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A homeless man asked a college student for some tea, and a deluge of kindness followed

The unlikely pair spent the day getting to know each other, and now thousands of strangers are invested in Unc's well-being.

Sanai Graden/GoFundMe

Neither Sanai Graden nor her "Unc" knew what their meeting in a parking lot would lead to.

Every once in a while, a story of two strangers turns into a shared connection that touches millions. This is one of them.

Sanai Graden is a 21-year-old college student living in Washington, D.C., who likes to vlog on TikTok while she does everyday things. As she was heading to the grocery store on a random day at the end of January 2024, she turned on her camera, and soon after, a man approached and asked her if she could help him get some hot tea.

Not money. Not even food. Just some simple, hot tea.

Graden told the man she was going to Trader Joe's and he could go along with her and they could stop at Starbucks. As they walked and chatted, Graden learned the man was homeless, had no family and was suffering from prostate cancer. He has just gotten insurance, but it wouldn't kick in for 45 days and he needed a prescription filled.

Over the next four to five hours, Graden got him some tea, helped him get his prescription filled so he could get some relief from his pain and put him up in a hotel room for the night. By the end of the day, she was calling him "Unc," and he was calling her his "angel."

She left him with some cash and her phone number and then posted this video:

@hustlanani

Please help me help him !

At the end, she said she wanted to start a GoFundMe for Unc (whose real name is Alonzo), and she did just that.

"I'm just a college student, there's only so much I can do," she shared in another TIkTok. "I did the best I could. But that man, he was literally suffering, and it broke my heart…He was so kind…I just wanted to help him."

Her initial video started going viral—it currently has over 20 million views—and people started donated to the GoFundMe. When it reached $12,000 in a matter of hours, she called her parents to tell them about it. They told her she was exactly the right person to be helping this man because she will make sure the money is used to get him what he needs.

@hustlanani

Replying to @The JasmynYvette Thank you so much eve

Little did she know that that $12,000 would soon rise to $20,000, and then to $50,000, then $100,000 and more. As of the writing of this article, two days after the GoFundMe went up, it has jumped the $300,000 mark.

At this point, so many people are invested in Unc's well-being. Upwards of 20,000 people have donated, and the number just keeps rising. As one commenter put it, "He's everyone's Unc now."

Graden went to tell him the good news the next morning when the GoFundMe was around $150,000, but when she arrived at the hotel, he had already checked out. She searched everywhere she thought he might be, even renting a car to cover more ground more quickly, but she wasn't able to find him.

Finally, she shared a brief voice message he left for her that started, "Hey, Niece! It's your uncle," and ended with "I love you!" but he neglected to tell her where he was. After she looked around some more, he called again and and told her he was at church. She told him to wait right there.

She found him in front of a church and invited him to go get something to eat. She said she wanted to talk to him in private, but he was waiting with his aunt and couldn't leave just yet. Finally, she was able to sit with him in her car and tell him about what thousands of people were doing to help him live comfortably and more easily manage his cancer.

She had to convince him the money was his, not theirs together. He also said he hadn't finished writing her a letter he'd started.

@hustlanani

I know you’ve all been waiting on his reaction. I just made it home. Please enjoy it. Thank you everyone for coming together. This would not have been possible without the endless support. This is just the beginning of something great. I’m enternally grateful. God did that !!!

The first thing Graden did was take Alonzo to Target to get him his own phone and some new clothes of his choosing. He even had a little laugh with Graden when she asked him if he wanted to get some floss, forgetting that he doesn't have any teeth.

This story is still developing and there are obviously a lot of complex details to work out as they get Alonzo settled with however much money the GoFundMe ultimately raises. No one wants Alonzo to lose his health benefits, and there are various financial as well as mental and emotional elements to consider as they move forward. But the power of the kindness of strangers to change someone's circumstances, starting with just one caring soul, is certainly worth celebrating.

Follow @hustlanani on TikTok for updates on Unc.


This article originally appeared on 2.13.24

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8-year-old raises $100,000 after finding out his favorite Waffle House server lived in a motel

Living in a hotel with his family has been the safer option for the health of his daughters.

THV11/Youtube

Boy raises $100,000 for Waffle House server who lived in a motel.

Everyone has their favorite place to eat, and if you visit enough, you get to know the regular servers and sometimes even form a bit of a friendship with them. When 8-year-old Kayzen Hunter started going to a local Waffle House in Arkansas with his parents and sometimes grandpa, he became familiar with his server, Devonte Gardner. Actually, Gardner became Kayzen's favorite server, giving him high fives and letting Kayzen tell him jokes.

The relationship between Gardner and Kayzen's family continued to develop, which led to the little boy noticing Gardner was often dropped off for work because he didn't have a car. Eventually, the Hunter family found out Gardner had a wife and two daughters who were living in a hotel because of issues in their previous home.

“We wanted to find something affordable, so we moved into a low-income area," Gardner told Today.com "We just got tired of infestations with rats and roaches and all this black mold. My daughters were getting sick. No heat and things like that. When it was cold outside, we had to bundle up with like four or five blankets in order to stay warm."


Garner had been living in a hotel with his wife and two daughters, who are 2 and 3 years old, for the past eight months. I'm sure most people have spent a night or two in a hotel, and unless it's a penthouse suite, the space is crowded with more than two people in a room. It serves the purpose for a vacation, but living in a standard hotel room would likely begin to take a toll on your mental health as well as your finances. But when your options are limited, it's an understandable best option.

Of course, after learning this information about his Waffle House best bud, Kayzen wanted to do something to help. That's when he came up with the idea to start a GoFundMe to help Gardner get a car to help him get back and forth to work. Kayzen's mom took a bit of convincing to get on board, but since 8-year-olds can't open an account on their own, his mom had to sign off.

Originally, the goal for the fundraiser was set at $500 to help Gardner get back and forth to work, but as it started to gain more traction, it blew past the original goal and continued to climb. People were moved by the GoFundMe page written by Kayzen and his mom.

“Devonte is one of the most joyous and positive people you’ve ever met!! He always greets us with the biggest smile,” Kayzen wrote on the GoFundMe. “I hope your heart is as BIG as mine and you will help me spread kindness in the world. Any amount helps!!”

Gardner has big plans for the money raised by Kayzen, but his first step is moving into a brand new apartment. The father of two told Today.com that he recently signed the lease on a two-bedroom apartment. As for the rest of the money? Well, the donations keep pouring in. It's currently up to $108,000, and Garner isn't planning on spending it frivolously.

“I’m gonna save the rest because I want to put my daughters in a good school, I want them to be in a good environment,” Gardner explained to Today.com. “Everything I’m getting is going mostly towards my daughters to make sure they have a great, great life. Make sure we won’t have to struggle anymore.”

And yes, he still works at Waffle House and greets Kayzen and his family just like always, high five and all.

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Students raise $225K for 80-year-old janitor forced to unretire after his rent skyrocketed

We need to get Mr. James "out of this school."

via Grey.Thurman/TikTok

Mr. James had to come out of retirement to pay his rent, and some students weren't having it.

Over the past few years, the outlandish increase in the cost of living for the average American has been hard on just about everyone. Prices on consumer goods have been through the roof as inflation reached its highest level in 40 years in June of 2022.

Rent has been going up for the average American as well. From 2017 to 2022, the average year-over-year increase was 5.77%, with the most significant increase of an average of 14% occurring from 2021 to 2022.

Almost every American feels the pain of the increased living expenses, but it has to be especially hard on those living on a fixed income. Fox 4 News reports that when an 80-year-old retired man affectionately known as “Mr. James” saw his rent go up by $400, he had to work again to make ends meet. Callisburg High School in Texas hired Mr. James as a janitor, and the sight of seeing a man that old lifting garbage cans and scrubbing lunch tables didn’t sit right with some of the students.

“It’s just so sad seeing an 80-year-old man having to do things an 80-year-old shouldn’t have to do,” Callisburg senior Banner Tidwell said, according to KXII.

A few of the school's students decided to do something about Mr. James' situation and started a GoFundMe campaign called “Getting Mr. James out of this school” to raise some money for him so he could resume his retirement. The teens started with a goal of $10,000 that was quickly surpassed after Greyson Thurman, a Callisburg student, promoted it with a TikTok video that went viral.

Just 8 days after the GoFundMe campaign started, it has already raised $225,000 for Mr. James. "He doesn't want any part of the spotlight. He's appreciative of what these students have done," the school's principal, Jason Hooper, told Fox 4 Dallas-Fort Worth.


@grey.thurman

Go fund me is in the bio! My classmates and I hate seeing Mr. James here, no one his age should have to be cleaning our messes up to continue to live. #fyp#school#gofundme#fy#mrjames

“It’s crazy to see something that we knew people would have wanted to help. But we didn’t know it would blow up,” senior Marti Yousko, one of the campaign’s organizers, told KXII, "When we told him, he was kind of like, 'dang, that's alright!'" Yousko continued.

“It's just amazing,” Hooper told KXII. ”You know of the need that was met because of three kind kids, but of all of our students who have pitched in to help that need.”

gofundme, mr james, senior citizens

The students who organized the campaign and Mr. James.

via GoFundMe

Incredibly, these students had the heart to realize Mr. James' struggles and stepped up and do something about the situation. This is one of those stories that is both heartwarming and sad. It’s beautiful that the kids, the community and people around the world are helping Mr. James, but it’s terrible that an 80-year-old man would have to resort to going back to work in the first place. Especially in a country with so much wealth.

Fox 4 News reached out to the Callisburg Independent School District to see if Mr. James is still working at the school, and he hasn’t said anything about leaving his job just yet.

"Nobody deserves to work their whole life. They deserve to enjoy everything," Thurman said.






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Teen raises $186,000 to help 81-year-old Walmart worker pay off her mortgage and retire

'Life shouldn't be this hard.'

Photo by Jeremy Wong on Unsplash

Teen raises $186,000 to help Walmart worker retire.

In America, many people have to work well past the age of retirement to make ends meet. While some of these people choose to work past retirement age because it keeps them active, some older people, like Nola Carpenter, 81, work out of necessity.

Carpenter has been working at Walmart for 20 years, way beyond most people's retirement age just so that she can afford to continue to pay her mortgage. When 19-year-old Devan Bonagura saw the woman looking tired in the break room of the store, he posted a video to his TikTok of Carpenter with a text overlay that said, "Life shouldn't b this hard..." complete with a sad face emoji.

In the video, Carpenter is sitting at a small table looking down and appearing to be exhausted. The caption of the video reads ":/ I feel bad." Turns out, a lot of other people did too, and encouraged the teen to start a GoFundMe, which has since completed.

The retirement age in the United States in order to collect Social Security benefits is 66, or 67 if you were born in or after 1960. But early retirement starts at 62 for reduced benefits. How many years you worked is a deciding factor in how much financial benefit you will receive from Social Security, with the average amount expected to be $1,827 a month in January 2023.

@dbon973_

WE LOVE YOU NOLA I HOPE THIS HELPS❤️🙏 #blowthisup #fyp #gofundme #nola #walmart #viralvideo

While that amount of money is nothing to scoff at, it's also not enough to live off of alone, especially for those who fall below the average amount. You also have to factor in Medicare premiums and tax withholdings that must come out of that figure. So it's no wonder that people over the age of 67 have to continue to work if they don't have adequate savings put away to retire on. The cost of living increases impact all age groups, including the elderly.

Thankfully for this elderly Walmart worker, the GoFundMe quickly exploded and raised $110,000 in just 24 hours. But when Bonagura went to give the money to Carpenter, she was grateful for the help but explained she would still need to work until the other $60,000 of her mortgage was paid off. This prompted users to give more to secure Carpenter's retirement.

In the end, the GoFundMe raised $186,000, which was enough to pay off the mortgage on the woman's house. Retirement is now on the horizon for the grandmother, who says she's set to retire on the first of the year. She wants to make sure she helps her co-workers get through the holiday season before hanging up her vest for good.

@dbon973_

Update video with Nola ❤️ #nola #dbon #gofundme #viral #blowthisup #love #kindness #givingback

As for Bonagura, he's currently suspended with pay due to him filming at the store and posting it to TikTok. While he wasn't an employee of Walmart, he worked for a cellphone carrier that operated sales inside the store. Nevertheless, Bonagura feels he did the right thing and is focused solely on making sure Carpenter gets to retire.

It's amazing what people can accomplish when they work together. Happy retirement, Nola! Here's to hoping you enjoy every minute of it.

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