Casual worker goes above and beyond, surprising employer with sweetest gift

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A casual worker has surprised his employer by going above and beyond in his efforts to collect plastic bottle caps for a wheelchair fundraiser at the office.

Lee Randall an occupational therapist in Joburg’s northeastern suburbs sent us a beautiful story about Matlampa Michael Mootane. Michael came into Lee and her associates live’s at just the right time.

They were having trouble with the local municipality cleaning up the area surrounding their practice. The problem got so bad that they had to deal with dead rats and human waste near their front gate. After having just about enough, they decided to take on a casual worker to clean the area surrounding their practice.

“We’ve been trying unsuccessfully for months to get the City Council to deal with the weeds, clogged gutters, missing manhole covers, potholes, water leaks and loads and loads of litter from pedestrians and recycling collectors – recently, the situation worsened to the extent that there was human waste and a collection of dead rats in the bushes across from our gate! Although I’ve been working on the road myself during the mayor’s A Re Sebetseng days, the results felt like a drop in the ocean.”

That is when Lee got in contact with Michael. He had fallen in very hard times and was in need of a job. She called him up and offered him some casual work on a weekly basis to keep the area clean.

“Michael then happened along, going door-to-door looking for work and expressing a willingness to do anything. He has some tertiary education and much formal work experience (including years and years of working for Putco) but since his last job ended in 2017 he’s been unable to secure further employment and his wife has only a part-time job at an old age centre….making it very difficult for them to support their children. We hired him on an ad hoc basis to clean the street for a day here and a day there, and he’s been incredibly thorough and dedicated with this.”

When Michael started working at the practice, he noticed they had a collection of plastic bottle caps. Lee mentioned that they were collecting them to help raise funds for a wheelchair through the Sweethearts Foundation. A collection of bottle caps and tops needs to weigh a total of 450kgs in order to be able to afford a wheelchair. Lee and her colleagues have been slowly building up their collection over time knowing fully that it may take them a year or so.

The next week, Michael showed up for his shift with a massive bag of plastic bottle caps he had collected for the office.

“I casually mentioned our bottle top collection to him and have been blown away by his response – he has now arrived two weeks running with entire shopping bags full of bottle tops, easily doubling what we’ve collected over many months!”

“However, what has really astonished me is how many bottle tops he’s collected in his own time, between his visits here – and for no financial gain! Despite his own plight, he is very keen to help a stranger who needs a wheelchair.”
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“In a couple of weeks Michael has more than doubled the number of bottle tops collected by all of us and our patients over the past several months! I’d really like to reciprocate by making people aware of him, in the hopes that he will be offered proper work.”

Lee was so moved by his contribution that she knew she needed to do more for him. That is why she contacted us, in the hopes that sharing his story would mean people see his compassion and dedication to doing a job right. If one person could be inspired enough, maybe his opportunities for work would broaden.

Michael is an inspiration and his contributions to Lee’s practice have been invaluable!