On a small backstreet is a house exploding with tinned corn. Twenty five tonnes of it to be exact. It’s wedged behind the sofa, groaning on the kitchen table, trapped under a tarpaulin in the garden — along with thousands of nappies, toothpaste, tinned fruit and cereal bars.
Its presence is all down to the gumption of north London lads James Hunter, David Goodfellow and Benny Crane, aka The Kindness Offensive. Dedicated to doing ‘random acts of kindness’ for the past 6 months, the trio are distributing the supplies filling up their flat amongst some of London’s most marginalised, hungry and homeless.
The Kindness Offensive was born earlier this year on Hampstead Heath, when the three set up a desk on Parliament Hill and asked passing members of the public to describe what act of kindness they would like done to them. As a result, a granny with arthritis got a new fridge, one that she wouldn’t have to bend down to open, a father and his kids got to train with the Moscow State Circus, and one young boy got a red electric guitar.
“We are phone whisperers in essence,” laughs Goodfellow, “we ring up companies, explain what we’re doing, and give them the opportunity to do something nice.”
So effective were their phone whispers, they were given two electric guitars. They posted an ad on gumtree.com asking who would like the spare, and received hundreds of replies, amongst which were some from asylum seekers.
They began a dialogue with a Zimbabwean woman whose affiliation to Mugabe’s opposition party saw her chased out of the country. Now the head of a group called Women Asylum Seekers Together, she told them what act of kindness she’d like.
We were shocked, we had no idea people in London were literally starving
“The list she sent back shook our world,” says Hunter, “it was food to take them through the winter, tinned, because they had no fridge or cooker, and nappies for their babies. We were shocked, we had no idea people in London were literally starving.”
The outrage they felt was catching, and they soon had two businesses — food company General Mills and organic baby products company Spirit of Nature — offering to donate.
“It just proves that kindness is catching,” says Goodfellow, “and doing this just makes us feel awesome.”
There’s nothing more rewarding you can do with your day than helping people.
(Source: The Big Issue, Daisy Greenwell)
