In a gesture that is winning over the internet actor Tom Hanks wrote a letter to a bullied Australian boy called Corona and gifted him a cherished typewriter bearing the same name.
The Toy story actor and his wife Rita Wilson contracted COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, in March and spent two weeks recovering in a Queensland hospital, before returning home to the United States.
Eight-year-old Corona De Vries sent a letter to Hanks asking after his health. “I heard on the news you and your wife had caught the coronavirus,” the boy wrote. “Are you ok? I love my name but at school people call me the coronavirus,” De Vries said.
“I get very sad and angry when people call me this.”
Reacting to the letter, Hanks responded with words of encouragement, typed out on one of the typewriters he often carries around.
Dear Friend Corona. Your letter made my wife and I feel so wonderful! Thank you for being such a good friend - friends make friends feel good when they are down."
“You’ve got a friend in me!” Hanks also gave him a Corona-branded typewriter that he had brought to Australia saying “I thought this typewriter would suit you. Ask a grown-up how it works. And use it to write me back.”