Small Gift. Big Heart

Every day on the way to school, 12-year-old Naren Patel of Boston listens to the news on the radio with his mom. When he heard a segment about the SNAP benefits pause and the urgent need for food in Massachusetts, Naren knew he wanted to help.

“I was thinking, people are going to be starving, and it would be awesome to help them,” he explains.

At the advice of his mom, Shradha, Naren began researching hunger-relief organizations online, and decided to help GBFB.

“We’ve been very blessed to not face food insecurity,” Shradha says, “and the question was, what can we do? We talked about how Naren could buy cans of food, or he could donate using his allowance.”

Naren decided to donate his allowance and made his own personal gift to GBFB. Both Naren and Shradha made donations ending in the digits one or five, a symbol of good luck and best wishes in Indian culture.

When asked what he would tell other kids who want to help in times of need, Naren says: “There’s always someone having a harder day than you, and you can help them.”