r/tifu
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u/lazybear90
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TIFU by donating $15,041 to a poor community in Bangladesh instead of the $150 donation I intended. L
This happened in February of last year, but my friends have been telling me I need to post this story online … so here goes nothing:
My wife and I (both 31 years old, at the time) moved into a new three-unit apartment building in San Francisco. One of our neighbors is a 70-something year old retired veteran, we’ll call him Joe. For context, Joe is a white American guy and he’s also a devout Hindu priest. One day I run into Joe in my hallway, and he tells me about this charity he manages for a community in Bangladesh. I wanted to support my neighbor and the charity, so I ask Joe to send me the GoFundMe link.
The next day at work, I go on the GoFundMe page and donate $150. Or so I thought. Moments later, I get a text on my phone warning me of an unusually large transaction on my credit card. I’m confused and swipe to open the text message. It says I have made a payment of $15,041 to GoFundMe. Immediately I’m sweating. How could I have donated FIFTEEN THOUSAND DOLLARS? I spend the next 10-15 minutes retracing my steps, and finally I realize my credit card starts with the numbers 4 and 1. It seems I had accidentally started typing my credit card information while my cursor was still in the donation box, and just like that 150 became 15041. Yikes.
I call GoFundMe’s support line in a panic, and when I finally connect with a human I explain what happened. “No need to worry”, he tells me, they will initiate a refund of the transaction which should process in 3-7 business days. That’s a huge relief. But then I ask the agent if the charity will be able to see the donation on the GoFundMe page until it is refunded. “What do you mean?” the agent asks me. “What do YOU mean what do I mean?” was my response. “Will they be able to see the $15,041 donation?!” Unfortunately, yes, the agent tells me. They will be able to see it until the refund process is complete. I tell him that’s a big problem, as the entire GoFundMe had hardly raised that much at that point. Surely they will notice their fundraiser doubling overnight?
My plan was to knock on Joe’s door the following morning to give him the full story, so that he could pass it along to his contacts in Bangladesh. But when I woke up the next morning, I looked at my phone and saw I had 40+ notifications on Facebook. Someone had sent me a friend request, had liked many of my old posts, and had sent me many messages. Immediately I was concerned when I saw that the individual messaging me had a Hindu name, but I never could have imagined what I saw when I opened his first message…
The man had sent me a video of himself from Bangladesh, surrounded by dozens of impoverished and hungry people holding bags of food, thanking me BY NAME (Michael) for my generous donation. A big round of applause for Michael. At this point, I’ve leapt out of my bed and I’m pacing. Part of me wants to scream, part of me wants to crack up laughing. I start swiping through the man’s messages, and it is picture after picture after picture of poor Bangladeshis thanking me for my kind donation. Literally hundreds of photos of frail, elderly, disabled, and malnourished individuals holding signs with my name. Thank you, Michael. Thank you, Michael. I've uploaded a portion of the video, and a few photos, for you guys to see here: https://imgur.com/gallery/tROXniV
Needless to say, I couldn’t live with myself just donating $150 after seeing how the community responded to the $15,041. I decided the least I could do was to add a zero, and so I donated $1,500 once the original donation was refunded. The charity’s host was incredibly gracious and understanding, and he explained to me that $1,500 goes very far in Bangladesh for urgent food relief. Here is the charity’s new GoFundMe link if you want to check it out: https://www.gofundme.com/f/urgent-food-relief-assistance-in-bangladesh
Ultimately I think the whole experience was a win-win. I helped a great cause, and I got a funny story out of it.
TL;DR: Some impoverished folks in Bangladesh thought I had sent them $15,041 but it was an accident and I had to request a refund for most of it.
EDIT: Many are asking why there is no $1,500 donation listed in the fund’s donation history. I donated to an old campaign link for the same charity. It is readily findable online, if you feel compelled to search for it.
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u/GunasInFlux 14d ago
Best post on here in AGES. Thank you for the great story and for helping out those folks. $1,500 is still very generous. Man, this got me good. I hope you didn’t get behind on bills or anything after this mix up.
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u/Eruionmel 14d ago
And $1,500 is nothing compared to what they're gonna get on that GFM, lol. He's already long since doubled that $1,500, and I'm sure it will be going for a while. This has only been up for 4 hours.
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u/mr_potatoface 14d ago
170 total donations over the duration, with 147 of those in the past 5 hours lol.
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u/jonesing247 14d ago
That's seriously so fuckin awesome. This is the wholesome content I come to Reddit for!
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u/Churloey 14d ago
409 total donations now. I think Michael deserves another thank you! Without their FU this wouldn't be happening
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u/fishsticks40 14d ago
Just looking back at the recent donations they're averaging about $100/minute over the past hour or so.
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u/lazybear90 14d ago
Too kind, thank you! 😂
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u/SomeoneNicer 14d ago
Something tells me this post is going to get them a lot more than $15,041 - look at the donations pouring in. Basically you did them a solid and ended up getting them even more than the accidental deposit!
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u/GunasInFlux 14d ago
It’s the thank you video arriving before you were able to begin the refund process that took this one to the moon. I can’t imagine that mix of emotions happening all at once.
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u/Sychosonik 14d ago
Holy Shit Man! That put a pit in my stomach just reading. I cant imagine how you felt. LOL. Shit happens! Glad your neighbor was understanding and good for you for going the extra mile. Watch this post blow up and a shit ton of Redditors donate. That would be awesome.
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u/thepolesreport 14d ago
Over $1100 raised since this post!
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u/Sychosonik 14d ago
I donated $100. Keep it going.
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u/2oothDK 14d ago
Reminds me of Scott’s Tots.
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u/NoNameSoNoBully 14d ago
Has it really been ten years?
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u/thunderstriken 14d ago
Stanley laugh when he first hears about it kills me lol most contagious laugh I’ve ever heard
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u/Onespokeovertheline 14d ago
Hey OP Michael! What you gonna do? What you gonna do: make our dreams come true!!
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u/baronas15 14d ago
You know what's invalueable... is intuition. Does anybody out there have intuition?
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u/DiputsMonro 14d ago
All we need is 1,500 redditors donating $10 to reach that original donation. If everyone who upvoted this post donated $10, we would have already done it!
I've already done my part (and a little extra)!
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u/other_usernames_gone 14d ago edited 14d ago
I'd recommend being wary.
It's not unheard of for these types of posts to later turn out to be scams.
I'd recommend doing some due diligence on the charity in question and make sure the money from the gofundme is actually going to them.
I'm too tired rn to do it myself but I'd encourage you to do due diligence yourself.
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u/lazybear90 14d ago
This is always good advice. In this particular case I have personal knowledge of the GoFundMe organizer (he’s my neighbor) and photos & videos from the boots-on-the-ground Bangladeshi host, but to all others who are reading this online… always make sure you’re comfortable the charity is legit before you donate 👍
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u/Never-On-Reddit 14d ago
For a mere $10, I will take the risk. Not everything is a scam, and this would be a hell of a lot of effort with the photos and video of so many different people.
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u/CheckIntelligent7828 14d ago
Never donate more than you can stand to lose is my theory. But, it'll be interesting if this later blows up for the wrong reasons!
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u/Serinus 14d ago
Well it's not just that. It's that your donation can actually cause harm by encouraging scams, flooding spaces real charities need and causing people to be reluctant to donate in general.
I'm not saying you can't gamble, but one should probably be a lot more sure than 50/50 before donating.
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u/T_that_is_all 14d ago
This GoFundMe only has 67 donations and now has over $36k, 10k over their goal (average of over $500 per donation). And the person organizing this has some other GoFundMe fundraisers. Wonder if Reddit did that?
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u/zirtbow 14d ago
Did you read that wrong? I think I see it say they're at $12k of a $36k goal.
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u/sKiLoVa4liFeZzZ 14d ago
Looks like one guy has donated approximately $11,500 of that total too.
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u/JaysFan26 14d ago
Kent Putnam hard carry
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u/Fartoholicanon 14d ago
Dude has been donating constantly for the past 8 months it looks like. Sounds like a great individual.
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u/LeeKyros 14d ago
I think the person meant the original old GoFundMe that OP donated to. You're looking at the new one
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u/WonderousPancake 14d ago
Oh man what a ride, I’d feel horrible. I hope Reddit comes through and helps. I’ll throw in a few bucks and maybe others will too!
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u/GunasInFlux 14d ago
Plot twist: this was all a marketing ploy to get more donations for the charity. Jk but it would be kinda genius
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u/lazybear90 14d ago
I can’t deny a part of me hoped sharing the story could help generate some positive momentum for their charity!
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u/GunasInFlux 14d ago
How dare you try to help people and entertain us at the same time? Who do you think you are?! /s
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u/GapingFartLocker 14d ago edited 14d ago
Just sent $25 myself, it ain't much but it's what I can do. Thanks for the story friend.
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u/Metamorphis 14d ago
There's been quite a few donations in the past hour if you take a look
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u/ClassicEvent6 14d ago
How great would it be if this made it to r/all and the fundraiser fulfils its goal. I really hope that happens.
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u/XboxPlayUFC 14d ago edited 13d ago
As of this comment, the GoFundMe campaign has garnered an additional $1,209 in donations due to this post.
Edit - Since I made this comment over $60,000 has been donated!
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u/lazybear90 14d ago
Wow if true that’s incredible!! Thank you all for your generosity, I can’t wait to hear the reaction from the charity.
Easing some of the guilt I’ve carried for the past year lol …
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u/XboxPlayUFC 14d ago
Reddit can be a good place(sometimes)
You shouldn't feel guilty. In the end, you still donated when you didn't have to, regardless of the amount difference it's still a wonderful thing to do!
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u/Jackson_Cook 14d ago
The previous last donation was ~5 days ago and there are dozens of donations in the last hour alone
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u/Mardak5150 14d ago
I hope this thread gets the eyes of some secret internet millionaire philanthropist who makes the donation a reality. Unfortunately I can't be that person.
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u/xstrike0 14d ago edited 14d ago
Now here's a story that actually belongs on the sub.
EDIT: Got 100 out of me.
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u/jillifloyd 14d ago
Really thought this was going to be some weird spoof off of Scott’s Tots for karma, but I’m glad I was pleasantly surprised. Just donated.
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u/bitches_love_brie 14d ago
Michael Scott's Dunder Mifflin Scranton Meredith Palmer Memorial Celebrity Rabies Awareness Pro-Am Fun Run Race For the Cure
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u/RobF86 14d ago
Donated 20$. Let’s get to 15,041 Reddit!!
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u/patmansf 14d ago
$14662 now!
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u/TeachOfTheYear 14d ago edited 14d ago
A few years ago I went to Bangladesh to support schools. I did a go fund me and one of the big Portland papers did a front page story on the trip with a link to the go fund me. I ended up flying over with a pretty hefty chunk of change in the fund. I spent the amount of the fund raiser buying supplies for different schools and doing things like funding a lunch program for a year and supporting an after school program that keeps kids safe and a home for girls saved from human trafficking and organ harvesting. Seriously amazing to have the ability to help so many people. (your dollar is worth about 10X what it is here--meaning your $1500 donation has the buying power of $15,000).
I also spent a pretty decent amount of my own money. When the month ended, I decided to pay for my own hotel (a non profit was paying to bring me over to Bangladesh). This meant they had more money to spend on students and I was so honored by the whole experience that I was happy to make such a donation.
I have to mention that during this time I was being bombarded by messages from all over the world. Seriously, the media attention had gone a little nuts and my inbox was often full of hundred of messages.
I returned from the trip and my husband was kind of horrified how much I spent. But, he and I kind of tightened our belts and caught up.
About three years later I turn on Go Fund Me for something and find that I never had the money transferred in to my bank account. They had emailed me over and over but I never responded and it was all returned to the people who made the donation. No wonder my husband freaked out about how much I spent. The entire amount on go fund me was never put in the account. It was all out of pocket. I never looked at how much I spent (to save myself the shock--so I never caught that it hadn't been deposited. (Husband does all the finances).
Still, we both knew great good was done with the money and we've never been sorry we spent the money. Just sorry I'm such an idiot.
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u/FuzzyLogic27 14d ago
On another positive note - your post has raised another $900+ dollars for the charity already. Definitely the perfect story to share!
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u/Global-Cattle-6285 14d ago
That $1500 will go FAR in Bangladesh. You’ve helped a lot and I’m guessing you now have a fairly close affinity with the charity. I hope you get the chance to go out and visit them in person to see how you’ve helped out. Kudos to you!
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u/Proper-Atmosphere 14d ago
I checked out the go fund me and was absolutely floored at the amount of people donating because of this post- it’s crazy how one fuck up can encourage so many people to help others
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u/DrunkenOlympian 14d ago
Ayyy I commented on the other post just to say well done. You are a good person. I cringed hard when you got to the part about them thanking you, 😱
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u/-Chris-V- 14d ago
So...any idea what the story is with the donor on that GoFundMe, Kent, who has donated like half of the donations? Quite large donations spread out over months...
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u/Rydraenei 14d ago
Maybe someone who fundraises locally, and donates it online in chunks?
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u/chloen0va 14d ago
Tbh that was my guess. Stand outside a store all day and raise cash donations, cash and then put into the gofundme for consolidation
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u/lazybear90 14d ago
I don’t know that individual, sorry. But he’s clearly very generous! I’m glad they have him as a supporter.
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u/gatorella 14d ago
If he is who I think he is (because of his last name), he owns a chain of car dealerships in the Bay Area. Could be donations from a part of car sales.
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u/chartyourway 14d ago
he's probably doing larger scale fundraisers with his church or something and then donating the lump sums. or he's just a cool dude.
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u/killj0y1 14d ago
Someone elsewhere said he's a car dealership owner and a few people from that area confirmed it.
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u/LeeKay203 14d ago
I sincerely hope that this post blows up and the gofundme link gets put to good use
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u/DavyJonesLocker2 14d ago
If reddit works with a tiny bit of the magic it had when the charity for foster care and adopted children went viral this could be a great day for the charity!
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u/StillUnsullied 14d ago
Holt shit dude. Your story may have raised the amount you accidentally funded. Do you see all those donations in the last few hours? Thanks for sharing and for also sharing your wealth when you saw the people you helped. You're a good soul and your story is making a huge impact.
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u/motithejrt 14d ago
Good on you, my dude. I can't swing $15,041 or $1,500 but I can swing the $150 you originally intended.
And done!
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u/AscendedAncient 14d ago
Don't worry fam, Reddit's got you covered for the other 13541 based on what donations i'm seeing now.
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u/adahadah 14d ago
I once worked in a store where I would put amount to be paid on the machine, press next, and the customer would enter their pin and agree. However, once I, or the machine, failed and the customer put in their 4 number pin, adding 4(!) Digits to their total. Since it didn't go through the first time they gave the pin again resulting in them paying about 80k $ for a cod filet. My boss laughed but refunded the money, off course.
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u/OnBrokenWingsIsoar 14d ago
Something similar happened to a coworker of mine when I worked at Burger King, except they thought the number hadn't worked the first time, so put it in again. Ended up charging the customer $150,015 for one whopper combo (and it accepted!!). They didn't notice at the time and came back a week later. My boss was not happy it happened in the first place and obviously refunded them.
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u/JaysFan26 14d ago
Fun fact, that amount of money would buy you a Whopper with 93,464 patties on it
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u/lmamakos 14d ago
For the original $15K, you probably could have gone there to visit the statue of you they'd have put up.
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u/dexter7377 14d ago
Your story was a rollercoaster hahah. $1500 is still a very generous donation though buddy!
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u/obivousundercover 14d ago
I truly believe after sharing the gofundme link here their donations will balloon! There are a lot of good ppl here and i am so excited to see more less fortunate folks be assisted!
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u/Alswel 14d ago
Given that the donations basically stopped a couple months ago up until almost exactly when this post went up, I think it's safe to say this post is directly responsible for most if not all of those donations
I stopped doing mental math around "40 minutes ago" because you'd already doubled that $1,500
$15,000 is seeming very doable
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u/Lovehatepassionpain 14d ago
In all seriousness, this may be my favorite Reddit story ever. I am broker than broke, yet, had this happened to me, those photos and videos would have done me in - I would have just resigned myself to a life of working 4 jobs and forgoing sleep- just to honor my "commitment" because I was too horrified to explain the mistake!!
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u/giantgreyhounds 14d ago
All the new "Anonymous" donations hitting the GoFundMe rn
Redditors on the march
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u/Jackson_Cook 14d ago
Send this to the top!
I just looked through the donation history and previously this fundraiser was only receiving ~1 donation per week.
Folks, there have been nearly 50 in the last two hours since this post has been made.
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u/Jackson_Cook 14d ago edited 14d ago
I just did a quick count and as of right now, about $2,000 has been donated since you made this post. $700 has been donated in the last 15 minutes since making my comment
Edit: aaand there's another $800
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u/Defiant_Bad_9070 14d ago
That GoFundMe is going nuts! Best result from a TIFU in a very long time.
THANKS MICHAEL FOR YOUR KIND
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u/BidGroundbreaking483 14d ago
On the other side of the story , you're a really cool person ! Im glad people like you exist. Coming from a 3rd world country person
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u/whitecloud197 14d ago
This was a Rollercoaster of emotions!!
Good on you for 1500 tho! And I'm so glad they were not disappointed in the refund.
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u/JBoozehound 14d ago
Now this is a great TIFU, complete with receipts (and videos) so you know it’s not some made up BS.
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u/bettercallaCPA 14d ago
Man, seeing that video and all of the pictures they sent you were unreal. It's really incredible how much our money can do for these people living in absolute poverty. It seems like a lot of good has already come out of posting this with all the additional donations, I dropped a hundred, this is what our money should be used for.
I cannot understand how we have some billionaires on this planet who cannot even donate a tenth of a percent of their unimaginable pile of gold to literally save other human lives.
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u/Andythecao 14d ago
$1500 is crazily generous. Thats more than some people make in a year there sadly
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u/ItsHowWellYouMowFast 14d ago
Just a heads up, you're the only $150 listing so folks will be able to deduce who you are - if you care
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u/haha_squirrel 14d ago
Wait I thought it was $1,500?? Maybe that’s a different person!
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u/lazybear90 14d ago
My donation was on a different campaign link to the same charity. So all good.
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u/Goldy_lordy 14d ago
You published this 4h ago... now they have 5500$ donations in last 2 hours... after a 5 day no donations... in this pace, tomorrow the donations will outpass your 15041 mistake.
Did good with this post!
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u/IM_BAD_PEOPLE 14d ago
Seeing all of the new donations on the gofundme restores a small amount of my faith in humanity.
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u/ALadWellBalanced 14d ago
This is an incredible story. I'll have to donate to this. Maybe just $50, or $50,000. One of the two.
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u/Churloey 14d ago
Michael, you deserve another thank you! Without your FU the fundraiser wouldn't be doing this well right now! It's at nearly 400 recent donations!
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u/danceswithshelves 14d ago
Oh man those photos!! Thanks for sharing this story. I just donated :) Hope this post gets them the $15,000 they were so excited for.
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u/StrongGreen 14d ago
This is actually a great TIFU. I couldn't imagine how i would react, probably more scared tell my wife then the charity too
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u/maxlanman 14d ago
This is simply incredible. All-time great r/tifu post. Good on you for the generous donation.
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u/giantgreyhounds 14d ago
Holy shit that had me in tears. Thank you for sharing.
Too good not to donate after that and seeing the pictures so I just donated $50. Fuck that is a funny ass story.
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u/Ecleptomania 14d ago
You didn't fuck up at all, this was all for the best and you are a good man Michael, you eventually donated what is to me almost three months of salary. That's not nothing, that's a lot of money, and it will go to help out these people. You should be proud of yourself.
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u/Piginabag 14d ago
Ok, that is the hardest I've laughed in a minute.
Unexpectedly, the charity link only has ~$10000 in the first six months, and has now over doubled in a day.
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u/lurkie_lurker 14d ago
Loving all the new donations on the gofundme with message of "Michael sent me"
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u/19781984 14d ago
Reminds me of the time I committed fraud by depositing a check into my account for a quarter of a million dollars. The actual amount was $250.41, but instead of hitting a decimal point I hit a extra zero and deposited $250,041
I soon realized my mistake, called the bank and got it sorted out.
You're a good soul for donating the $150 in the first place, following it up with an even larger actual gift of $1500.
Awesome!
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u/HellsHound98 14d ago
Woah checked the go fund me and the amount of recent donations is amazing. The power of Reddit!
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u/SpaceportFloozies 14d ago
I’m going to be hitting refresh on that GFM all night. 333 people just donated … Good on you for sharing, OP.
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u/shoulda-known-better 14d ago
I love this story!! AND think its freaking phenomenal that the new charity link is very close to their new goals!!!! This is the internet I miss and love to see
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u/Septiark 14d ago
And just like that, you hit the front page and are probably responsible for at least $15k in donations.. again .. well done, brother! 😂
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u/nightmareonrainierav 14d ago
If it makes you feel better, once after staying up for multiple nights straight, a canvasser for a certain tenacious charity talked me into sponsoring a child in a developing nation. I was barely employed, had –$50 in my bank account, oh, and I was sixteen.
A friend was with me and thought this was the funniest shit. I know exactly how you felt calling tail between my legs and backing out the next day, though not as big a FU as yours. They were mostly understanding since I was basically a child myself.
And two decades later that friend still gives me shit about it.
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u/jimsbook 14d ago
That was really nice of you. Sounds like a great charity, I'm so concerned that my donation to a charity ends up in the hands of a guy in Beverly Hill's CA driving A Rolls Royce, and that nothing gets in the prior hands. You've found a wonderful charity where the money feeds people.
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u/Quartzitebitez 14d ago edited 14d ago
Damn Kent Putnam single handily funding that charity