the Pura x Malala Collection’s “Nigeria: Hope for Tomorrow,” can be found throughout the vibrant markets. Like these native scents, Mama Habiba says that the Nigerian girls are also bright and passionate, but too often they are forced to leave school long before their potential fully blooms.
“Some of these schools are very far, and there is an issue of quality, too,” Mama Habiba says. “Most parents find out when their children are in school, the girls are not learning. So why allow them to continue?”
When girls drop out of secondary school, marriage is often the alternative. In Nigeria, one in three girls is married before the age of 18. When this happens, girls are unable to fulfill their potential, and their families and communities lose out on the social, health and economic benefits.
Completing secondary school delays marriage, and according to UNESCO, educated girls become women who raise healthier children, lift their families out of poverty and contribute to more peaceful, resilient communities.
Centre for Girls’ Education, Nigeria. Captured by James Roh for Pura
To encourage young girls to stay in school, the Centre for Girls’ Education, a nonprofit in Nigeria founded by Mama Habiba and supported by Malala Fund and Pura, has pioneered an initiative that’s similar to the Ayomidê workshops in Brazil: safe spaces. Here, girls meet regularly to learn literacy, numeracy, and other issues like reproductive health. These safe spaces also provide an opportunity for the girls to role-play and learn to advocate for themselves, develop their self-image, and practice conversations with others about their values, education being one of them. In safe spaces, Mama Habiba says, girls start to understand “who she is, and that she is a girl who has value. She has the right to negotiate with her parents on what she really feels or wants.”
“When girls are educated, they can unlock so many opportunities,” Mama Habiba says. “It will help the economy of the country. It will boost so many opportunities for the country. If they are given the opportunity, I think the sky is not the limit. It is the starting point for every girl.”
From parades, film screenings to safe spaces and educational programs, girls and local leaders are working hard to strengthen the quality, safety and accessibility of education and overcome systemic challenges. They are encouraging courageous behavior and reminding us all that education is freedom.
Experience the Pura x Malala Fund Collection here, and connect with the stories of real girls leading change across the globe.
Some celebrities really live up to their fictional personas. Harrison Ford is certainly one of them, and this recent story from Brendan Fraser is a prime example of it.
During a panel at MegaCon Orlando, Fraser shared how he first met Ford while working together on the 2010 film Extraordinary Measures, based on a true story. In the film, they play two men who team up to develop a drug to save children from a life-threatening disease.
As Fraser told the crowd, he randomly received a phone call from his costar, asking how quickly he could get to the airport. Not wanting to disappoint, Fraser replied, “I guess I can get in a cab now.” Apparently, as soon as he arrived, Ford was there waiting for him. The two then hopped on Ford’s plane, where Fraser was allowed to sit in the co-pilot’s seat.
Showing himself to be a true Star Wars fan, Fraser recalled, “I’m Chewbacca, b**ches,” dusting himself off proudly. Honestly, who could say no to being Chewbacca to the OG Han Solo? And even if you aren’t a Star Wars aficionado, it’s heartening to see Fraser relive a positive memory from his earlier Hollywood years.
“I’m smiling ear to ear and damn I needed that,” one viewer on TikTok aptly wrote.
Another gushed, “Han Solo flew you around? AMAZE AMAZE AMAZE.”
“This made me cheese so hard what a legend,” added a third.
This is only one of two hilarious Ford stories Fraser shared. Apparently, for one scene, Fraser couldn’t remember a newly updated line and was growing more flustered with each failed take. Ford, clearly done with the situation, grabbed a Sharpie, wrote the line on some duct tape, and promptly stuck it on his forehead so Fraser could simply read it.
“It was hysterical, but it totally defined Harrison,” Fraser recalled during an interview in Beverly Hills, according to the Orange County Register. “His philosophy on acting is ‘Do it, and do it right.’”
The outlet also noted that Ford was only trying to help his co-star relax. It just happened to be in the most Harrison Ford way possible.
“Marlon Brando once said that an actor can’t care about anything or the audience will see it on his face. Maybe Brendan was caring too much,” he quipped.
It’s interesting to think about how this time must have felt for Fraser. After the success of The Mummy, he had become an Indiana Jones type in his own right. And there he was, a decade later, not only meeting the OG, but actually working alongside him. That kind of full-circle moment had to feel surreal and nerve-wracking all at once.
And now, both universally loved actors have enjoyed their own renaissance of sorts: Fraser with his Hollywood comeback in projects like The Whale, Doom Patrol, and Rental Family, and Ford with Shrinking. Who knows—maybe we’ll see them share the screen again. If so, there will likely be even more great stories to come.
“Grease is the word, is the word that you heard/It’s got a groove, it’s got a meaningGrease is the time, is the place, is the motion/Grease is the way we are feeling”
The title track to the 1978 film Grease, starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, brought three generations together and hit number 1 on the Billboard Charts. The song is based on a movie about teenagers in the ‘50s, sung by a legend from the ‘60s and written by one of the biggest hitmakers of the ‘70s. In other words, there was almost no one alive at the time who didn’t love Grease!
(And did you know that Grease was a Broadway musical years before the film? The story and songs, in many instances, are wildly different between the two, however.)
Grease was written by Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees but sung by doo-wop legend Frankie Valli. Although the Bee Gees toured in the late ‘70s and made a comeback in the ’90s, they never played the song live until 1997 when it was part of their “One Night Only” concert and album featuring many of their biggest hits.
What’s impressive about the song is that even though Valli does a great job singing it on the original recording, when you hear the Bee Gees sing it, it sounds exactly like something you would have heard them perform in the late ‘70s.
During the performance, Barry Gibb points to Grease star Olivia Newton-John, who’s seen dancing with her daughter, Chloe Lattanzi in the audience (Newton-John passed away in August 2022).
In the third verse, Valli’s vocal from the original is played so you can hear the difference.
The magic started when producer Robert Stigwood, fresh from the Travolta-starring ‘77 hit Saturday Night Fever, went into production on a film adaptation of the Broadway musical Grease. The film promised a killer soundtrack filled with new versions of the classic show tunes, but it needed a song for the film’s opening credits.
So, Stigwood tapped Barry Gibb, lead singer of the Bee Gees, the band that had just launched into the stratosphere after being featured on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. Stigwood also happened to be the band’s manager and planned to feature them in a Beatles-based musical, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
Legend has it that Barry wrote the song “Grease” in one day. Instead of sounding like a ’50s doo-wop or rockabilly track, it was a slick-sounding disco-adjacent number about a feeling of generational confusion. The song was given to Valli, who’d had a recent comeback with the songs “My Eyes Adored You” (1975) and the 1976 nostalgia-dazed Four Seasons doo-wop disco number “December 1963 (Oh, What A Night).”
Valli had the option of recording the song or appearing as the Teen Angel who sings “Beauty School Drop-Out.” The “Walk Like a Man” singer opted to do the theme song and Frankie Avalon was given the Teen Angel role.
“I just remember that it all happened in one afternoon,” Barry Gibb recalled. “I was babysitting and my wife was out. And Robert Stigwood called up and said, ‘I have two wonderful new songs by John Farrar called ‘Hopelessly Devoted to You’ and ‘You’re the One that I Want.’ But we don’t have a song for the film’s title. Could you come up with a song called ‘Grease’?” I said, “How do you write a song called ‘Grease’? I don’t understand what direction I would take to do that.’ And Robert said, ‘Just Grease duh-duh-duh-duh-duh, Grease duh-duh-duh-duh-duh.’ So he wasn’t very helpful. But I understood that they really wanted something that was positive and sunny. It really all happened in that afternoon. I walked on the dock for a bit….”
Indeed, the feature film version of the musical is known for its upbeat and optimistic music when compared to the slightly darker tones of the stage musical.
Grease was a box-office smash and became the highest-grossing film of 1978. Unfortunately for Stigwood, his follow-up film, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, starring the Bee Gees, would be one of the biggest flops of the decade.
To celebrate the 40th anniversary of “Grease” in 2018, Barry Gibb released the demo he originally recorded of the song accompanied by piano. Take a listen and chill out for a few minutes.
This story originally appeared two years ago. It has been updated.
An 18-year-old in Michigan is getting attention for a bold move many disgruntled drivers understand, even if they wouldn’t take the same risk.
Ali Chami, who lives near the border of Dearborn Heights and Inkster, had grown tired of navigating the pothole-ridden stretch of Cherry Hill Road during his daily commute. Like many others in the area, the issue had gone from a minor annoyance to an expensive problem.
As reported by WXYZ-TV, he spent more than $600 replacing damaged tires over the past six months. He also saw a friend’s tire pop after hitting one of the same potholes.
At a certain point, the frustration boiled over
So on a Saturday afternoon, instead of waiting for repairs, he decided to act. Chami went to Home Depot, spent about $60 on asphalt, and headed to the road to start filling potholes himself.
He documented the process on TikTok, where his candid commentary quickly struck a chord
“Why is every single road but Cherry Hill getting fixed?” Chami asked in a video. “That s*** is pissing me off. I swear to God. So you want to know what I’m about to do? I’m about to go to Home Depot and I’m about to put some f****** asphalt on the road for all the these potholes.”
Using a simple method, he got to work.
“So pretty much, I just grabbed the cap of the bucket and I just scooped it out and spread it out, and I used it as a pushing point where I could just step on it and flatten it out,” Chami said.
In a follow-up video, he celebrated the effort.
“Yup, wallah, I do this s***,” Chami quipped.
Other drivers passing by seemed to share his sentiment, honking or shouting in support. One driver even called out, “Potholes are getting horrible. I had to change my tire last week.”
Videos go viral
The videos quickly gained traction online, racking up more than 175,000 views and drawing the attention of local officials.
John Danci, a representative from the Dearborn Heights Department of Public Works, acknowledged that the road has been a known issue for years. According to him, the delay is partly due to the complexity of the situation, as the road falls under three jurisdictions: the Wayne County Federal Aid Committee, Dearborn Heights, and Inkster.
“Historically, between Dearborn Heights and the city of Inkster, the funding for a road project like this is much higher relative to our city budgets versus the county that gets a lot of state revenue,” Danci told WXYZ-TV.
Mayor Mo Baydoun also responded, noting that temporary fixes have been attempted but are difficult to maintain in colder temperatures.
“I can tell you that we have patched Cherry Hill a few times already,” Baydoun wrote on Instagram. “Unfortunately, nothing is going to stick with the temperatures continuing to drop. The good news is that the city has been awarded a $2.6 million grant to fix all of Cherry Hill from Gully-Inkster. Project is expected to begin June 1st.”
While officials emphasized that residents should not attempt their own repairs due to safety concerns, Danci acknowledged the impact of Chami’s actions.
“You did something that at least gained a lot of attention,” he told Chami.
Chami, for his part, is not ruling out doing it again.
“If it happens [raises money], then I’ll do it,” he told WXYZ-TV.
Whether or not you agree with Chami’s actions, his feelings are certainly understandable
Yes, taking on road repairs yourself can be dangerous and is not recommended. At the same time, when problems go unresolved for too long, it’s natural to want to be the solution that seemingly will never come on its own.
For many people, it’s not just about fixing the specific issue, but about feeling heard. And in this case, one teenager’s decision did just that, bringing new attention to an issue years in the making.
We’ve historically seen the midlife crisis represented by large and lavish purchases, or maybe by questionable dating choices. But for Millennials, the next in line to approach this milestone, the image doesn’t really resonate. A 35-year-old New York comedian was able to perfectly capture why.
Mike Mancusi recently went viral on TikTok and Instagram after pointing out why the Millennial midlife crisis looks a little different from those of previous generations.
What makes the Millennial midlife crisis unique?
For one thing, Millennials, by and large, can’t afford to buy “Lamborghinis” or get “second families,” Mancusi quipped. Instead, they cope with nostalgia, like going to Disneyland to relive their childhoods.
Similarly, Mancusi argued that while other generations trigger their midlife crises by “looking forward” (“Whoa, I’m going to be old someday”), the Millennial midlife crisis is ignited by “looking back” and realizing that even though they “followed the blueprint” to success, they still aren’t “happy” or “fulfilled.”
“That is a way different crisis,” Mancusi said, noting that it often manifests as a career-specific midlife crisis. Many Millennials come to the stark realization that, 15 years into a job they thought would give them meaning, it simply doesn’t deliver.
Mancusi said there’s only one solution: build meaning outside of your job
“The more that you allow some job that you don’t even like to define your entire existence, the more it’s going to crush your soul,” Mancusi said. “You have to find something else to do. Whatever you want to call it. A hobby. A passion. But it has to be something that’s for you. It’s not to make you money, not to please your family, it’s for you.”
While Mancusi said that interest could potentially grow into a career, that’s not really the point. What matters is that it allows you to “move forward” with a sense of autonomy and your passion intact.
In the comments, many Millennials shared their newly discovered passions
“I’m writing again after 5 years. I used to do it constantly. But then life got in the way after I lost all my notes for the last thing I was working on, bills, debts, and this summer, when I had all but given up hope, my creativity came roaring back like a Phoenix reborn.”
“Started recording and releasing music this year.I can confidently say although it is actively losing me ALOT of money. I’m much happier than I was last year.”
“For me, this has now become running. Quite the form of therapy in my opinion. Since it seems like very few people affording therapy.”
“I started going out dancing/clubbing this year, something I basically skipped in my teens and 20s, and love being immersed in the music so much. I try to go at least one or 2 weekends a month.”
Mancusi may have prescribed this midlife crisis antidote for Millennials, but the wisdom applies to any generation. No matter your age, time on this planet is temporary and nothing is guaranteed. So you might as well spend it doing the things that bring you joy—or die trying.
During his shift as a pizza delivery driver for Domino’s Pizza, Dan Simpson noticed the order included a two-liter bottle of Diet Coke, but the shop was out. Instead of canceling that part of the order, he went to a nearby convenience store to buy the soda.
“It took about three minutes,” he told the Idaho Statesman. Those three minutes earned him a “tip” that now totals more than $24,000.
When Domino’s is out of Diet Coke, but your delivery driver stops at the store to get it for you. Dan, you went above and beyond tonight, thank you!The world needs more Dans. Happy almost retirement! #dominos#fyp
Caught on a Ring camera, Simpson presented the pizza and store-bought sodas to the grateful customer, who was astonished he had gone out of his way to get the Diet Coke. The customer was appreciative but upset they didn’t have any extra cash to add to Simpson’s tip. Simpson, however, was happy to have done a good deed and receive the tip he’d already earned, sharing that he had been delivering pizzas as a second job for 14 years and was just 26 days from retirement.
Simpson’s small gesture goes viral
The Ring camera footage was posted online, and commenters remarked on Simpson’s kindness:
“This is old school respect and going beyond duty.”
“As a loyal Diet Coke drinker, this would mean everything to me.”
“I am going to screammmmmmn, I love him. 😭😭😭”
“This literally made me cry. He’s so sweet. 🥺”
“He is a Pawpaw. I know it. This is something my Daddy would do. 🥰🥰”
“He’s overjoyed about $6.60 🥹 That’s so humble but it makes me sad for some reason. Probably because he deserves the WORLD with a soul like his. 🫶”
“GET DAN’S INFO!!!! He retired already and is still working! He deserves to retire! And I’m willing to pitch in for his retirement!!!”
Everyone wanted to “tip” him
Commenters and the customer agreed that Simpson’s $6.60 tip wasn’t enough. Not only did the customer send him a retirement card with $50 inside, but a GoFundMe was also started to contribute to his retirement. Within a couple of days, Simpson’s additional GoFundMe “tip” reached more than $24,000 and is still growing as of this writing.
Commenters cheered on and praised the donations as they came in:
“As someone that has worked with Dan for years, he is so deserving of this. He would always stay late and take extra deliveries when we were super busy even though he started his first job at 5am and had to be back at 5am the next day.”
“Just donated! Happy retirement Dan!🥹🩷”
“An example of how being a decent human goes a long way. One kind gesture turned into a 5k tip!! Kind gestures are so rare that the masses want to gift those who do nice things.🫶👏”
The customer who posted the Ring camera footage on TikTok later gave commenters an update:
“We dropped off a retirement card & an additional cash tip to the Domino’s Dan works at. In the card we wrote him a letter that explained how we put him on TikTok and that the internet fell in love with him. Dan gave us a call this afternoon and thanked us for the card, additional tip, and for TikTok’s donations to the GoFundMe. When we were talking with Dan, it had just reached $900! He was literally speechless and so humble. Dan doesn’t do technology, but he’s very thankful for all the support. We’ll keep ya’ll updated!Let’s see how far we can get this to go for Dan, he deserves it!”
Simpson was shocked and humbled by the gesture, especially since he believes in doing the right thing for its own sake.
“I know what it’s like to be down and out,” said Simpson. “So when I see people who are hurting, I try to help them.”
What Simpson did proves that even the smallest gestures, like getting a soda, can make a big impact on people.
A beautiful art project has strangers answering an old-fashioned telephone and saying whatever’s on their minds. – Photo credit: aview.fromabridge/Instagram
Viral “street interviews” are a relatively new form of content. They’ve popped up in the last couple of years and often involve random social media creators sticking a microphone in someone’s face on the street and asking personal, funny, or sometimes invasive questions about sex, relationships, and money.
In many big cities, these interviewers are everywhere. Though the clips are sometimes entertaining, many have pointed out problems with the format. Namely, that (often drunk) people can go viral for embarrassing moments and wind up humiliated on an international stage. Or famous. Either way, there’s little recourse for regretful participants, and even less substance in the interviews.
Artist Joe Bloom wanted to reimagine the street interview
“Interviewing strangers is such a beautiful art form but it’s been made so tacky,” Bloom told The Guardian in 2024. “You get some knobhead on the street running up to someone with a microphone asking them about their trauma. It feels awful. The AI-generated subtitles don’t even match up. It’s contrived and rushed. They just don’t care.”
He came up with what he thought was a better idea. Inspired by the early optimism of Internet projects like “Humans of New York,” he wanted to find a way to share people’s real stories, not just farm viral clips about embarrassing topics.
Immediately, he harkened back to his nostalgia for the telephone. No, not the iPhone, not texting, but the classic landline handset.
“You see it in movies: it’s always this nostalgic and almost glamorous thing, holding a phone up to your ear and talking into this object,” he said.
The project, called “A View from a Bridge,” launched in 2023 and saw Bloom place old-fashioned handset telephones on random bridges in London. When strangers would pass by and if they picked up, he’d be on the other end ready to chat.
What he found was that, surprisingly, people were willing to talk. Not just that, but they were more than willing to bare their souls.
There was the kid who had deep thoughts about the body after learning he was more than just a skeleton with a heart inside.
“What’s the point in not knowing who are you?” the wise boy said of his mission to devour all the books he could about anatomy.
Another young man opened up about all the time he spent chatting and connecting with people all over the world during COVID via virtual reality chat:
“A lot of people tend to think that history as it was has ended. … Things can never be how they once were. I don’t think things have changed that much in terms of people wanting each other and needing each other.”
“I don’t think things have changed much, in terms of people wanting each other and needing each other” – Cameron’s View From A Bridge @Cameron Winter . Filmed, interviewed + edited @Joe Bloom Original music @Ross Woodhead #geese#vr#virtualreality#Love#connection
Bloom’s project brings down people’s guard in a natural, organic way. As the interviewer, he stands far away. Typically, the subject can’t even see him at all. It gives the subject a sense of safety in the anonymity and lack of face-to-face eye contact.
And then there’s the phone itself.
“It creates an openness for the person being interviewed,” Bloom said of the format. “The action of holding the phone to your ear is powerful. It’s quite a calming thing.”
Who doesn’t remember long nights spent talking on the phone as a teenager, pouring out your deepest fears and dreams to friends and crushes? Research has found that in intimate, trusting relationships, we prefer to open up face to face. However, with people we don’t yet trust or are just getting to know, we’re often more forthcoming online or over the phone.
Bloom uses this phenomenon to get stranger interviewees to open up in ways the “street interview” creators could never dream of.
And the results are far more powerful and human. In each story, thousands of viewers see themselves and find ways to connect with the subjects—with their fears, pain, or even just funny observations. The videos are ultimately helping millions of people feel less alone.
That’s exactly the kind of optimism and connection Bloom was going for, and it’s something sorely lacking in most corners of the Internet.
Imagine you’re an older woman sitting alone in a small apartment in Tokyo. Your children live across the country. Your husband passed away years ago. Most days, you don’t talk to anyone at all. But on Mondays? On Mondays, you get dressed. You straighten the cushions on the couch. You wait by the door. Because you know someone is coming.
That someone is your Yakult Lady—one of more than 31,000 women who crisscross Japan on bicycles and motorbikes, delivering small bottles of probiotic drinks to elderly homes. On paper, it’s a sales job. In practice, it may be one of the most important social welfare roles in the country.
And most people outside Japan have never heard of it.
It started with a doctor who wanted everyone to be healthy, not just the rich
The story begins in 1930 with a young Japanese medical student named Minoru Shirota. He was deeply concerned that poor children kept dying from preventable diseases, something most doctors at the time ignored. This wasn’t because medicine didn’t exist, but because it had no way of reaching them.
So Shirota made it his life’s work to change that.
By 1963, Yakult had launched a home-delivery network staffed by women from local neighborhoods: people they trusted, who knew their communities, and who could sit with a customer and explain what “good bacteria” actually meant in plain terms. Thus, the Yakult Lady was born. Today, 81,288 of these women operate across 40 countries and regions worldwide, with 31,341 working in Japan, visiting between 30 and 50 homes a day, up to four days a week.
Japan’s loneliness crisis is bigger than most people realize
In 2024, 76,020 people died alone in Japan, and 76.4% of them were over 65. Some of those bodies weren’t found for weeks. In 130 cases, they weren’t discovered for more than a year.
This problem is so widespread and serious that it even has a name in Japanese: “kodokushi”—lonely death.
So when a woman on a bicycle shows up at your door with a cooler box and a warm smile—when she’s been doing it every week for years, when she remembers your knee has been bothering you and asks how it’s going?—that’s not just a sales call. That’s a lifeline.
“We are watchers”: What Yakult Ladies actually do
Asuka Mochida is 47 years old and has been a Yakult Lady for years. When the BBC asked her to describe her role, she didn’t mention sales targets. “We are watchers in a sense,” she said. “People who look out for others. We notice small changes in health or lifestyle.”
That phrase—”small changes”—is everything.
What makes a Yakult Lady genuinely irreplaceable isn’t the probiotic drink (though research does suggest it helps). It’s the consistency. She sees the same faces week after week. She knows Mrs. Tanaka takes her delivery at 9 a.m. sharp, and that if it’s still on the step at noon, something is wrong. She knows Mr. Yamamoto doesn’t like to talk about his health directly, but always mentions his energy levels when you ask how his garden is doing.
That kind of knowledge—intimate, earned over months and years—can’t be replicated by a government form or a wellness app. When something seems off, these women act. They’ve contacted family members, alerted local authorities, and in multiple documented cases, helped locate seniors who were in real medical danger.
They’re neighbors who show up, and keep showing up.
One anonymous customer said it better than any policy paper ever could: “Knowing that someone will definitely come to see my face each week is a tremendous comfort. Even on days when I feel unwell, hearing her say, ‘How are you today?’ at my doorstep gives me strength.”
Small bottle, big idea
There’s something almost quietly revolutionary about what the Yakult Ladies represent. In a world that keeps looking to technology to solve the loneliness epidemic—chatbots, wellness trackers, social apps—Japan’s most effective answer turns out to be a woman on a bicycle who remembers your name.
Children often possess a remarkable ability to make friends wherever they go, largely because they operate with an innate openness that’s not yet hindered by learned social barriers. It can make for some unexpected friendships and truly heartwarming stories.
That was certainly the case for Hudson Drew, a three-year-old Oklahoma boy who went viral for his sweet interaction with an elderly man during breakfast at McDonald’s.
As Ashlyn Drew, Hudson’s mother, explained to KFOR-TV, they had made a “last-minute” decision to stop at the fast-food chain for a quick breakfast. That’s when Hudson, affectionately known as “Huddy,” noticed the senior eating alone.
Curious, Huddy asked his mom where the man’s children might be. She replied, “They probably grew up and moved away.”
This didn’t sit well with the boy, so he immediately marched over to the man so they could share a meal together. This kind gesture left Drew “crying in the middle of a McDonald’s.”
“My little boy has the biggest heart,” she proudly wrote in her TikTok video’s caption.
My little boy has the biggest heart. He was sad that this man was eating alone so he took his food over and sat with him. Made this momma’s heart happy and sad at the same time 🥺❤️#fyp#raisingaman#bigheart#mcdonalds#toddlersoftiktok
Duracell’s official account urged folks to “protect his positive energy at all costs.”
“Pass me the tissues,” echoed Pizza Hut. Meanwhile, Eggo shared, “immediately starting sobbing this is SO sweet.”
This kind of behavior is typical of Huddy
“Since he was born, he has always lit up the world,” she told KFOR-TV. “He’s a very sweet kid. I didn’t think I would get emotional. I always say ‘Live like Huddy’ because he doesn’t see people any differently. He loves everyone.”
He also apparently has an affinity for intergenerational friendships. As Drew explained in the comments, “he loves all old people like they are his own grandparents.” At the restaurant his family owns, “he always sits with older couples.”
“He lost his great-great-grandparents and misses them dearly,” she explained.
Interestingly, Drew later discovered that the man lives just three miles away, and was good friends with Huddy’s late great-grandfather. Perhaps their connection was destined. Either way, more Mickey D’s meetups are in store.
As for the overwhelming positive response to Huddy’s video, Drew hopes it inspires others to show some love to the elderly community.
“When you see an older person, more than likely their spouse has passed away or is in a nursing home, so I just say take the time to say hi, smile,” she said. “A smile can do a lot. Sit with them. They can tell you some great stories.”
