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Emily Williams

00:00:00

'Hey there. We've got your weekly dose of feel good stories. We'll tell you about an 81-year-old beauty queen who's strutted her stuff for Miss Universe this week. Plus, how parks in one state are helping people who are colorblind see nature in a whole new way.

Ethan Howes

00:00:16

It looks like a highlighter taken to the world, so everything's a bit brighter.

Emily Williams

00:00:20

From CNN, I'm Emily Williams, and this is Five Good Things.

Emily Williams

00:00:29

If you visit the penguin enclosure at the Sea Life Melbourne Aquarium in Australia, you'll notice one penguin is not like the others. In a group of black and white king penguins, Pesto is big, fluffy and brown. That's because he's a nine month old chick. But Pesto is especially big for his age. This week he weighed in at about 52 pounds.

Emily Thornton

00:00:55

He's probably on the 95th percentile of a normal King penguin chick.

Emily Williams

00:01:00

That's senior penguin keeper, Emily Thornton. She calls Pesto their resident superstar because he's recently become Internet famous.

Emily Thornton

00:01:08

We all love Big Baby. Everybody loves a big baby, so. Even human babies, if you have a baby that's big, everyone's like, 'aww it's so cute!' So it's that sort of stuff as well, I think.

Emily Williams

00:01:19

The aquarium has posted videos of Pesto on TikTok where they now have about 104,000 followers. In one, they call Pesto their "chonky king." The days of Pesto being a fluffy brown baby are numbered, but that's normal. He hatched at the end of January, so now he's nearing the time where he'll start to shed that fluffy brown coat and become an adult.

Emily Thornton

00:01:41

It's usually quite funny to see how he's going to lose those brown feathers.

Emily Williams

00:01:45

Emily said Pesto Internet fame has given her a chance to teach people more about his species and the threats they're facing in the wild.

Emily Thornton

00:01:53

I love the fact that he's bringing in questions about the biology of the animal bat's physiology of the animals, about the environmental conservation side of things. We're hopefully sharing a bit more information about them as well to people in the wild, which is good.

Emily Williams

00:02:12

'As you listen to this podcast, Nels Matson is running across the country - over 3000 miles from San Francisco to New York City - all to honor veterans.

Nels Matson

00:02:23

We run through these little towns across America, and a lot of the people that are in these areas are also serving our country as well.

Emily Williams

00:02:32

We didn't want to slow him down, so Nels told us about his journey while running through Fort Collins, Colorado. He's calling his transcontinental run, Project Campbell's Call. It's named in honor of his friend's brother, Chris Campbell, a Navy Seal who died serving his country in Afghanistan in 2011. In his will, Campbell included, that he hoped to have 100,000 people donate to the Wounded Warrior Project, an organization that provides resources for military veterans who served on or after September 11th, 2001. So Nels is doing what he can to make Campbell's last wish a reality.

Nels Matson

00:03:08

The number one goal is trying to raise $100 per mile. There's about 3067 miles. That's $306,700 that we're trying to raise.

Emily Williams

00:03:21

'He's also aiming to break the world record for running this distance, which means finishing in 42 days or less. Nels says he's been running about 16 hours-a-day. So when he gets to New York City, he's looking forward to using a real bathroom and taking a hot shower. But most of all, he wants to honor Chris and other veterans for their service.

Nels Matson

00:03:43

Whatever challenge we're doing, just remember that we have the freedom to do things like this because of a lot of great men and women who who gave a lot or gave all in order for us to be able to do these things.

Emily Williams

00:04:01

For me, one of the best parts of fall is going on a hike and seeing the leaves change colors. But that's something. Virginia State Park ranger Ethan Howes never got all that excited about. That's because he's red, green, colorblind. So the experience has always been a bit muted.

Ethan Howes

00:04:19

I can see some of the reds that pop out and things like that. It's always been, okay, let's move along with it.

Emily Williams

00:04:25

But when he heard about a park in another state that installed viewfinders adapted for people who are colorblind, he thought that was a pretty good idea.

Ethan Howes

00:04:34

The lenses that are put into these viewfinders help filter out certain wavelengths. And so folks with red green colorblindness have a capability of seeing a broader spectrum of color.

Emily Williams

00:04:45

Virginia's Natural Tunnel State Park installed its first adaptive viewfinder last year, and Ethan was able to see the fall leaves in all their colorful glory. He said one of the other color blind park guests who tried it said it best.

Ethan Howes

00:04:59

It looks like a highlighter taken to the world. So everything's a bit brighter. My own mother, when I told her that, you know, I look through it, she cried on the phone. So that was pretty impactful.

Emily Williams

00:05:10

This year, the viewfinders were added to all 43 of Virginia's state parks, making it the first state park system to offer them at all park locations.

Emily Williams

00:05:23

'When Korean model Choi Soon-hwa discovered that the Miss Universe beauty pageant changed a long standing rule this year, she knew it was her time to shine. But here's the thing. Choi isn't your typical Miss Universe contestant. She was born about a decade before the global pageant launched in 1952. For many years, competition in this universe was restricted to women between 18 and 28. But this year, the organization decided to get rid of the age limit in an effort to make the competition more diverse. That opened the door for people like Choi, who didn't start modeling until she was in her 70s. She was working at a hospital when a patient told her she should give modeling a try.

'Choi Soon-hwa and her Translator

00:06:09

I've never walked in straight lines until the age of 17. So model walking, posing and smiling were really difficult. I practiced walking, posing and smiling every night.

Emily Williams

00:06:22

'So this week, at 81-years-old, Choi became the oldest woman ever to compete in a national level Miss Universe contest. Miss Universe Korea got rid of its swimsuit segment this year. But Choi took part in the rest of the classic pageantry. She sang, she model walked, she wore a beautiful white gown. She even took home the best dressed award. And while she fell short of her dream of moving on to the international pageant in Mexico, Choi showed women what it looks like to do what you love. At any age.

'Choi Soon-hwa and her Translator

00:06:53

You have to do what you wanted to do, the things that you gave up to raise your kids. You have to do that when you're old. And when you do that, you'll be super happy and encounter happiness at every moment.

Emily Williams

00:07:10

There's a sports mascot shaking things up and shaking her stuff on the basketball court this playoff season. That's next.

Emily Williams

00:07:25

'The WNBA playoffs are underway and New York's own Liberty team has a good shot at winning the championship. The Brooklyn-based ballers have some of the best players in the league, but the team favorite might not be a player at all.

Announcer

00:07:39

Come on, Ellie! Show 'em how we do it girl! Uh huh! Work it Ellie!

Emily Williams

00:07:47

The announcer is hyping up Liberty's mascot, Ellie the Elephant. She is tall, rocks a long braid, cute outfits and loves to perform. Fans like Lauren Ludwig and Neysa Lewis ,love it.

Lauren Ludwig

00:08:01

Definitely her sass and her dance moves and her whole personality.

Neysa Lewis

00:08:07

'I've always loved elephants, so seeing Ellie as a character for the Liberty - the best! Unmatched! There's no other mascot that can touch Ellie.

Emily Williams

00:08:14

'You can usually find Ellie on the basketball court during game breaks or dancing with fans in the stands. But if you can't make it to a game, don't worry, you can find her on Instagram and TikTok - twerking twirling and two-stepping to all kinds of music, like salsa, hip hop, R&B. And she does it so well, she's got thousands of followers on social media. She's been called the 'Beyoncé of mascots.'

Shana Stephenson

00:08:40

She's just so full of joy. And she lives out loud. She dances like nobody is watching.

Emily Williams

00:08:46

Shana Stephenson is the team's chief brand officer. Shanna says the performer who plays Ellie is from Brooklyn as well. But their identity is kept highly confidential. However, the fact that Ellie is a woman who gives a nod to Black culture is no secret at all.

Shana Stephenson

00:09:03

You know, so many mascots are typically masculine or dopey or kind of like have this jock energy about them, and that's fine. We recognize that our mascot represents our athletes who are women, you know, strong, powerful, everything. And so we wanted that to really come through in everything that Ellie embodies as well.

Emily Williams

00:09:28

All right, that's all for now. Join us tomorrow for the next edition of One Thing. Host David Rind and CNN's Nic Robertson break down how October 7th and the subsequent wars, changed the trajectory of the Middle East. Five Good Things is a production of CNN Audio. This episode was produced by Eryn Mathewson and me, Emily Williams. Our senior producers are Felicia Patinkin and Faiz Jamil. Matt Dempsey is our production manager. Dan Dzula is our technical director and Steve Lickteig is the executive producer of CNN Audio. We get support from Joey Salvia, Haley Thomas, Alex Manasseri, Robert Mathers, Jon Dianora, Leni Steinhardt, Jamus Andrest, Nichole Pesaru, and Lisa Namerow. Special thanks to Lilit Marcus Gawon Bay, Harmeet Kaur, and Katie Hinman. Thanks so much for listening. Come back next week.

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