Welcome to your Daily. Today’s five hand-picked stories look at one unusual effect of hyperpartisanship, Britain’s need for friends, a patient wait for change in Venezuela, climate collaboration in Louisiana, and books that give a deeper look at migration.

But first, I’d like to start with someone I met today.

Chol Duang embodies the hope of South Sudan. In his trim gray suit, with his fluent English and bright smile, he is a symbol of what South Sudan can be – engaging, educated, and talented. He’s in the Boston area for a U.S. State Department-run leadership program, but he came to the Monitor with a specific question: How can I become a better journalist?

He works for state-run television news and once, after reporting on a spate of military rapes in a refugee camp, officials confiscated all his footage. “I’m in the middle,” he says, caught between government bosses and the public – and all with only three years’ experience as a journalist. Like his country, he’s finding his way.

But the impression he left was that he already has something more important than journalistic experience. Speaking of his hopes, Mr. Duang said, you have to “build yourself up first to help others.” That was really why he had come to America and the Monitor. Humbly, he wants to serve, to improve, and to lift his fellow citizens. In the list of virtues that will most help South Sudan and the world, that could be right at the top.