A Saudi cleaner has been given a present of gold, as well as promises of money and other gifts, after a photo of him sadly gazing at the window of a jewellers' shop went viral in the Kingdom.
The photo appears first to have been shared on Instagram, with the caption: “This is a guy who supervises the rubbish, hahaha”.
A screenshot of the original post was then shared widely in Twitter, where it gained the attention of some generous souls who began to search for the man in the photo.
In a post which has been retweeted 6,500 times since Saturday, an account called “the Humanitarians” requested the assistance of Saudi Arabia’s huge Twitter community to track him down:
السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته
— انسانيات (@ensaneyat) December 3, 2016
ارجو ممن يعرف هذا العامل ان يتواصل معي.
فله طقم ذهب مجاناً . pic.twitter.com/Md3fVUjqUB
Peace and God’s blessings be upon you. I beg of whoever knows this worker to get in contact with me, and we will kit him out with gold for free.
It seems that they were successful, as a later tweet showed images of the same man holding a large gold chain:
اللهم لك الحمد والشكر والف شكر لمن قدّم الخيhttps://t.co/sHRd7DWqGj pic.twitter.com/pp0Mb48nnp
— تركي الدعجم (@turkialdajam) December 4, 2016
Oh praise and thanks and a thousand thanks to those who did this act of goodness.
In a powerful wave of human generosity, many others tweeted also their willingness to help the unnamed worker, including this journalist:
وله مني هدية .. الله يعزه ويرفع قدره https://t.co/AqEA7gh6ST
— أحمد محمد الطويان (@altowayan) December 4, 2016
He has a gift from me... May God treasure him and increase his abilities
@ben_aon @ensaneyat إذا توصلت له يبو عبدالله بلغني. مني له ٢٠٠٠ ريال كعربون هدية
— بدر البياعي (@baderalbayai) December 3, 2016
If you manage to contact him Abdullah, let me know. He has 2000 riyals [$530] from me as a token gift.
#انسانيات على اسمك #انسان
— ابراهيم الغضية (@goodiah) December 3, 2016
بيض الله وجهك وكثر الله من امثالك
وإذا وجدتموه أعطني خبر فله مني باقة عطور متنوعة له ولاولاده#السعودية د https://t.co/T2wJlArVbO
“Humanitarians”, you are worthy of your name. May God make you proud, and may He make many like you. If you find him, let me know, and I will give him a lot of different perfumes, for him and his children.
In Saudi Arabia, working as a cleaner is often seen as a shameful and dirty occupation. The kindness shown towards this man in the last two days, however, has defied social norms and shown the best of Saudi society.
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