7-year-old Harvey left his mom in awe of his kindness after he gave away his special meal to a homeless child in need.
South Africa (31 January 2022) – Young Harvey has the internet in tears with his kind gesture. Every six weeks, he gets to go on a mom-date of his choice, and while sitting in the Burger King parking lot ready to eat his meal, he saw a street child and decided to give his burger away instead.
Tiffani, the founder of The Maletsatsi Foundation, invites each of her older children to select a date night with her. Every Monday, she takes one of the children out for an activity and dinner of their choice. She does so because life running a safe house for orphans abandoned and legally removed babies can be quite overwhelming, and she wants each of her children to have special one-on-one time.
The Maletsatsi Foundation is a child welfare organisation founded in 2020 that provides a safe haven for children in need. If the organisation sounds familiar, that is because it is home to the famous Midnight Weetbix Bandit from 2021.
Tiffani shared a recent mom-date night update about her son Harvey, who has been having a tough time and was really looking forward to his turn. Harvey has a heart issue that is currently being monitored by a machine he has to wear around his chest. He has been feeling quite shy and felt nervous that if they went to a restaurant for his meal, people would stare.
Instead, he asked Tiffani if they could go to the Burger King drive-through and sit in the car to enjoy the meal. Wanting to make sure Harvey enjoyed his big night, Tiffani agreed.
Sadly, being in the parking lot, they caught the attention of a homeless child. As the child walked towards them with a paper in hand, she felt cold with dread. Firstly, she had no more cash on hand and worst of all, having tragically lost one of the children in her care to illness just a few days before, Tiffani was too emotionally raw to handle the situation.
The last thing she imagined at that moment was Harvey doing an act of kindness.
“With my window still closed, I gestured to say ‘I’ve got nothing’, ‘sorry, can’t help’. The honest truth is that I tried not to make eye contact, and felt secure I’d avoided the awkwardness because the windows were all up and such was life.
Situation avoided.
I turned to the centre console, and distracted myself with getting the straws into the milkshake next to me so I could hand it back to Harvey before we pulled off.
Suddenly I heard a little voice say, “Come Here”. I hadn’t heard him open the window but as I swung around to see who he was talking to, I watched my sweet little date handing his meal out of the window to the forlorn little boy I had just shunned.
The meal that he waits six weeks to share with me. The simple meal that he’d selected for his special night.
The meal that he should have been enjoying.‘Oh my boy’ I exclaimed, ‘What did you just do?’
‘I just got sad for him mommy. I always feel sad for the children I see on the road but I never have things to give them. But today I did. So I gave it to him.’”
Tiffani was so proud of Harvey’s kindness, especially because he too was feeling raw from their loss, his own health struggles at hand, and the fact that he won’t get that kind of spoil again for six weeks.
“Despite these things he still had capacity to be a darn good human being.
Despite the fact that he’s just seven and that all he had to give was a Burger King Meal, this kid just taught his mamma a thing or two.”
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