This isn’t a long story, but damn, it’s a great one: students at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom recently came together to celebrate one of the best things about where they go to school: a Janitor named Herman Gordon. Running into Gordon on campus, by all reports, is a bright, shining high point in the day of many of the University’s students. According to one individual, quoted by the BBC, Gordon “…is the epitome of happiness.”
Considering the fact that Gordon spends his days cleaning up after the thousands of folks that roam the university on a daily basis, his great attitude is just that much more amazing. My father was a janitor and he was a miserable prick. Anyway, one of the University of Bristol’s students thought that it was time that those that know and appreciate what the cleaner brings to their lives on a daily basis showed their appreciation to him. So, a fundraising campaign to send Gordon and his wife on a vacation to visit family in Jamaica was launched. The campaign managed to raise £1500 – more than enough to send the couple on their way.
From The Daily Mail:
According to an admin from the Bristruths Facebook page – an anonymous ‘truth’ page for Bristol University – the idea for Mr Gordon’s trip came from a Facebook post.
‘It all started with this post on the 19th May,’ they said.
The initial post called Mr Gordon ‘the jolliest man I have ever met’ and said ‘if you wanna reason to smile, go talk to him for a min or two’.
A day later, another anonymous Facebook user posted that they were starting a crowdfunding page for him.
Within five days, they’d almost reached their target.
Mr Gordon said that he was overcome with emotion when he received the money from the students.
Lovely.
Image via Creative Commons Images