SA HERO IS BIG IN JAPAN

LIFE once seemed bleak and hopeless, his grandmother’s social grant the only thing keeping him and his mother from starving.

Paballo Lobone is a qualified firefighter and paramedic but couldn’t find a job. “It was a really hard time for me,” says the 26-year-old from Klerksdorp in Matlosana, North West.

Never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined then that he’d become a figure of inspiration in a country halfway across the world – a real-life hero who puts the needs of others before his own.

Paballo proudly shows us the English textbook for Japanese middle-school pupils in which his courageous deeds are detailed under the headline, “Pabalelo