Feel Good Friday: Global BC’s highlights of the week

Here are the five stories we want to share:

Trailblazing: Blind Paralympian and her guide dog find missing woman on Vancouver Island

Jessica Tuomela has crossed finish lines, won gold for Canada and travelled the world, but one of her most vivid memories will always be one close to home in Saanich, B.C.

The blind Paralympian, who relies on her guide dog Lucy, got an urgent text from a neighbour nearly two weeks ago stating that an aging family member who suffers from memory loss had gone out for a walk and not returned home. The friend asked Tuomela if she and her golden retriever could hit the trails.

2:15 Blind Paralympian and guide dog locate missing senior

Fundraiser launched to build plaque at Deb Hope’s favourite trail in Metro Vancouver

A family friend of beloved former Global BC anchor Deb Hope has launched an online fundraiser to build a small memorial on Hope’s favourite trail in Metro Vancouver.

Angela Sinclair, who works with one of Hope’s daughters, Katherine, aims to collect $2,500 to put a plaque on both ends of a walking path in Anmore, where Hope would often walk her dog.

1:10 Deb Hope trail memorial fundraiser launched by Coquitlam woman

‘A really nice kid’: Vancouver cupcake burglar apologizes, offers to pay for repairs

What’s more, according to Emma Irvine, who owns Sweet Somethings on Vancouver’s Dunbar Street, he’s “a really nice kid.”

The unusual burglary was caught on a security camera early Friday. In the recording, the young man can be seen smashing the glass on the bakery’s front door.

But instead of going for cash or other high-value items, the video then shows him spending the better part of an hour hanging out, mopping up the floor, and snapping some selfies on the business’ work phone — before leaving with six cupcakes for the road.

3:30 Sweet & Sorry: Canada’s apologetic cupcake bandit

After a traumatic brain injury, UBC student heads to Stanford to help others

UBC student Yi Yi Du never thought he would graduate from university.

The 24-year-old fell into a two-month-long coma after being struck by a car in the fall of 2021 and suffered a severe traumatic brain injury.

But now, the ambitious young man has fought back and in the fall, he will start a Ph.D. program at Stanford University, where he is hoping to develop technologies that can support people who suffer traumatic brain injuries.

2:16 UBC graduate heading to Stanford after battling back from traumatic brain injury

‘Our eyes and ears on the land’: Indigenous Guardians soar to 170 programs nation-wide

Countless people living in Alberta, Nova Scotia and other regions of Canada have had their lives turned upside down by wildfires in recent weeks, as the world experiences more and more climate-related disasters.

Among the fire crews, outreach workers and military personnel who’ve been called in to fight the fires are Indigenous Guardians — trained experts who manage protected areas, help restore animal and plant populations, test water quality and monitor development of the land.

“They’re our eyes and ears on the land,” Valérie Courtois, executive director of the Indigenous Leadership Initiative, said.

They’re almost like conservation officers, Courtois said, but have a unique relationship to the land that has been going on for millennia.

In northern B.C., the Dane Nan Yḗ Dāh Guardians program, cares for Kaska traditional territory, including Dene Kʼéh Kusān, the proposed Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area spanning 40,000 square kilometres.

1:55 Indigenous Guardians provide expertise in monitoring the land

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