As Feroza Syed waited in line at an Atlanta McDonald’s, she witnessed a horrible act when a man in front of her threw his drink at the fast-food employee working at the window.
The customer apparently didn’t want ice in his drink and abused the employee who was soaked in soda and crying while being 6 months pregnant when Syed met her.
Feroza Syed offered Bryanna $20 before she left to post about the incident on Facebook. “At drive thru, guy in front of me threw a soda at the woman b/c it wasn’t what he wanted. She was crying,” Syed wrote. “Tried to get out of my car to kick his ass, but I was blocked in. Y’all do better.”
People started commenting and reacting to the post and then Syed decided to raise funds for Bryanna, to send “$5 or (whatever)” to her Venmo or Cash App for the soon-to-be-mother. After collecting the donations, Syed got in touch with Bryanna through her manager.
“(Feroza) was like …’I have a surprise for you and I really want to give it to you in person’ so I sent her my address,” Bryanna said. “She gave me the envelope and I couldn’t do nothing but cry because I wasn’t expecting that.” Syed gave her a total of $1,700 in donations from people.
This is my new friend B., on last Friday afternoon I was getting some fast food at a local McDonald’s when the man in…
Posted by Feroza Syed on Tuesday, December 8, 2020
“A large portion of the donations were $5, $10, $20 and that totaled up to a large sum of money,” Syed said, she wanted to show Bryanna that “not all humans are horrible.” Syed shared Bryanna’s Cash App handle for others to send money to her directly and also helped her set up a baby registry. “She has been a blessing,” Bryanna said of Syed. “There’s still some good people out there.”
The story is a holiday miracle for Bryanna, but Syed had an important message for everyone to support community members and essential workers during these tough times.
“Doing the right thing inspires others to do the right thing and what I keep learning again and again and again is when you see something like this or any situation where someone is being mistreated or harmed … all it takes is one person to change the narrative,” she said. “When we talk about how to give back to our essential workers who put their lives on the line feeding, housing, shopping and providing health care for us — remember that anyone can do what I did.”
