The Happy Pod: The hug that stopped a bombing

Summary

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Global News Podcast: The Happy Pod – The Hug That Stopped a Bombing

BBC World Service | Host: Holly Gibbs | Date: March 28, 2026

Episode Overview

In this uplifting edition of The Happy Pod, Holly Gibbs and the BBC World Service showcase stories of remarkable bravery, viral animal adventures, educational innovation, sporting trailblazers, quirky science, and cultural celebrations from around the world. Key moments include the moving account of Nathan Newby, whose courage prevented a hospital bombing, a viral dog adventure in China, educational reform in Ghana, an apology to a pioneering women's football team, surprising hummingbird science, and the annual magic of Washington D.C.'s cherry blossoms.

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Key Stories & Discussion Points

1. Bravery that Saved Lives: Nathan Newby and the Hospital Bombing (01:40–07:25)

• Nathan Newby's Heroic Intervention:
  Nathan, a hospital patient in Leeds, England, spotted an anxious man who turned out to be preparing a bomb attack. Over two tense hours, Nathan engaged the would-be attacker, Mohammed Farouk, in conversation, persuaded him to move away from the building, and ultimately stopped the bombing.
• Recognition:
  For his actions, Nathan received the prestigious George Medal from King Charles.
• First-Person Reflection:
  Nathan recounts the moment he realized the man was armed and the life-threatening choice he made to stay:

  "When I saw what were in the bag, that's when reality hit ... If I run, it'll panic, could set it off. There's no way getting away now. Just stay with the guy." — Nathan Newby (05:04)

• The Hug That Changed Everything:
  The would-be attacker asked Nathan for a hug before telling him to call the police:

  "...he asked me to stand up and give me a hug. So I said, yeah, I have a hug mate. And then he said, right, I want you to phone up police before change my mind." — Nathan Newby (05:27)

• Nathan's Mother Reacts:

  "We heard that from the hospital that he'd gone missing ... Next minute it was just on the news. I think it was six o'clock news..." — Tracey, Nathan’s mother (07:03)

• Notable quote:

  "It would just thinking about others and trying to get my way and try to protect them." — Nathan Newby (05:56)

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2. Viral Dog Adventure in China (07:25–12:54)

• The Story:
  A video showing seven dogs of various breeds walking as a pack down a main road in China captures social media’s imagination.
• Not Just a Hollywood Ending:
  All seven dogs belonged to three households and were safely returned after a coordinated community and volunteer drone search:

  "All seven dogs have been found and returned to their respective owners ... They typically roamed around freely together." — Kerry Allen, BBC Reporter (08:37)

• Expert Perspective:
  Clinical animal behaviorist Heather Thomas explains canine social behavior:

  "Dogs naturally synchronize their movements with other dogs. So coordinated group movement... doesn't necessarily require a leader..." — Heather Thomas (09:22)

• Insights:
  • Dogs' group behavior is fluid, not hierarchical.
  • Their return was likely guided by scent and familiar environments, showing "how socially intelligent and adaptable dogs are." (11:54)

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3. Education Innovation in Ghana: Learning Through Play and Parental Involvement (12:54–17:51)

• The Challenge:
  Compulsory preschool in Ghana did not yield expected educational outcomes due to large class sizes and traditional teaching.
• The Solution:
  The Lively Minds project, now adopted by the Ghanaian government, emphasizes play-based learning in local languages and parental involvement, particularly mothers.
• Key voices:

  "Parents are the sleeping giants of education. They can drive change in early childhood development..." — Fayuda Tuyakubu, Lively Minds Ghana (15:08) "I have never been to school in my life...Now I am very much convinced that I know many things. So now I am very confident woman." — Local mother and program participant (16:29)

• Community Impact:
  Women report improved confidence, status, and respect at home and in the community.

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4. Righting Past Wrongs: Apology to Trailblazing Women's Football Team (21:47–25:17)

• Historic Injustice:
  The English Football Association apologizes to the Manchester Corinthians and other women's teams for its 50-year ban on female players (1921–71).
• Voices from the Past and Present:

  "I feel absolutely top of the world. Absolutely, because to me it's Corinthians 1f8 nil. And it was the best win we've ever had." — Myra Lipniski, former player (22:02) "I never felt that I was a pioneer. I just wanted to play." — Myra Lipniski (24:29) "It's been too long for some of us that are no longer with us ... But still, they say, better late than never." — Myra Lipniski (25:07)

• Legacy:
  The Corinthians traveled internationally, defied the ban, and inspired future generations.

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5. Science Spotlight: Do Hummingbirds Get Drunk on Nectar? (25:17–27:28)

• The Discovery:
  New research by Alexei Marrow (UC Berkeley) reveals that hummingbirds consume enough low-level alcohol from nectar to equal a human drinking a pint of beer daily — but spread throughout their day.

  "They end up really adding up because hummingbirds consume something like one and a half times their body mass in nectar. So even a little bit of alcohol adds up ... they're consuming something similar to 5%, you know, half a liter lager per day." — Alexei Marrow (26:45)

• Implications:
  The findings highlight a unique evolutionary relationship and signal opportunities for further ecological research.

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6. Cultural Celebration: Washington, D.C.’s Cherry Blossoms and International Friendship (27:28–31:07)

• Symbol of Hope and Diplomacy:
  Washington D.C.’s iconic cherry blossoms, a 1912 gift from Tokyo, draw millions and are a testament to enduring US-Japan ties.

  "The first time I saw the cherry blossoms I definitely fell in love with everything they represent ... the feeling, the emotions that come from it." — Diana Mayhew, National Cherry Blossom Festival (28:27) "No matter what else is going on in this world, this is something you can rely on to happen, that the blossoms will bloom no matter what the weather is or no matter what's happening." — Diana Mayhew (28:49) "They remind us that good things can pass fast. They're fleeting ... just reminding us that life is fleeting. And so enjoy what you have in front of you." — Diana Mayhew (30:46)

• Visitor Reactions:

  "They're very beautiful and pink and it's really surreal to see them with all the monuments around the Taito Basin." — Visitor (30:32)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Nathan Newby on why he stepped in (04:36):

  "He was just anxious... Just looked out of place. So I just went over to see if we were all right and have a chat and see if I could turn him off and make him feel better."

• Tracey, Nathan’s mother, on learning of his bravery via the news (07:03):

  "Next minute it was just on the news. I think it was six o’clock news ... I just thought, what’s he doing?"

• Myra Lipniski on FA's apology (25:07):

  "It's been too long for some of us that are no longer with us. Good players who felt so ridiculed that they were ashamed to ever admit they'd played. But still, they say, better late than never."

• Diana Mayhew on the cherry blossom experience (28:49):

  "No matter what else is going on in this world, this is something you can rely on to happen, that the blossoms will bloom no matter what the weather is or no matter what's happening."

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Nathan Newby Hospital Bombing Story: 01:40 – 07:25
• Viral Dog Pack in China: 07:25 – 12:54
• Education Reform in Ghana: 12:54 – 17:51
• Women’s Football Team Apology: 21:47 – 25:17
• Hummingbirds and Alcohol: 25:17 – 27:28
• Cherry Blossom Festival in D.C.: 27:28 – 31:07

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Tone & Takeaways

With its hallmark warmth, empathy, and optimism, this "Happy Pod" celebrates ordinary people achieving extraordinary things — from literally hugging away catastrophe to quietly creating generational change through education and rewriting sports history. Interwoven are scientific curiosities and celebrations of nature that underscore the resilience, connectivity, and beauty in our world, no matter the context.

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Transcript

[Narrator]

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk.

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[Holly Gibbs]

This is the Happy Pod from the BBC World Service. I'm Holly Gibbs and in this edition

[Nathan Newby]

I didn't have time to think about how I felt, you know what I mean? Just thinking about others and trying to get my way and try to protect them.

[Holly Gibbs]

The man rewarded for his incredible bravery after he hugged an armed man and stopped him setting off a bomb. The canine adventure caught on camera.

[Kerry Allen]

The dogs, made up of golden retrievers, Labradors, corgis and mixed breeds, quickly went viral after a local driver surnamed Lu posted footage of them on Douyin, which is China's local version of TikTok.

[Holly Gibbs]

We look at the viral video of seven dogs walking together on a main road in China. Also in this edition, do hummingbirds get drunk on nectar?

[Myra Lipniski]

And I feel absolutely top of the world. Absolutely. Because to me it's Corinthians 1f8 nil. And it was the best win we've ever had.

[Holly Gibbs]

The trailblazing footballers who received an apology from the sport's governing body. We start with an extraordinary story of bravery. A patient who hugged an armed man to stop him setting off a bomb at a hospital in northern England. Nathan Newby spent two hours talking to the would be attacker outside the St James's Hospital in Leeds and persuaded him to abandon his planned attack. This week Nathan has been given a medal by King Charles in recognition of his bravery. The BBC's Emma Glasby has the story

[Myra Lipniski]

for intervening in a potential terror attack. The George Medal to be decorated.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

Mr. Nathan Newby receiving one of the highest honours for his remarkable bravery. Nathan Newby has been awarded the George Medal by the King for an act of kindness that saved lives.

[Holly Gibbs]

Front at Bonnet here.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

This was 5am in January 2023 outside a Leeds hospital and armed police arrested a man with a bomb.

[Nathan Newby]

What is it? What's it made from? Pressure cooker. A pressure cooker? And what's in it?

[Narrator]

It's not live.

[Nathan Newby]

Gunpowder. There's gunpowder in a pressure cooker.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

Described in court as a self radicalised lone wolf terrorist, Mohammed Farouk had been waiting around at St James's planning to detonate the bomb and kill nurses. But he'd been stopped by Nathan Newby, a hospital patient who spent more than two hours with him in the car park talking him down.

[Nathan Newby]

So apparently bumped into you. What were your intentions? To lay off inside. Why do you think that's okay to do?

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

Farouk is serving a 37 year jail sentence after being found guilty of preparing acts of terrorism. Before receiving the George Medal from the King, Nathan spoke for the first time about that night.

[Nathan Newby]

I remember going outside for a vape and saw this guy. He was just anxious, if you know what I mean. Hands in his pockets and fiddling about and swaying backwards and forth. Just looked out of place. So I just went over to see if we were all right and have a chat and see if I could turn him off and make him feel better.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

But Farouk eventually confessed to Nathan he had a bomb in a bag and showed him the pressure cooker device.

[Nathan Newby]

When I saw what were in the bag, that's when reality hit. Then I'm like, well there's no. I'm with it. I'd have been killed anyway. If I run, it'll panic, could set it off. There's no way getting away now. Just stay with the guy.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

In fact, Nathan moved Farouk and his bomb device further away from the hospital building.

[Nathan Newby]

So he asked me to stand up and give me a hug. So I said, yeah, I have a hug mate. And then he said, right, I want you to phone up police before change my mind. He, he was just about to kill a lot of people. Where, Whereabouts are you? Outside St. James Hospital. Whoa. No, right, put outside there ultimately, yeah. He just pulled the gun out.

[Holly Gibbs]

He just pulled a gun out.

[Nathan Newby]

Yep, yep.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

You Sounded very calm. How are you feeling inside?

[Nathan Newby]

You don't have time, you don't have time to think how you're feeling. You just thinking about the people around you and thinking about the hospital, him. I didn't have time to think about how I felt, if you know what I mean. It would just think about others and try to get my way and try to protect them.

[BBC Reporter/Interviewer]

As the police operations swung into action, Nathan returned to his hospital bed to relieved nurses who wondered where he'd been.

[Nathan Newby]

Just crazy that if I hadn't been there, if I hadn't to be in hospital, if I hadn't got a chest infection, got washed in, I'd have been at home, I'd have been seeing that news. I hate going to hospitals, but on that day, I were in there for a reason, not to get better. I was in there because that weren't happening. Right place, right time.

[Holly Gibbs]

Nathan's mother, Tracey, spoke to the BBC after meeting King Charles. She says she first found out about Nathan's bravery. Avery when she saw it on the news.

[Myra Lipniski]

We heard that from the hospital that he'd gone missing. We didn't know where he was. I'd reported, I'd asked his girlfriend, I'd asked everybody. Nobody knew where he was. Well, clearly, obviously we're down there. And they just said, I just. Next minute it was just on the news. I think it was six o' clock news without, you know, and I just thought, what's he doing?

[Fayuda Tuyakubu]

Idiot.

[Myra Lipniski]

But yeah, he deserves it. He's a good guy.

[Holly Gibbs]

Nathan Newby's mother, Tracy. Next, the viral video showing seven dogs walking together along a main road in China. The pups can be seen walking in a tight group and many people online have suggested that the animals are heading home after escaping capture. We can't confirm that Hollywood style ending, but we certainly do know the video has captured the hearts of millions online. As the BBC's Kerry Allen explains, the

[Kerry Allen]

dogs, made up of golden retrievers, Labradors, corgis and mixed breeds, quickly went viral after a local driver surnamed Lu posted footage of them on Douyin, which is China's local version of TikTok. Mr. Lu told a local newspaper they looked like a group of helpless little brothers in distress. The pack of dogs were traveling in a formation with a German shepherd in the middle that appeared to be injured and the others were surrounding him. He said that he was worried that they might get hit by a car or that a driver might have an accident trying to avoid them, so he tried to lead them to a safe area. Of the road. Mr. Lu said, though, that the dogs did not respond to his calls or come closer to his car, so he posted his video online, alerting the local authorities. After Mr. Lu posted footage of the dogs on Douyin, dog lovers in the vicinity formed a volunteer team and sent out drones to find the missing dogs. One volunteer has since told Chinese media that all seven dogs have been found and returned to their respective owners, who lived about 10 miles, or 17 kilometers from where they were found. The dogs came from three different households in the same village, and they typically roamed around freely together. Social media users in China have fallen in love with the dog's tail and their lucky escape after what could have been a huge tragedy. Users have been commenting things like, this is a story that deserves a movie.

[Holly Gibbs]

Kerry Allen there. I spoke to Heather Thomas, she's a clinical animal behaviorist and I started by asking her for her interpretation of the video.

[Heather Thomas]

The thing that stood out for me the most is that the dogs clearly are choosing to be together as a group, and particularly from a behavioral science perspective, is that dogs naturally synchronize their movements with other dogs. So coordinated group movement like this doesn't necessarily require a leader as such, and it can emerge simply from dogs just responding to those around them. When you look at that video, though, there does appear. Appear to be some loose formation at times, and you can see some of the dogs moving closer proximity towards the German shepherd. That could give the impression that they're shielding or protecting that individual. However, from that footage alone, I couldn't clearly identify any injury. What we're really observing is social cohesion and the research shows that they tend to align their behaviour with the groups around them.

[Holly Gibbs]

That's so interesting and really important context to add. Somebody who was an eyewitness said that they tried to lure the dogs away to what they thought would be safety and they said that the dogs weren't so responsive. Is that that kind of herd mentality kicking in there?

[Heather Thomas]

Quite possibly, but it may just be that they are in a fearful state of mind as well. We don't know what's happened to them, so they may be a bit more fearful about approaching someone. That's. That's a bit new. That said, they may not want to come out of their social construct because they feel safer and more secure in that sense.

[Holly Gibbs]

And in the video, it seems that the little corgi is the one that's leading the pack. Is that natural to have one dog leading the rest?

[Heather Thomas]

So in terms of the idea that the corgi is the ringleader. I wouldn't say that I can confidently draw that conclusion from the clip. So lots of behavioral research actually shows that dogs don't operate in a fixed hierarchy or a strict leadership structure in the way that people might assume. Instead, social relationships are much more fluid and context dependent, a bit like a group of friends that, you know, us humans. Some dogs may appear to lead simply because they're just a bit more confident. But we know from studies on group movement that dogs will often follow or align with others automatically without any clear leader dictating the group. And if you look at the video, the cork is not always in the front, but often herding around the shepherd. I noticed. So what looks like leadership is often just individual variation within a group.

[Holly Gibbs]

And this idea that they led themselves home. How do dogs and other animals navigate their way back?

[Heather Thomas]

So this is quite an interesting topic and something that I've explored before, but with cats, the really easy way to understand a little bit about how dogs work is by thinking about their noses. They are highly coordinated and in terms of navigation, they have an extraordinary sense of smell, and that is really the key system that they rely on. So research does show they are able to detect and follow scent trails over long, vast distances, even when those cues are extremely faint or fragmented. They also build up what we might think of as a mental map of their environment. They combine scent information with visual landmarks and then repeated experience and exposure to those. So rather than actively planning a route home, they're probably just following layers of familiar sensory information. What this story really highlights is how socially intelligent and adaptable dogs are. And I don't think we give them enough credit for it.

[Holly Gibbs]

Heather Thomas in Ghana, preschool has been free and compulsory from the age of four for almost 20 years. While it means attendance levels are high, bigger class sizes and teaching styles have meant that children's educational outcomes are not improving. Now a new approach is being introduced to try and tackle that by making kindergarten lessons more fun and accessible. With the help of mothers. Justice Beidou went along to a school in Cernyane in western Ghana to find out more.

[Justice Beidou]

This school has no toys or building bricks or craft materials that you might expect to see in kindergarten in Europe or North America. Instead, each of the mothers has a game in front of her on her mat and is interacting with the children. I start by sitting with a mom called Cecilia. She speaks to children in the local language.

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Chi,

[Justice Beidou]

The mother, is showing the photographs of cattle and a deer. For a Ghanaian school, this is really unusual. I mean, it's Amazing. At my school, we learned the names of things in English from books. Cecilia never saw those books because she never went to school. So here, speaking this language, she is the expert. She is treated with respect by the teacher and called Madame by the children. The children do still study English in classes, but the playgroup always takes place in their own language. The fun carries on outside. Because of the large class sizes, children alternate between indoor and outdoor playgroups. The games were all developed and designed by an international charity called called Lively Minds. The organization has been in Ghana for 18 years working on this kindergarten process. But now they are in the process of handing it over to the Ghanaian government.

[Fayuda Tuyakubu]

Okay, so my name is Fayuda Tuyakubu. I work for Lively Minds Ghana as the country director. In Ghana, people actually enroll their children in school. And for the entire life of their child in the school, the parents never step a foot there. And at Lively Minds we believe that parents are the sleeping giants of education. They can drive change in the early childhood development of their children.

[Justice Beidou]

But it's not just focused on teaching at school.

[Fayuda Tuyakubu]

There are simple activities such as counting trees on your way to the farm, such as identifying vegetables in the kitchen when you are cooking. Simple things that you can do with your child, that you helps the child to learn even though you have not been in school. But also it's part of your daily activities that you already do. And so those parents have been empowered to believe that they have the skills, they have what it takes to support their children to learn. And they are doing that amazingly.

[Justice Beidou]

The main aim of this project is to improve education for the children. But the women who I have met taking part in this project have also reported that their confidence and self belief levels have grown up and they feel now that they are more respected at home and in their communities.

[Heather Thomas]

I have never been to school in my life. When this project started, I said, not me, I can't do that. Now I am very much convinced that I know many things. So now I am very confident woman. When we started, nobody believed in us. But since we started, it's really helped us.

[Holly Gibbs]

We've learned a lot that also helps

[Heather Thomas]

us to teach our children.

[Justice Beidou]

This program has brought a lot of happiness for someone who didn't even know

[Nathan Newby]

what number one was.

[Justice Beidou]

Now I know about numbers.

[Nathan Newby]

Nowadays I even have a watch.

[Justice Beidou]

And so as early as 6am I

[Nathan Newby]

tell my kids, guys, hurry up, hurry

[Justice Beidou]

up or you will be late for school.

[Nathan Newby]

I have become so happy knowing I am also a teacher now.

[Holly Gibbs]

And you can hear more about this story on people fixing the world wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Coming up in this podcast.

[Diana Mayhew]

I believe that no matter what else is going on in this world, this is something you can rely on to happen. That the blossoms will bloom no matter what the weather is or no matter what's happening.

[Holly Gibbs]

Why Visitors Are flocking to Washington, DC's Tidal Basin.

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Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway. It's stock up savings time now through March 31st spring in for storewide deals that earn four times the points. Look for in store tags to earn on eligible items from Lindor, Chips Ahoy, Gatorade, Post Ziploc and Zoa, then clip the offer in the app for automatic event long savings. Stack up those rewards to save even more. Enjoy savings on top of savings when you shop in store or online for easy drive up and go, pickup or delivery restrictions apply. See website for full terms and conditions.

[Holly Gibbs]

Welcome back to the Happy Podcast Here in the uk, England's most powerful sporting organisation, the Football association, has apologised to a women's team who defied its 50 year ban on female players. Myra Lipniski is one of them.

[Myra Lipniski]

I feel absolutely top of the world. Absolutely, because to me it's Corinthians 1f8.0 and it's the best win we've ever had.

[Holly Gibbs]

The FA also praised the team Manchester Corinthians for blazing a trail for women's football around the world. Reporter Will Chalk has more on this story.

[Narrator]

Women's football in the UK today is absolutely massive, with tens of thousands of supporters packing out stadiums for matches. It's been an incredible growth from where the sport was even a few years ago, with funding, fans and media coverage all on the up. Except more accurately, it's not growth, but a return to the world of a century ago.

[Nathan Newby]

A summer Sunday 1914. The established order was not widely questionable. Father at the head of the family, the monarch at the head of the nation.

[Narrator]

The outbreak of World War I had upset that established order and with Men off fighting at the front. Back in the UK, women's football matches were drawing in crowds of 50,000 plus. That is, until 1921, when the FA, deeming football quite unsuitable for women, banned it from being played on official grounds. A ban that wasn't lifted for half a century.

[Kerry Allen]

What that meant was any team that

[Heather Thomas]

let women play on their grounds was kicked out of the fa. Any coach that helped them, any referee that helped them, was struck off.

[Narrator]

That's Helen Tither, the director of a new documentary about a women's football team established in Manchester in England in 1949. Who defied that bat?

[Myra Lipniski]

The Corinthians were a ladies football team. Corinthians from Banchester.

[Heather Thomas]

We never seem to lose.

[Myra Lipniski]

Just about.

[Narrator]

The Manchester Corinthians were so successful, they traveled the world, playing teams such as Sporting Lisbon and Juventus, and even in 1960, touring South America. Myra Lipniski, who's now 90 years old, used to play for them.

[Myra Lipniski]

I didn't even know that a woman's football team ever existed. I watched these girls playing. I'd never seen anything like it before. So I spoke to the manager and he said, well, come next week and we'll see how you go. I went next week and I was in the team and I stayed in the team until I Pakiton. We played on cricket grounds, we played on fields where cows had been grazing.

[Nathan Newby]

Yeah.

[Myra Lipniski]

But when we went abroad, we played on the real national stadiums. Coming from a public park where you've got the spectators of, like, half a dozen underdogs to 50,000 people, I never felt that I was a pioneer. I just wanted to play. My husband never stopped me playing and my parents never stopped me playing. So why should some faceless person in the FA tell me I couldn't do it?

[Narrator]

Now the FA has apologised to the Manchester Corinthians and other teams like them for that ban. The association said the Corinthians blazed a trail for women's football around the world.

[Myra Lipniski]

It's been too long for some of us that are no longer with us. Good players who felt so ridiculed that they were ashamed to ever admit they'd played. But still, they say, better late than never.

[Holly Gibbs]

Myra Lipniski ending that report by Will Chalk. Next to one of the world's smallest birds. That's a hummingbird. They are known for their colourful feathers and incredible flying skills. But it's. It seems there's also something else remarkable about them. A study has found the alcohol in the nectar they consume is the equivalent of A human drinking a pint of beer. Rajini Vaidyanathan spoke to Alexei Marrow, a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, and the lead author of the study.

[Alexei Marrow]

Yeah, well, it hasn't been studied before. We have all of these studies about how bees and hummingbirds respond to alcohol in lab settings that assume that there's alcohol in flower nectar or somewhere in their diet. But the concentrations before have just been too low for previous methods to detect. And so that's new. We didn't know how much alcohol was in the flower nectar before.

[Kerry Allen]

Tell us a bit more about how you went about your research then.

[Alexei Marrow]

Yeah, we went to the botanical garden at the University of California, and we ended up sampling around 29 species of flowers using these very tiny amounts of nectar. And we used an enzyme assay, chemical reagents, to very accurately estimate these seemingly very low concentrations.

[Kerry Allen]

So, low concentrations. But do hummingbirds show signs of being drunk?

[Alexei Marrow]

Yeah, so they end up really adding up because hummingbirds consume something like one and a half times their body mass and nectar. And so when you're drinking that much volume, even a little bit of alcohol adds up. When you correct for body mass, they're consuming something similar to 5%, you know, half a liter lager per day. But they're doing it very slowly over the course of the day. And hummingbirds, they evolved drinking nectar. It's been over 100 million years that flowering plants have been around, and they do it their whole life. So I imagine they have a slightly different relationship to it, but that doesn't mean they don't enjoy it. If it's a dietary signal like we think it is, it may play that kind of role. When you smell alcohol, you know that there's yeasts and there's nothing spoilage bacteria in the nectar.

[Holly Gibbs]

Alexi Marrow from UC Berkeley. We end with a celebration of international friendship. Millions of people in Washington, D.C. have been enjoying its beloved cherry blossom trees in full bloom. The trees were a gift from Tokyo more than a hundred years ago. Riley Farrell went along to find out more.

[Riley Farrell]

Each spring, Washington, DC's Tidal Basin turns briefly into one of the most photographed spots in the United States. Do y' all want any together or anything?

[Heather Thomas]

Oh, sure.

[Riley Farrell]

Yeah.

[Diana Mayhew]

Okay.

[Riley Farrell]

One, two, three. These are so good. That's when the cherry blossoms arrive, bloom and fall within days. And yet the crowds gather reliably year after year. Diana Mayhew has spent decades at the center of it. She first became executive director of the National Cherry Blossom Festival in 2000.

[Diana Mayhew]

The first time I saw the cherry blossoms I definitely fell in love with everything they represent and the feeling, the emotions that come from it. And people that are down at the Tidal Basin just seem to be happy and connecting to community.

[Riley Farrell]

What is it that keeps people returning to the cherry blossoms?

[Diana Mayhew]

I believe that no matter what else is going on in this world, this is something you can rely on to happen, that the blossoms will bloom no matter what the weather is or no matter what's happening.

[Riley Farrell]

But the flowers are also a form of soft power. The original trees were a 1912 gift from Tokyo, a gesture of diplomacy that the festival still honors.

[Diana Mayhew]

It is our great responsibility to continue to communicate the history of the National Cherry Blossom Festival. These trees were given by the mayor of Tokyo more than 100 years ago, 114 years ago on March 27th to be exact. So it is very important to remember our culture and heritage. Japan's relationship with D.C. and the National Cherry Blossom Festival continues to be very strong. They, in honor of America's 250, have donated another 250 cherry trees to be planted at the Tidal Basin. So that is a tremendous gift and the gift that continues to keep on giving over the years.

[Riley Farrell]

And out on the Basin path, those visitors are clear about why they showed up.

[Kerry Allen]

Well, you know, here.

[Heather Thomas]

Exactly. This is one of the. My favorite spot because you can see the flowers and the cherry and then you can see also Thomas Jefferson Monument. This is just a fantastic view. I don't know, I always encourage everyone to come during this season to Lisi. I think it's a magic place.

[Alexei Marrow]

This is our third year coming together,

[Holly Gibbs]

probably our like 10th time, probably. We love the cherry blossom.

[Riley Farrell]

For anyone who's never seen the blossoms, would you mind describing them and what it's like to be here?

[Heather Thomas]

They're very beautiful and pink and it's really surreal to see them with all the monuments around the Taito Basin.

[Alexei Marrow]

I see a lot of like these

[Holly Gibbs]

nice cherry blossom pictures from Japan and

[Alexei Marrow]

lets you live a little bit of that here.

[Diana Mayhew]

The trees remind us that good things can pass fast. They're fleeting. So when they come, it's just something people just stop and pause and just take a quiet walk. So I think it's the appreciation of that just reminding us that life is fleeting. And so enjoy what you have in front of you.

[Holly Gibbs]

Diana Mayhew ending that report from Riley Farrell. And that's all from the happy copy pod for now. We'd love to hear from you. As ever, the address is globalpodcastbc.co.uk. this edition was produced by Rachel Bulkley the editor is Karen Martin. I'm Holly Gibbs. Until next time. Goodbye.

[Diana Mayhew]

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