When British teenager Alice Pyne found she had terminal cancer, she made a "bucket list" of things she wanted to do before she died. That was four years ago. One year ago, she started a blog and posted her list, but acknowledged that "some are possible, some will remain a dream."
She quickly became something of an Internet sensation – the hashtag #alicebucketlist began trending on Twitter, attracting the attention of celebrities from David Cameron, Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, and Johnny Depp, according to the Huffington Post. The hashtag even became the top trending term one morning in June, The Guardian reported.
Through her Internet stardom, Pyne has managed to get 40,000 people to join the Bone Marrow Register, according to ITV News. But Pyne, cognizant of her terminal illness, hopes the trend will continue far into the future. “It’s really good that I’m getting so many people to join the register, but what about when I’m not here?” she wrote in 2011. “I don’t want it all to stop.” Pyne then explained her next mission: to have large card companies such as Hallmark, Camden, and Phoenix become involved in spreading the word as well.
And just recently, a company in Vancouver arranged for Alice to accomplish the last thing on her original list.
Whale watching was probably one of the main things on my bucket list and I've wanted to go for as long as I can remember but I'd kind of accepted that I would never get to do this one. I wanted to see Orca whales in their natural habitat and without me knowing, Mum had been chatting to Nicole at Mackay Whale Watching to set things up. I first chatted to Nicole about a year ago cos she sent me a You Tube video that she'd made of whale watching. At the beginning, it has her dad saying "welcome aboard Alice" and I can't tell you how amazing it was to hear him say that to my face! Yes, it was a bit mad as we couldn't get full insurance but mum and dad had decided that they needed to get me there regardless and as I was on what we call 'a good spell', they just took me!