Has a random act of kindness stayed in your memory forever?

[CrushWithEyeliner]

Once when I was 21 I was on the tube going home after work when I suddenly felt really really awful and had to get off the train. I wandered up to the ticket barrier when a guard saw me and asked me if I was OK. I was feeling so faint I couldn't even talk I just said I felt sick. He then took me into the back room where he and his colleagues made me sweet tea, toast and talked to me for ages until I felt better then called me a cab home, they were really concerned.

I know it sounds really silly but I have never forgotten how sweet they were to me and how much better I felt for it and it was so long ago and such a little thing - does anyone have any similar experiences?

I am mortified that I have only just thought of this.

Last year I was having a difficult time in real life and finding MN too hard to take. A lovely poster (who incidently I haven't seen around for ages ) galvanised a collection and my door bell rang heralding a massive bunch of flowers. I was barely over the shock when it went again and it was the biggest hamper of chocolates I had ever seen. All from some of the lovely people who post on here and the card with them meant everything. It said From your friends at MN.

Thank you again to you all .

Ooh I'd like to add mine to the collection.
When I was very small (about 4 or 5) I smiled at an old lady who was selling plums in a market in germany; she gave me her last bag of plums. It taught me the power of a smile.

When I was 20something, my dad lent me his car, saying airily that the tyres would need changing at some point . Well I set off on a 150mile journey and about 20miles in the back tyre blew on the motorway and I was lucky I had got to the hard shoulder ok. A BMW driver saw what happened and changed the tyre for me (in his pristine white shirt and tie!) And sent me on my way - I was so flustered I never really felt I thanked him enough, but he was a complete star.

I like doing RAOK to pay it back too.

i was 8 years old and was out riding with my dads friend i had only owned my pony for about 2 weeks and really didn't have a clue a very novice rider.
we were going along this sandy canter track which lead from the main road all the way through the woods.
my df left me at the back of the line and my pony for no reason decided to take off in the opposite direction full speed gallop. my df didn't even notice id gone. i can remember screaming in terror with tears streaming down my face we were heading straight for the main road and i couldn't stop. then out of nowhere two men riding western in their cowboy hats galloped out of the surrounding trees and grabbed my pony brining her to a stop!
they were my knights in shining armour and if it hadn't been for them i dont know what would have happened. thanks guys thats was 16 years ago and i still remember how glad i was to see you bursting out from the trees to my rescue!

i started a new thread about this as i didn`t realise this was here. Reading through all these is really making me cry. Very emotional.

When I was fairly newly pregnant with DS and before I'd found out I suddenly felt very unwell and hot in a shop in the city centre. I went outside, took my coat off and sat on a bench. It was a freezing January day but I felt like I was burning up.

A newspaper vendor from across the road came running over after a few minutes and sat next to me. He asked me if I was ok and told me I should really put my coat back on or I'd freeze. I told him how awful I felt and he went running back over to his stand and came back with one of the bottles of posh water - his words - that they were giving away as a free gift with the paper that day and sat chatting with me about his DD and GCs until I felt well enough to go and get on the bus. I have never forgotten how kind and concerned he was. And I found out shortly afterwards through my job at the time that nearly all of the newspaper vendors had problems with alcohol, drugs or homelessness and they were employed through a charity. I did go and look for him a few times, to thank him again, but never found him. I hope he is ok.

I was traveling back from the US to Mexico. I had enough pesos to pay for a bus in Mexico but was 1 dollar short to pay for a bus over the border. I asked someone if he could give me a dollar he did.

When traveling round a safari park back in Kenya we got a flat tire. My partner got out to change it, and a group of South African man stopped to help. Every other private vehicle stopped to ask if we were alright. Every tour group just drove past, in some case looking annoyed that we were stopped in the middle of the road.

What a great thread! Here's mine...

I was a young, single, pregnant 21 year old. I had just been turned away from the Benefits Office and I was homeless and hungry. An elderly lady took me to the cafe in Habitat and bought me some mushroom soup and a roll, then gave me 50 quid. I used the 50 quid to put a deposit on a rental flat and from then on, my life just got better and better.

I never got the chance to repay the 50 quid but I have never forgotten her. I can't eat mushroom soup without remembering her!

She is probably dead by now, but I would love the chance to repay the money, maybe to her family. Her name was Sybil Crabbe and she lived in Bristol. Does anybody here know of her or the family?

I clicked on this thread and thought I must have started it when drunk or something!

CrushWithEyeliner, if you are still around, sorry for stepping on your toes.

Will change into a previous incarnation forthwith.

CrushedWithEyeliner x

Loving this and therefore resurrecting it.

When DS was born, the labour was difficult and he needed to be resuscitated.

He was born just before shift change so once he was stable, the midwife who had supervised his delivery left us in someone else's care and went to do the paperwork before leaving for the night.

Once our admin was done, she came back to see how we were doing and then went off to do her time sheet. She then returned again by which time DS was beginning to deteriorate. She promised to phone to see how he was once she got home. Half an hour later the mw who was treating us was called out of the room to take a phone call...

Not only that but she came to visit me daily for the remainder of our stay whilst DS was in neonatal. Her visits were brief, without pity but full of compassion. Her visits were even more valuable given that apart from DH and a visit from my dad (who isn't local) we had no other visitors.

Just the memory of this lovely woman coming in and sitting on my bed for 5 mins a day makes me well up in gratitude.

I've just found this thread. It's lovely!

My friend's father was dying in a hospice. The first time she went to see him, they'd taken him into the garden in his bed so he could enjoy the sunshine and flowers. When he was dying, a nurse called my friend and said 'You should come soon.' She was just getting ready to go, and she got a call back. 'He's just passed. He wasn't on his own, someone was holding his hand.'

My mum lives abroad and was mugged recently. She doesn't earn much and the bastard took every penny she had. The day after she found an envelope full of cash in her letter box. All of her friends deny knowledge of where the money comes from.

My brother broke his neck and had to have a tube put down his neck before his operation while conscious. A lovely trainee nurse held his hand through the procedure.

When I was a teen my lovely uncle went walkabout for a week. He'd had a breakdown, and left the house with a few coins and the clothes he was wearing. Travellers made sure that he was sheltered, fed and clothed for a few days. He'd got very far from where he lived, and when he 'came to' a friend of the family paid for him to have a flight home, and got him to the airport.

I have some:

I was at chemist, dd2 was 3 weeks old and had been in so much pain from gallstones (didn't know that's what it was) I started being sick outside chemist. 2 little old ladies walked me home, and stayed with me till my mum arrived

Another was the night we received a call to say dh blood results were "off" and he had to go to local hospital. It was 4am and I was shattered, dd2 was 18 months and still waking and I knew as soon as I got home she would want a feed. The nurse there saw me leave dh room and start crying and she just stood there, hugged me and waited for me to calm down and then walked me to the car.

Everything that mumsnet posters have done since DS dog went missing! The kindness of strangers should never be underestimated

My best friend was in Sydney on a gap year and I was visiting. The place she was living was about 10 miles out of town. We had mis-budgeted in the bar (!) and had no money to get a bus home, so were wandering the streets of Sydney at 3am.

A huge guy with shades and designer stubble approached us and asked if we wanted to buy drugs. We said that we didn't even have enough for the bus fare home and showed him our empty wallets.

He gave us 10 dollars for the bus fare home, walked us to the busstop and said "stay safe, ladies".

I was 22 weeks pregnant and started miscarrying. I was moved into a side ward and realised there was no TV. I was dreading a whole night of silent worrying. A care assistant who had just finished her shift, searched the whole hospital to find me a TV and was an hour late home. Will never forget that.

Believe in the power of random acts of kindness. Many years ago I was coming home from work on the train when there was a catastrophic overhead power line pull down and a 45 min journey took 7 hours and ended 30 miles from my destination. In my carriage was an elderly man getting increasingly worried about it. I told him to stick with me and and when we finally arrived at a station I was able to call my brother in law to collect me and take me and my new friend back to our respective houses.
Fast forward to the terrible snow of last year when my son and his girlfriend were trying to get home for Christmas laden with laptops, revision and presents and all but a handful of trains were cancelled. As they set out for an hours walk to the station as there were no taxis or buses in operation a young man in a car stopped and took them right to the station entrance and refused to take any payment.

In the supermarket an elderly lady in front of me at the checkout had a dizzy turn and clearly her frail husband could not cope with her and their shopping. After a sit down and a glass of water she rallied a bit and I offered to drive them home. As it turned out they were not even far out of my way. This small act has been repaid multiple times over by so many kind people who helped my Mum in her earlier stages of dementia when she went out and forgot how to get home and later when she went AWOL from her care home and turned up in random places miles away from home.

When I went for my first scan (first baby), very exciting, had drank lots of water - all ready to go in. They couldn't see the baby properly and told me to go back and drink another jug of water. I was panicking at this point (not believing I was pregnant anyway until I saw evidence) just wanted to see my baby! So I drank the jug of water and waited...and waited. By this point I was so desperate for a wee I was actually about to wet myself, I could feel myself filling up. I ran to the toilet and did the biggest wee ever. I came back to the sonography room, and was looking for a Sonographer to tell, but instead the little old lady who was a volunteer asked me if I was okay, I burst into tears and told her "I had to go for a wee" she told me that it was fine, got me another jug of water and made sure that I was next in the queue and didn't have to wait any longer.

DD eventually showed up on the scan and is now 15months.

Such a lovely thread.

This is very very random. When I was about 13 I was in the Scouts and we started talking on CB radio (I think it was CB, possibly not). Anyway over a period of weeks and months we started talking to what we believed was a group of Scouts in Czechoslovakia. Our Scout leader was a lovely man but random to say the least and in the course of these conversations it was decided we would go over there on our summer camp and meet up with these Scouts. We loaded up the minibus and drove to Czechoslovakia. In case anyone is wondering that takes a long time.

When we got to what we thought was the rendez vous - nothing. No campsite, no Scouts. We spent a night in a layby and drove into Prague (about an hour fortunately so not far) where we contacted the British Consulate for advice and also to get in touch with parents at home to discuss what we should do and, I suppose, get some money wired. Whilst in Prague our random Scout leader ended up chatting to some young bloke who was gorgeous I might inconsequentially add who was a doctor and, hey presto, an actual Scout leader. His troop were going on camp two days later and they invited us to join them. So we spent the next two nights in a youth hostel we found and then joined this completely random set of Scouts in their camp. They shared their food, drink, tents, everything with us.

We never knew whether the other Scouts were just a massive wind up, whether there had been a miscommunication, whatever. But the bunch we ended up with were the nicest people in the world and the following year me, my mum and one other girl went to stay with gorgeous young doctor's parents in their flat in Prague, and afterwards the troop came back with us for a week's camp.

Beautiful, beautiful thread. So lovely it seems to be revived around this time of year.

I've reagents while thread and sobbed like a child at all the wonderful stories.

Mine are fairly small things, but nice nonetheless;

I at Download Festival in 2010, when managed to lose my purse with all my money and bank cards (a festival virgin who didn't separate my money!). I was distraught and luckily my friends lent me some cash for food. I was made up the next day when I found that my purse was handed in to lost property - complete with every penny of my £200+ and my bank cards! Thank you to whoever handed that in - just shows we metalheads aren't as scary as we look I repaid my friends plus bought us all beer.

(Bit different to my experience at Sonisphere Festival later that year. On my first night, despite being super cautious about separating my cash/cards and hiding spare in my bra, I put it all together when I went to sleep. Someone broke into my tent and stole the (same) purse from out of my bag from next to my sleeping face . Thankfully (?) I didn't know until I woke up the next day, but I was once again at a festival with no money. Again, my fab friends (different ones) lent me food money and bought me cider. The purse was handed in - but this time sadly stripped of cash. The card was there but i had already cancelled it. Luckily my travel insurance covered me and I got all my money back, less the excess fee. Again I repaid my friends - but I got rid of that damn purse as I'm sure it was cursed)

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When I started high school, we has not long moved to a "rough" estate (not that rough in comparison to some, but the worst here). We were considered "posh" for some reason as we spoke a bit nicer, and as a result used to have things thrown through our windows etc. I didn't make any friends on the estate because of this and because I was incredibly shy at that age. One day on the bus home, I was sat in my usual area at the front downstairs when some older boys started picking on me; calling me names, throwing sweets and eventually culminating in squashing a tangerine in my hair . Some older "hard" girls had somehow heard about what was happening and come down the stairs, shouted at the boys to stop and told me that from now on, I was to come and sit upstairs at the back of the bus with them. I sat on the second back seat on the top deck til the say I left school - long after those older is had gone. I was still a shy mouse who had no friends on the estate, but no one questioned my right to sit up there

I know this is old ish now but i wanted to add a few...

Me and some friends hitchhiked across Europe for charity when we were at uni and some of the kindness from total strangers was amazing. There was the couple who loaded all 3 of us complete with huge backpacks into their tiny citiron already filled with their luggage and drove us for 2 hours and ended up taking us 50km out of their way so we could catch a midnight ferry and save a fortune.
There was also the well dressed business man who picked us up in france in the early hours after wed spent the night sleeping rough in a field because we couldnt get a life anywhere else. He stopped for 3 dirty rough looking hitchhikers in his brand new audi and even put the heating on because i was so cold i couldnt feel my feet.

They 2 lads when i was travelling in Bali and mis judged the prices and gave me and a friend their hotel room for the night and slept in a shared room with friends becuase we couldnt afford a room. This was the first time wed had running water and air con for 2 weeks ! We left all the money we had but it didnt feel like enough of a thank you !

Anyway , all you you thank you so so much , you restored my faith in people !

After withdrawing a whole lot of money from my first paycheck for a proper job when I was 20, I accidentally dropped it while trying to pocket it. About 10 minutes later, a man and child approached me with the cash. They had seen me drop the money and had followed me down some busy city streets to catch up with me. They had not given up when they called me to turn around and I didn't hear due to the traffic noise. My heroes!

Have really enjoyed reading this old thread and wanted to add a couple myself. Years ago whilst travelling alone in the States, had a really long walk from the underground station to the youth hostel in North Carolina, carrying 2 v heavy suitcases (without wheels) and therefore could only walk about 5 steps before stopping for a rest, when a guy appeared out of nowhere and carried them the entire rest of the way for me (about a mile). He simply dropped them off for me and walked back the way we came, not looking for anything in return.

Another was not long after I'd moved to England. On a night out with my new flatmate in Birmingham, we ended up having a row and I stormed off out of the nightclub (very drunk!). I didn't know where I was or where to go to get a taxi home and was staggering aimlessly when a young couple stopped and asked me what I was doing. When I told them what happened, they told me to go with them took me to the main area, hailed a taxi and gave me £20 for the taxi home! They said they were off duty police officers and had seen too many bad things happen to girls like me so wanted to be sure I got home safely. They also told the taxi driver who they were and to make sure I got home ok.

Will always be grateful to them for looking after a drunk lost girl.

I was 8 and a half months pg with DD. We are travellers and were on the road at the time.
I travelled with horses (they pulled my home). My main horse was also pg (10 and a half months, due at the same time as me).
I had had a hard time with XP who had left me and didn't want to know. So a few months previously I'd travelled (without my horses) to southern europe to stay with friends and had just returned to the UK after deciding that Spanish maternity 'care' was slightly rudimentary and not for me.

My horses had been in the care of a traveller friend while I was away but it was time to gather my possessions around me in time for myself and my mare to deliver.

I had found a field which I could just about afford to rent, which was near a traveller site, where some friends were, and hopefully we could stay in one place for long enough for me to have the baby.
This was about 25 miles away from the place where my mare was and it was spring. Having no money at all now that I had paid four weeks advance rent on the field, and having six legs between us, I decided we should just get out there and start walking.
Unfortunately since I was too round to get on and off the horse on my own, and she was a bit round too, I knew that we wouldn't make it in a day. But there was no other option available, and I decided that something would turn up.

We happily strolled and munched the verges for around 13 miles in faint sunshine and light drizzle, looking possibly a bit Nativity, if Mary's donkey had been a nice bay mare too many hands high for her to get onto... and then the daylight started to fade.
We came into in a little Cotswold village. I stopped everyone I saw and asked if they knew any of the owners of the fields around us. Eventually someone pointed me in the direction of the vicarage, because they told me that vicar's wife ran a Riding for The Disabled scheme.
I walked up to the lovely old stone building across a gravel drive with a horse in my hand. I knocked on the door and a lovely lady answered. I explained that I was travelling with my horse and asked if I could pop her into the field with her horses for the night, I would be back first thing in the morning to pick her up and continue my journey.

The vicar's wife was delighted to help, and we'd let my mare loose in her field with the other horses within minutes. The horse kicked up her heels and ran around in excitement. I asked the lady if I could use her phone as my friend who had a car had arranged to be in the pub in the place I was headed for - this was in the days before mobile phones! The lady said of course, and would you like some food too? Before I knew it I was wolfing down a huge plate of veggie lasagne straight out of her Aga.

As my friend with the car arrived to pick me up for the night, the vicar's wife asked me as a kind of afterthought, why was I walking with the horse and not transporting her in a horsebox? Was she difficult to box? I told her that I didn't have any money to rent a horsebox, and she asked very politely if I would possibly accept the use of her horsebox the next morning?

Reader, I could have wept. I hichhiked back there the next morning (friend with car had other business to attend to) and we popped that pregnant mare in the horsebox and drove her the remaining 12 miles to her new field. This was really brilliant as the final 3 miles would have meant walking through a town centre and then up a massive hill. Feisty and independent though I was, I'm no fool and my motto is always never look a gift horsebox in the mouth.

Within 10 days both myself and my mare had been delivered of two females of the species.

I will never forget that vicar's wife. My DD is now at university and I think I should go back to the vicarage to see if I can leave a message of thanks.

In LA I stopped to ask a homeless guy for directions and he gave me $5! I was so startled I just said, "thank you".

When I was working in central London and used to leave my newspaper at the coffee shop each day. There would always be a guy sitting there, he looked homeless. Every day I used to think, "One day I'll give him some money/do something for him.". Then he approached me and gave me two quid saying he always read the newspaper I left and it was time he gave me some money.!

At a coffee shop I got to the counter to find I'd left my purse behind and the guy next in line said, "I'll get it for you" - wow, so kind.

When my baby son was well enough to be discharged from hospital, the staff offered to bring him home so I didn't have to drive into the city again as they knew how exhausted I was. Amazing.