The Kindest “Pay It Forward” Gestures
Sometimes the kindness of a stranger can really turn someone’s day around. Small gestures like a hug in a moment of crisis, or life-saving acts of heroism can all make a huge impact.
These Redditors shared their stories of the kind gestures they experienced which inspired them to pay it forward.
1. Under The Bridge
I was in Barcelona with my father. It was my tenth birthday, so he took me for a vacation to just chill, see the city, and have some father-son time.
Anyhow, we decided to take one of these two-story red buses that rides around the city, and you can jump on and off as you'd like. Obviously, as Norwegian tourists, we wanted the top floor.
He told me to go grab us a seat while he paid for our tickets. The bus driver was rather impatient and started driving while people bought tickets. As my dad walks up the stairs and has barely had his feet on the top floor for more than two seconds, some random Asian guy in his mid-40 jumps out from his seat and pushes my dad down so he also goes down himself and hits the floor. I was horrified—and then I realized why he’d done it.
The bus just drove under this tiny bridge of stone and would have literally crushed my father’s skull if this smiling Chinese man in his mid-forties didn't leap forward and push him.
2. Out In The Cold
When I was younger I had parents who were horrible, like really terrible parents. One night in the middle of a snowstorm they threw me outside in the snow with no shoes or socks and in a t-shirt. It was freezing cold.
I was wandering around the neighborhood behind the houses because I was too embarrassed. Suddenly, a neighbor of mine, (around 17 years old) was sitting on his window smoking and looking at the snow.
He saw me and asked what I was doing. I just gave him this look and he leaned out his window, grabbed me by the arms, and hauled me up into his window.
He gave me some blankets and let me sit there in the warmth for a while and we just small-talked and he put on a movie. A little while later my mother came by, saw him, and asked if he had seen me.
He instantly, without hesitating, told her no, and watched until she left before helping me back home. At the time, it was the kindest thing anyone had ever done for me. The only person who had ever protected me from my parents.
Since then I've always been doing my best to help my friends and acquaintances from their difficult families or relationships.
3. When In New York
When I was 19 years old, I was with my best friend on a trip to New York from Vancouver, Canada. We were staying in Times Square but we went to a concert in Long Island and ended up taking really late transit home. Enter the creeps.
A man and a woman clearly high on something get on the train and sit across from my scrawny pale friend and my equally scrawny self.
They start to inexplicably pick a fight with us, accusing us of making fun of them or something. I don't know, probably just an excuse to beat the snot out of us and maybe take whatever we have on us. The man becomes physically threatening when out of nowhere, an exceptionally large man with a thick New York accent says "Out of the way, fatty needs a seat" to me, temporarily defusing the situation—but he didn’t stop there.
He then proceeds to pull jawbreakers out of his pocket and hands them to my friend and me while telling a story of the jawbreakers he used to steal from kids at school.
When the creepy couple gets belligerent again, the huge dude instantly changes the topic to his current bodyguard job and tells stories of smashing people's faces into cement walls and putting bad people into the hospital.
The creep shut up and got his girlfriend off of the train at the next stop, and we rode the rest of the way back to the hotel with this awesome dude talking about our favorite candies and the fastest ways to get to the center of a jawbreaker.
I will be forever grateful for this guy for rescuing me from this weird situation. Very welcoming first night in New York!
4. Bench Buddy
I didn't have the best childhood. My adoptive father has some unconventional parenting methods, and so I used to cry a lot. On one such occasion, I was sitting on a park bench, crying softly to myself.
I was trying to be discreet but I couldn't have been more than 11 or 12 at the time. An old lady sat at the other end of the bench and we sat in relative silence for a few minutes (I would sniffle occasionally but I was trying to be quiet).
She clearly noticed me wiping my eyes and asked me if I was okay. I told her I was, but she insisted on taking me to a nearby coffee cart and buying me a cup of hot chocolate (it was winter).
It was the nicest thing she could have done for me and it was really nice to know that someone cared. I’ll never forget this kind woman.
