Native American tribe reclaims part of Big Sur ancestral lands stolen from them 250 years ago
The indigenous people of the Big Sur area of northern California have been a landless group for 250 years. Taken from their ancestral homelands by Spanish colonials and sent to three different missions to be converted to Catholicism, the already small Esselen Tribe of Monterey County was nearly decimated. “The missionaries were here to save…
The indigenous people of the Big Sur area of northern California have been a landless group for 250 years. Taken from their ancestral homelands by Spanish colonials and sent to three different missions to be converted to Catholicism, the already small Esselen Tribe of Monterey County was nearly decimated.
“The missionaries were here to save the souls of the heathens, as they called us,” the official website of the Esselen Tribe states. “In this way they hoped to take the land for the Spanish king, Carols III. This had severe consequences for the Esselen and other tribes that called these mountains their home. There were four other tribes that were also affected by the missionary’s efforts for salvation.”
Prior to colonial invasion, the Esselen had inhabited the Santa Lucia Mountains and the Big Sur coast for 6,000 years. Now, they are taking back almost 1200 acres of that land, with the help of a $4.5 million grant from the California Natural Resources Agency.
The grant made it possible to transfer the land from the Portland, Oregon-based Western Rivers Conservancy to the tribe. The Conservancy had negotiated to purchase the land with the intention of transferring it to the U.S. Forest Service, but local residents were concerned about increased use of the land and whether the Forest Service would have the resources to care for the land. As the Conservancy began working with the Esselen people, they tapped into the grant, which came from a taxpayer-funded bond that included $60 million for acquiring Native American natural, cultural and historic resources in California.
“It is beyond words for us, the highest honor,” Tom Little Bear Nason, chairman of the tribe, told KTLA 5. “The land is the most important thing to us. It is our homeland, the creation story of our lives. We are so elated and grateful.”
According to The Hill, the land is a ranch just south of Carmel-By-The-Sea, and is a little larger than the Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Nason says that the tribe will build a sweat lodge and village to conduct traditional ceremonies and teach the public about Esselen culture. No permanent homes or businesses will be built on the land.
“We’re the original stewards of the land,” Nasion said. “Now we’re returned. We are going to conserve it and pass it on to our children and grandchildren and beyond.”
Congratulations to the Esselen people on this historic win.
A single door can open up a world of endless possibilities. For homeowners, the front door of their house is a gateway to financial stability, job security, and better health. Yet for many, that door remains closed. Due to the rising costs of housing, 1 in 3 people around the world wake up without the security of safe, affordable housing.
Since 1976, Habitat for Humanity has made it their mission to unlock and open the door to opportunity for families everywhere, and their efforts have paid off in a big way. Through their work over the past 50 years, more than 65 million people have gained access to new or improved housing, and the movement continues to gain momentum. Since 2011 alone, Habitat for Humanity has expanded access to affordable housing by a hundredfold.
A world where everyone has access to a decent home is becoming a reality, but there’s still much to do. As they celebrate 50 years of building, Habitat for Humanity is inviting people of all backgrounds and talents to be part of what comes next through Let’s Open the Door, a global campaign that builds on this momentum and encourages people everywhere to help expand access to safe, affordable housing for those who need it most. Here’s how the foundation to a better world starts with housing, and how everyone can pitch in to make it happen.
Volunteers raise a wall for the framework of a new home during the first day of building at Habitat for Humanity’s 2025 Carter Work Project.
Globally, almost 3 billion people, including 1 in 6 U.S. families, struggle with high costs and other challenges related to housing. A crisis in itself, this also creates larger problems that affect families and communities in unexpected ways. People who lack affordable, stable housing are also more likely to experience financial hardship in other areas of their lives, since a larger share of their income often goes toward rent, utilities, and frequent moves. They are also more likely to experience health problems due to chronic stress or environmental factors, such as mold. Housing insecurity also goes hand-in-hand with unstable employment, since people may need to move further from their jobs or switch jobs altogether to offset the cost of housing.
Affordable homeownership creates a stable foundation for families to thrive, reducing stress and increasing the likelihood for good health and stable employment. Habitat for Humanity builds and repairs homes with individual families, but it also strengthens entire communities as well. The MicroBuild® Initiative, for example, strengthens communities by increasing access to loans for low-income families seeking to build or repair their homes. Habitat ReStore locations provide affordable appliances and building materials to local communities, in addition to creating job and volunteer opportunities that support neighborhood growth.
Marsha and her son pose for a photo while building their future home with Southern Crescent Habitat for Humanity in Georgia.
Everyone can play a part in the fight for housing equity and the pursuit of a better world. Over the past 50 years, Habitat for Humanity has become a leader in global housing thanks to an engaged network of volunteers—but you don’t need to be skilled with a hammer to make a meaningful impact. Building an equitable future means calling on a wide range of people and talents.
Here’s how you can get involved in the global housing movement:
Speaking up on social media about the growing housing crisis
Volunteering on a Habitat for Humanity build in your local community
Travel and build with Habitat in the U.S. or in one of 60+ countries where we work around the globe
Join the Let’s Open the Door movement and, when you donate, you can create your own personalized door
Every action, big and small, drives a global movement toward a better future. A safe home unlocks opportunity for families and communities alike, but it’s volunteers and other supporters, working together with a shared vision, who can open the door for everyone.
There’s nothing more deflating than getting a bad haircut. You show the stylist a photo of how you want to look, sometimes inspired by a celebrity or fashion model, but when it translates to your head and face, it just doesn’t look right. Ultimately, much of the blame falls on the stylist for failing to execute the style or for not admitting it wouldn’t work.
Run Zhang of England shared her bad-haircut journey on TikTok, and millions of people have followed her transformation from disaster to a look that is cute and matches her upbeat, quirky personality. In the first video, she said she was excited to get a “cool girl…spiky” short haircut, similar to a “wolf” style. However, after the haircut, she didn’t look cool at all.
After the haircut, Run had to go straight to work and had no idea how to style her hair.
“This is not right at all. And I have to go straight to work. I’m driving three hours to go straight to work to look like a small fruit,” she joked while prepping herself for a day of embarrassment.
Maybe the haircut is…French?
“Why don’t hair stylists just say they don’t know how to do a cut?! It’s not even close!” Masdelaselva wrote in the comments.
Others joked that the hairstyle may be “French,” referencing an inspired scene from Fleabag in which Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s character tries to convince Sian Clifford’s Claire that her haircut isn’t terrible.
In a wonderful example of taking lemons and turning them into lemonade, Run enlisted her sister, Yun, to make her hair presentable.
“Yun’s been fixing my hair like a magician or an angel or perhaps a saint,” she said while revealing her new ‘do, which features a semi-slicked-back look held in place by old-school metal clips. Strangely, the new haircut kind of fits Run’s fun-loving vibe.
“Holy sh*t, your sister nailed that! I thought it was unsaveable, but I didn’t realize you had a team behind you,” Amy wrote. “Your sister is a miracle worker!” Harmony added.
Run and Yun did a fantastic job of turning a tragedy into a style that looks great until her hair grows back. One wonders whether Run will try to find another hairdresser who can get the wolf cut right or lean into her new ’90s-girl throwback hairstyle.
Until then, Run is still having trouble because she doesn’t know how to style her hair without Yun’s help.
Run’s bad-haircut saga started as a sad story about a woman who was destined to feel bad about her looks for a few months. But in the end, with a little ingenuity and help from her sister, she proved that she could turn a bad haircut into something that reflected her true personality. It’s a great reminder that nothing is impossible when we have people who can lift us up when we’re down.
Molly Bell Walls (@mollybellwallson) was sitting with her mother in a doctor’s office lobby, waiting for her dad to come out after an appointment. Her mom has stage 6 Alzheimer’s. In a video she posted on TikTok that has since been watched more than 19 million times, Molly is just trying to keep her mom engaged in conversation.
She mentions, almost casually, that her parents have been married for 40 years.
After Mom’s neurology appt today; waiting on Dad in the lobby. Trying to keep her occupied in conversation. It always turns to Dad. She looks for him constantly. Their love is so special. 🥰 #dementia#alzheimer#caregiver#alzheimersawareness
Her mom’s face changes. She pauses. Then, with the kind of genuine awe you can’t fake, she says: “Really? Yeah. Oh, my gosh. We are.”
She’s learning it for the first time again. And she’s just as delighted as she probably was the first time.
An older couple embracing on a couch. Photo credit: Canva
What makes the video so quietly devastating is what Molly wrote in the caption: her mom looks for her dad constantly. Conversations always turn to him. Even with so much gone, that part holds. The disease took the memories but apparently couldn’t touch whatever it is that makes her turn toward him in every room.
Commenters noted how present and warm she seems for stage 6, which typically involves significant cognitive decline. “She seems so alert and actively interacting,” one person wrote. After the initial moment, she and Molly chat easily about makeup – a tiny ordinary exchange that somehow makes the whole thing more moving, not less.
What stays with you isn’t the forgetting. It’s the rediscovering. Forty years of marriage, relearned in a lobby, and met with pure joy.
You can follow Molly Bell Walls at @mollybellwalls on TikTok.
“It was a flash of inspiration.” For years, this husband’s beautiful tribute to his late wife was hidden from the world, until a hot air balloonist looked down.
Grief often demands a physical outlet, a way to channel the weight of loss into something that lives and grows. For Winston Howes, a farmer in South Gloucestershire, England, that outlet became a six-acre labor of love. After his wife of 33 years, Janet, died suddenly from heart failure at age 50, Howes found himself looking at a blank field on his farm and seeing a way to keep her spirit alive.
In the months following her death in 1995, Howes began planting 6,000 young oak trees. For nearly two decades, the project remained a private family sanctuary, unknown to the public. However, as The Guardian reported, the true scale of his tribute was finally revealed to the world when a hot air balloonist drifted over the property and looked down.
The aerial perspective revealed a perfect, massive heart-shaped meadow hidden in the center of the dense oak forest. Howes had strategically left a clearing in the middle of the saplings, creating a secret “room” in the woods that is entirely invisible from the road.
The heart-shaped meadow only viewable from above. Photo credit: Google Maps
“I came up with the idea of creating a heart in the clearing of the field after Janet died,” Howes explained. “I thought it was a great idea, it was a flash of inspiration.” He even added a sentimental detail that can only be appreciated from the sky: the point of the heart is aimed directly toward Janet’s childhood home.
Inside the heart, Howes placed a seat where he could go to sit and think. It is a quiet place where the bustle of the farm fades away, replaced by the rustle of oak leaves. According to the American Psychological Association, engaging in meaningful tributes is a vital part of the grieving process, helping to transform acute sadness into a lasting legacy of love.
When images of the heart-shaped forest went viral, they resonated with millions. Social media users across the globe were moved by the quiet, patient dedication required to plant thousands of trees by hand just to create a sanctuary for a person who was no longer there to see it.
As the oaks continue to grow and the forest thickens, the heart remains a permanent fixture of the Gloucestershire landscape. It’s nice to remember that while life may be fleeting, the love we leave behind can take root and grow for generations. It is a lovely and lasting tribute that will remain standing long after we are gone, proving that sometimes, the most beautiful secrets are the ones grown from the heart.
There was a massive jump in credit card fraud in America the last few years due to the pandemic. According to a 2025 report from Security.org, 62 million Americans experienced credit card fraud in a single year, with unauthorized purchases exceeding $6.2 billion annually. In a world where online transactions are part of everyday life, it’s hard to completely protect your information. But, by staying vigilant and monitoring your accounts you can report fraud before it gets out of hand.
A TikTok user by the name of Lauren (@absolutelylauren) from San Diego, California, got a notification that there was a $135 charge on her card at Olaplex’s online store that she hadn’t made. Olaplex sells bond-building hair care products designed to repair and strengthen damaged hair. Before reporting the charge to her credit card company she asked her family members if they used her card by mistake.
“I don’t wanna shut my card down if it’s just my mom ordering some shampoo,” Lauren said in the video. “Definitely not my two younger brothers, they’ve got good hair but they don’t color it.”
How Lauren tracked down the person who stole her card
After realizing the charge was fraudulent, most people would have called their credit card company and had their card canceled. But Lauren was curious and wanted to know who stole her information and used it to buy hair care products. So she concocted a plan to get their information. She called Olaplex’s customer service line asking for the name and address of the purchaser to see if it was made by a family member.
“Hey, can you help me with something?” Lauren asked Tanya, the Olaplex customer service agent. “If I can give you the time and date, purchase amount and card number and whatever could you let me know who placed an order?”
Tanya had no problem helping Lauren with her request.
“At this point, I’m willingly giving Tanya enough info to steal my card as well — she could have very well taken advantage of me in that moment but she didn’t,” Lauren said. “She comes back — tell me why she gave me the little scammer their full government name and address.”
Tanya revealed that a guy named Jason in a modest suburb in Texas used her card to buy a gift for his wife. “They also did it on Black Friday so at least they got a deal I guess, it was the gift set,” Lauren continued.
Lauren then called her credit card company and shared the information she had on the fraudster. The card company is currently investigating the situation.
Was the customer service agent supposed to share that information?
One commenter thought that Olaplex wasn’t supposed to share that information with Lauren.
“For some reason, I don’t think Olaplex was supposed to give that info,” Arae270 said.
People should use utmost caution before deciding to track down a credit card thief. But kudos to Lauren for being clever enough to track down the person who stole her card information to help the authorities with their investigation. She didn’t put herself in harm’s way and if someone follows up on the tip, maybe they can prevent the same thing from happening to someone else.
This article originally appeared three years ago. It has been updated.
“If we put a circle next to their name, they got seated in Siberia.” Jennifer Garner just confirmed what a lot of us suspected about restaurant seating.
On the Dish Podcast with broadcaster Nick Grimshaw and Michelin-starred chef Angela Hartnett, released March 4, Garner finally laid it out. “You put the beautiful people at certain tables,” she said. “You put celebrities at certain tables. And if somebody even mildly famous walked in…”
The system had a name for the people who didn’t meet the standard. When Garner and her colleagues wrote down reservation names, some of them got a circle next to them. “If we put a circle next to them, they got seated in Siberia,” she said.
Hartnett confirmed this wasn’t unique to Garner’s restaurant. In high-end dining establishments, she said, the word “Siberia” is industry shorthand for the section where less desirable customers are quietly deposited — away from the windows, away from the room’s natural center of gravity, and away from the diners the restaurant actually wants other people to see.
One of Garner’s clearest memories involves Steve Martin, who was a regular and had a very specific preference: table five. If someone was already sitting at table five when Martin arrived, Garner had to move them. Mid-meal, mid-date, mid-whatever they were doing.
“I would have to go to those people and say, ‘I am moving you to the bar, and I’m going to buy you some calamari and that’s going to be on me,’” she said, describing the awkwardness of being a 22-year-old telling a couple on a date that they were being relocated because someone more famous had shown up.
Garner called the whole practice “merchandizing” the restaurant — treating the dining room the way a retailer treats a window display, positioning the most appealing elements where they’d be seen.
Grimshaw’s response, on hearing the Siberia detail for the first time: “I’m going to rethink every restaurant I’ve ever been in.”
The phenomenon isn’t just anecdotal. A 2016 Channel 4 documentary investigation called Tricks of the Restaurant Trade sent groups of models into three upscale London restaurants. In each case, the models were seated at prime front-of-house tables. When co-presenter Adam Pearson, who has neurofibromatosis, a condition that causes visible tumors on the face and skin, attempted the same exercise, he was seated in a corner at the first restaurant, initially ignored at the second, and turned away entirely at the third.
Research has also found an appearance premium for the servers themselves. One study found that attractive servers earn roughly $1,261 more per year in tips than unattractive ones.
Garner, for her part, said her hostess days were more psychologically taxing than almost anything that came after. “I’ve had more nightmares about my days as a hostess than I have had actor’s nightmares,” she said. “And I’ve had a lot of actor’s nightmares.”
“Red is for who you lost yesterday,” he said. “Yellow is to celebrate your birthday as bright as the sun today. And green is what you are about to prosper in the world.”
Then: “You are about to be the best actor in the world.”
Jada started crying.
She shared the video on Instagram on March 30, 2026 under her handle @jadajonesss, and the caption explained something Phae’l hadn’t known when he chose those colors. Red was the color associated with her partner Chris’s mother, who had recently passed away. Red was even in her username. The family wore red to her funeral, which took place on Jada’s birthday.
A woman blows out her birthday candles. Photo credit: Canva
He hadn’t known any of that. He was a stranger who had listened to a few minutes of conversation and offered something back that happened to land exactly where she needed it. Past, present, and future, bound up in three candles at a restaurant table.
“What I thought was just a free birthday dessert,” the on-screen text in her video reads, “turned out to be a moment I will never forget.”
Jada said she couldn’t stop crying, kept thanking him, and hugged him before she left.
For more delightful content, follow @jadajonesss on Instagram.
Not a week goes by where we aren’t treated to a story of a fare-paying airline passenger being asked to change seats with a parent who’s trying to sit next to their kids. People take sides. Outrage builds. The parents are labeled entitled and thoughtless, while the people who refuse to yield the seats they paid for sometimes get harassed for their perceived unkindness.
Meanwhile, it’s the kids who are stuck in the middle, seated away from their parents and surrounded by strangers for hours at a time. One recent story with this familiar start took a surprisingly heartwarming, if frustrating, turn.
Man pays extra for aisle seat before mom asks him to switch
A social media user took to a Delta discussion subreddit to share his story, aptly titled “What would you have done?”
The 30-year-old man describes how he had paid extra for an aisle seat due to his size. When he sat down, however, he was surprised to find a small boy seated next to him in the middle seat.
A man on a Delta flight was surprised to find a young boy sitting next to him without a parent. Photo Credit: Canva Photos
At first, he was excited. Kids don’t take up much room and he wouldn’t have to share the armrest. In air travel terms, that’s a win.
Then, a tap on the shoulder. “His mom was a few rows back also in a middle seat,” the man wrote. “She asked me to swap seats with her so she could sit next to her son.”
The poster says he politely declined, and no one could blame him. However, that left everyone involved in a pretty uncomfortable position. The cost of the man keeping the aisle seat he paid for was having an unaccompanied boy (around 5-8 years old, he says) sitting next to him for the duration of the four hour flight.
Kind stranger steps up—even if he wasn’t happy about it
The man says he didn’t raise a stink when the mom then asked if he could show the boy how to use the seatback display with movies and games.
And help him order snacks.
“I basically ended up having to babysit the kid for 4 straight hours, endlessly begging me to play games with him on the screen and constantly begging for more snacks , food etc. and then he just slept on my shoulder the last 60-90 minutes ish.”
“I tried to be the nice guy so I never said anything, just made my flight experience horrible honestly … We got that boy 4 rounds of snacks and played every single game on the screen.”
He adds that the mom thanked him for his kindness at the end of the flight.
Commenters give kudos for kindness
Though the OP was frustrated with having to grin-and-bear the experience, plenty of commenters chimed into applaud him for doing exactly that:
“thank you for being kind to the boy”
“You were truly a good sport!”
“You are a good man. As a parent I appreciate how you handled it. It’s easy to judge the mom but you never know the circumstances that lead to them being on that flight and separated.”
It no doubt meant the world to the boy to have a friendly face next to him, with his mom seated several rows away. It’s unfortunate that the man’s own flight wasn’t as relaxing as he had planned, but he earned himself major good karma points by stepping up and making the young boy comfortable throughout the duration of the flight.
Why is this still happening in 2026?
While some commenters opined that the mom was at fault for the mix-up and even may have somehow “arranged it” to get a free babysitter, the idea is laughable.
No parent wants their 5-year-old sitting next to a random man they’ve never met. And, like any human, parents sometimes have to book last minute or find themselves with surprise seating arrangements courtesy of an airline blunder.
The more important question is why minor children continue to be seated away from their parents on many flights.
The U.S Department of Transportation has recommended and encouraged all airlines to adopt better policies in this area. The DOT urges airlines “to guarantee that young children are seated adjacent to an accompanying adult without charging any additional fee.”
However, according to the agency’s own dashboard, only about half of the major U.S. carriers offer such a guarantee. Delta is one notable name that still allows young children to be placed in seats away from their guardians. That’s why the DOT has proposed to make the “strong suggestion” into a formal law that would carry penalties for airlines that don’t comply.
It’s important to remember that people, kids or otherwise, don’t necessarily end up getting stuck in middle seats by themselves because of laziness. Airlines do a lot of sleight-of-hand in how they categorize seats. “Basic Economy,” the most affordable option, sometimes means middle-seat only. The new proposal, if enacted, would put an end to the confusion.
The proposal, though, is still just that: a proposal. It will need Congressional approval to be enacted into law.
In the meantime, we can only count on two things: families planning ahead as best they can, and a little kindness and empathy from passengers like the man who shared this story. As frustrated and annoyed as he was by the whole ordeal, he did the right thing, and deserves a little kudos for so admirably stepping up to the plate.
A true hero was crowned prom king in Pauls Valley, Oklahoma. Kirk Moore, principal of Pauls Valley High School, was recognized by his students for his heroism in stopping a suspected school shooter just a few weeks prior.
On April 7, 20-year-old Victor Hawkins, a former student, entered the school with a gun and intended to carry out a mass shooting inspired by the Columbine school shooting, according to court documents reviewed by KOCO-TV. However, he was stopped by Moore, who courageously tackled Hawkins and held him down in a feat of strength while wrestling the weapon from his hands.
In the process, shots were fired, and Moore was hit in the leg. He was treated at a local hospital and released two days later.
In a statement released shortly after the shooting, Moore expressed gratitude to his community and supporters.
“Words alone cannot begin to express my gratitude for the outpouring of love and support I have received from the Pauls Valley community,” he said. “I am forever grateful for the support I am receiving from those close to me, as well as new friends who have wished me well in their prayers. This support is the reason I am healthy and recovering today.”
He added, “Like so many educators around the country, we prepare for these events through training and careful assessment of the threats. I am grateful that my instincts and training, as well as God’s hand, were available to me.”
Pauls Valley Police Chief Don May also acknowledged Moore’s courage.
“It doesn’t surprise me the actions that he took, but it is amazing, the actions that he took,” May said, according to NBC News. “There’s not a doubt in my mind that he saved kids’ lives.”
To help cover his medical expenses and rehabilitation, a GoFundMe campaign was started for Moore.
Principal Moore crowned prom king
In a video shared on TikTok, Moore receives a hero’s welcome after being announced as prom king. The DJ tells the crowd, “Ladies and gentlemen, our king…Kirk Moore!”
Principal Kirk Moore, the high school principal who tackled a gunman in an Oklahoma school’s lobby and stopped a potential mass shooting was crowned prom king by the students, who voted to honor him for his heroic actions. #Oklahoma#schoolshooting#highschool#principal#prom
The DJ plays “Hero,” Nickelback’s fitting hit, as Moore enters the frame, and his students go wild with cheers and applause. He high-fives them as he walks by, and a crown is placed on his head.
His students are ecstatic, jumping up and down and screaming for him. Moore appears emotional and hugs the prom queen as they pose for photos together.
