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Sometimes the simplest gesture can mean the world.

Staying in an Airbnb can be an adventure, sometimes for the worse but often for the better. The Internet is full of both heartwarming and horrible experiences people have had renting spaces from strangers—or having strangers rent spaces from them—but the popular short-term rental platform is a poster child for the "sharing economy" and the human connections that can come along with it.

One example of how staying at a stranger's house can lead to a beautiful interaction comes from two young women who stayed at an Airbnb in Finland. Jessica Judith shared a video of her and her travel companion singing "Happy Birthday" to an elderly man over a cake filled with candles.

"Our Airbnb host was alone on his birthday," Jessica shared in the caption, "and God knew to put two women who care too much about birthdays to celebrate with him." The women clapped and sang, then hugged the man before he blew out his candles.

@jess.judith

Tarmo fue el mejor host que he tenido en airbnb, nos llevo a ver los reindeers y todos los dias nos esperaba en su casa con cafe y galletitas listas, te queremos mucho Tarmo! que honor poder celebrar tu cumpleaños contigo!! kiitos kaikesta


"Tarmo was the best host I ever had on airbnb," the caption reads. "He took us to watch the reindeers and every day he was waiting for us at his house with coffee and cookies ready. We love you so much Tarmo! What an honor to be able to celebrate your birthday with you!!! Kiitos kaikesta."

(Kiitos kaikesta means "thanks for everything" in Finnish.)

The video was viewed over 32 million times as people chimed in with positive feedback on the women's thoughtfulness.

"I learned some people host Airbnb because of loneliness not money. I had the sweetest host one time who was just lonely and wanted company. Y’all made his whole year."

"You guys just gave that man a core memory."

"My soul 😭 he is someone’s baby 😭 I know his late momma was smiling down. All I could see is the little boy in him here. 😭🤍🤎 you two did a beautiful thing that’ll he’ll never forget. 😭💕"

birthday, blow out candles, birthday cake, little boy, babiesHappy Birthday GIFGiphy

"As a mother , knowing he’s someone son and was once just a little boy thank you for being so kind 🩵 I hope if my son was every alone [on] a birthday then someone would show him such kindness as you."

"This is how we’re supposed to live as humans 🥹."

"This should be an airbnb commercial."

"This is literally what airbnb was created for btw to bring people together."

Even Airbnb commented with, "When the guests make the host feel hosted 🥹."

What we don't see in the video is how the women communicated with their host. He didn't speak any English and they didn't speak Finnish, so they used translation apps to talk to one another. In another video, Jessica shared a bit more about their sweet host.


@jess.judith

la experiencia mas bonita


"This is Tarmo," she wrote. "He was our Airbnb host in Finland. He lives alone with his dog Peppi and his daughter set up this Airbnb (little cottage next to his house) which he takes care of the cleaning. He always had the table set with coffee and pastries waiting for us. He doesn't speak English but we used a translator and would have amazing conversations. Everything was so special and at the end of our stay he said, 'I hope this is not the last time I see you in this lifetime.' Best Airbnb experience ever."

As a short-term rental host and someone who has stayed at countless Airbnbs while traveling, I can attest to the fact that some guest-host interactions are truly special. As a host, I once had a guest from China who insisted on cooking my family a 3-course Chinese meal from scratch. As a guest, I rented a home in Greece with my family where the owner's mother, who lived on the property, would bring us fresh-baked Greek pastries from the local bakery every other morning with the warmest smile and most gracious welcome. As both host and guest, my experiences have been overwhelmingly positive.

The sharing economy can be wonderful when people are open and welcoming to the experience of connecting with others, and Tarmo and his kind guests are a perfect example.

Love Stories

Wife throws husband epic surprise 45th birthday party at Costco

"I threw my Costco-loving husband a surprise party for his birthday!"

itsdanapollack/Instagram

Wife Dana Pollack threw her husband a surprise 45th birthday party at Costco.

Pulling off a surprise birthday party is a feat that not many can say they've done. But Dana Pollack (@itsdanapollack), owner of Dana's Bakery, definitely can. The mom of two pulled of an incredible birthday surprise for her husband Adam's 45th birthday at their local Costco.

She shared the epic surprise with her followers in a video on Instagram, and it was a success; Adam was totally surprised. ""I threw my Costco-loving husband a surprise party for his birthday!" she wrote in the video's caption.

"He's straight to business," she writes as the video begins with their family walking into Costco and Adam getting his game face on for their shopping trip. "Sumo oranges first, obviously," she writes in the video as they run into the first (of what will be many) friends during the excursion.

"First run in. He has no idea (yet)," she writes in the video as her husband recognizes one of his guy friends and daps him up. Dana plays it off, also exchanging general pleasantries. Soon, they run into another pal. "Second run in. He's catching on but not 100% sure...," she writes in the video as her husband says hello to another one of his friends and his wife. Adam looks at the camera and shakes his head, acknowledging how crazy it was that they saw another friend during their outing.

Meanwhile, the family continues to shop and add items to the cart as they make their way through the store. But by the third friend run-in, she writes, "The gig is up. He's onto us." The camera shows a fourth meeting, then a fifth. Clearly, it's no coincidence at all.

From there, the gang heads towards the picnic tables at the food court, and the video pans to the party's catering: Costco's cheese pizza and hot dogs, of course. "A+ catering," she writes in the video. In the comment section, Dana added that the crew ate 3 pizzas and 10 Costco chocolate chip cookies. It truly was a birthday feast of feasts.

No birthday celebration is complete without a cake, though, and Dana came prepared with a chocolate one with '45' candles. Everyone sings happy birthday to him, and once he blows out the candles, a huge applause goes up. Other patrons in the food court and walking out of Costco cheer for Adam and get in on the celebratory vibes.

Finally, the group poses for a photo at the end of the video. "Success," Dana writes. In all, 23 people came out to celebrate Adam—and her sure felt the love.

The epic Costco surprise birthday party got lots of love from Dana's followers.

"This is the most parent coded event I have ever witnessed. Come for a party, leave with your weekend errands completed 😂😂 and bring the kids," one commented.

"Wife of the year and errands are done ✅ 😂😂😂😂," said another.

"The level of WHOLESOMENESS in this video is infinite. ❤️🙌🔥"

"Lmao this many friends with Costco memberships is insane tbh," still another says, making a great point. Then again, it isCostco, so are we all that surprised?

Kevin Olusola (far right) has a viral video that has nothing to do with music.

Even though the world has seemingly shrunk due to transportation and technology connecting people like never before, we still regularly encounter major barriers when it comes to language. There are around 7,000 officially known languages in the world, and most people don't speak more than one or two. If you've ever tried to communicate with someone when neither of you speak each other's language, you know how frustrating it can be.

But the reverse is also true. When you're in another country and unexpectedly encounter someone who speaks your language, it's a refreshing and delightful surprise. Americans are pretty familiar with that experience, as it's not uncommon to find people who speak English in other countries, but that's not the case for everyone.

It's especially not the case for Chinese people living in the U.S., where only around 1% of people speak Chinese at home, and those numbers are split between Mandarin, Cantonese and other dialects. Finding an American who comfortably speaks Mandarin is a rarity, which is why a video of employees of a Chinese restaurant reacting to a customer doing just that has gone viral.


That customer is musician Kevin Olusola, most well known as one of the vocalists in the a cappella group Pentatonix. Olusola was picking up some food at Okome Asian Grill in his home state of Kentucky when he surprised the crew by responding to them in Mandarin, and their reaction was sheer surprise and delight.

Watch:

Olusola shared in the comments that it meant a lot to him and filled his heart when the woman said, "You're one of us."

He joked in the video about being born and raised in Beijing, but he actually only lived there and studied Chinese for a year and a half. But as he said, he loved the language and put his "whole heart" into studying it. And apparently, however he learned it was incredibly effective.

"As a native Chinese speaker I need people to realize how amazing this is: not only is he speaking Chinese fluently and pretty quickly, he's also slurring certain words/speaking in a certain accent, using sentence patterns, and using phrases that's specific to Beijing: he is literally in every sense speaking like a Beijing locals, it's so cool to see 😍" shared one commenter.

Another commenter explained what he said after "The food is" in the video: "Se Xiang Wei Ju Quan, literally 'colour,' 'aroma,' 'taste,' 'complete,' the first three are the three basic requirements of well made food in the philosophy of Chinese cooking, so essentially it means 'Your food is amazing, it looks good, smells good and tastes good.'"

Another person wrote, "I’ve been watching videos like this on YouTube..it’s always so interesting. Once that language barrier comes down we are so much alike." That comment hit home for Olusola and he responded to it with another video.

"Once language barriers go down you realize that we're all alike—that statement resonates so deeply with me," he said. "I remember living in Beijing and hanging out with my Chinese friends, speaking to them in Chinese, and once the language barrier was down I realized that they had the same hopes, dreams and fears that I had…I think that's why empathy and understanding are so embedded in language learning."

Empathy and understanding really are the key to shared humanity. Ideally, one day we will have a universal language that we all learn to speak in addition to our native tongues, so that we won't have to navigate those language barriers that artificially separate us. But in the meantime, learning another culture's language can be a bridge that unites people in moments of delight like this one.