HAIKOU, March 5 (Xinhua) -- A video shot by Chantel Smit, a South African teacher who works in Haikou, capital of south China's Hainan Province, has recently gone viral online.

In the short video, Chantel, together with her family, praised the local police for doing an excellent job in the fight against the novel coronavirus and showed their gratitude to a police officer who has been giving a helping hand to her family during the difficult period.

The Smits came to Haikou in November last year. She works at a foreign language school and her husband Johan is a househusband, taking care of their baby girl at home. Two months later, however, the outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) upended their lives and they had to stay at home to avoid virus infection.

On Feb. 2, the couple received a phone call from a local police station, but they were unable to communicate with the police officer as they do not speak Mandarin. But after a while, another officer who speaks English called back, asking about their information and if they needed any help.

Chantel told the policeman that they had no masks and had no idea where to buy one as all masks were sold out when the contagion first started.

"He told us not to worry, and about 15 minutes later, he came to our apartment and gave us 10 masks," Chantel recalled.

"I was so shocked and thankful that he went through all this trouble to make sure we got some masks," she said, adding the policeman gave them five surgical masks and five ordinary ones. "But due to the shortage at the time, it didn't matter to us."

A few weeks later, the policeman knocked on their door again and brought them more masks. And this time, the masks were mailed by the policeman's parents from his hometown in eastern China's Fujian Province.

"Once again we were in shock and so grateful to him. We are in a foreign country and we are not locals, but he decided to take care of us and made sure we were okay," Chantel said. "He gave us peace and hope during this difficult time. He is kind-hearted and selfless, therefore, we consider him to be our hero."

The hero of the Smits, Tang Runze, is a young man who has been a police officer for just one year. The 24-year-old said it is his daily work to check the status of residents in the community. The police need to inquire about residents' movements to know if they have recently traveled to Wuhan, the epicenter of the epidemic, and check their body temperature.

Learning about the difficult situation facing the Smits, Tang decided to lend a hand.

Chantel shared the whole story on her WeChat page and wrote "Thank you, policeman, your kindness is overwhelming. China is truly our home away from home."

"This is a difficult time in China and an act of kindness like this makes you positive and happy," said Chantel, explaining why she wanted to share this positive story with more people.

Besides sharing the story on WeChat, Chantel and Johan also made a video to show their gratitude, saying "We're fighting with China."

Chantel said the Chinese government has done a fantastic job in containing the virus.

Tang and the couple have now become friends. Learning that the couple had trouble ordering groceries, he taught them to buy vegetables and food online via apps.

The couple has now gotten used to staying at home. "We play with our baby a lot. We cook together and clean a lot. We appreciate the extra time that we have to spend with our daughter," Chantel said.