Random acts of kindness

Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty - by Anne Herbert –
This quote comes to mind many times when our awesome guests shower us with gifts that can never be bought, gifts like kindness, consideration, humour, compassion; I can go on and on. They frequently bring gifts from their home country, giving us a glimpse into their worlds. Many of our guests have become firm friends, giving us the gift of friendship.

Swedish guests stayed at Lily’s Cottage for two months; hearing the happy chatter of their little boys and the splashing in the pool, was a gift of joy. They kindly gave us a beautifully hand painted little wooden Dala horse, which originates in the 17th century from Dalarna in Sweden. This now takes pride of place in our kitchen window sill, a constant reminder of that happy time.
More info on the Dala horse - https://www.theswedishwoodenhorse.com/dala-horse-history

South African expats now living in New York, gave our employees each a most generous tip and a dollar each as a keepsake. They surprised us with NY coffee mugs and a little clock, all constant reminders of these wonderful people.

We hosted an awesome New York family…many good guys seem to come from NY 😊 They currently work in a Zambian Orphanage, chose to holiday in Durban. Beautiful music with guitar and song wafted up to our house every morning during their worship sessions, truly felt blessed. They gifted us this amazing Anthurium, which flowered fully about a month after they left. So we now have a little piece of the Carr family in our garden!

An eight-year old BMX rider, gave us one of his medals, and we framed it. Such an awesome and generous gesture, and we hope to see Caleb grow up to be a champion rider one day.

Then we had a Spanish business guest who demonstrated the making of a delicious Spanish Tortilla, filled with little cubes of fried potatoes and peppers, Manuel had loads of fun with that demo and I now make Tortilla for our guests from time to time 😊

Some guests leave chocolates…we’ve had Italian, Belgium and of course local chocolates, some leave flowers, but all of them leave beautiful memories that will remain forever etched in our hearts and soul.

Back to the quote – although my guesthouse experience is not quite what Anne Herbert speaks of, it still is apt as these strangers who come to us really are the ones who expect to be treated with spoils, not the other way around. We should all go out and try and practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty – the world would be a better place!