High Praise and High Fives

March 3, 2007

Juanita's random acts in South Africa has intrigued and inspired those who have witnessed it as well as those who simply heard about it.

She has received high fives from guests who attended the black history event at the home of the U.S. consulate and high praise from corporate types. And she has received countless hugs from everyday people on the streets.

Kim Davis, president of the New York-based J.P. Morgan Chase Foundation
heard about Juanita's random acts while she was in Johannesburg to speak at a South African Women's Leadership Conference.

She described Juanita's grass-roots giving project as something powerful. "Corporations like J.P. Morgan can and will and must make a difference," said Ms. Davis, an African American who manages philanthropy and controls more than $100 million of the corporate giving efforts all over the world. "The real change will have to come from people touching, like she is."

Marcia Morgan is the wife of Michael Morgan, a diplomat who works at the United Nations Development Program. She met Juanita several years ago when they lived in Ethiopia. They recently moved to Johannesburg.

When a mutual friend told Marcia that Juanita was in the country performing random acts of kindness she said that she couldn't believe it.

She contacted Juanita and asked if she would be willing to assist the children of her former hairdresser, a Congolese woman who recently died leaving five children behind.
"I wanted them to meet somebody who could make them happy," she said.

Before we left for the day trip to Soweto on Tuesday, Juanita got up early to take the children grocery shopping.

Marcia didn't divulge how much Juanita spent on groceries but Robin, who accompanied her on the trip, said that she bought so much food that one of the shopping carts collapsed.

"The little ones were over the moon," said Marcia who smiled as she remembered the moment. She arranged for the children to miss school for the day so they could go with Juanita and help pick out the groceries.

The children were very conservative when they walked down the aisles to select the food and were thrilled when they were allowed to pick more than one of the same item.
"Not in their wildest dreams would they have that amount of foodstuff in a year, let alone a day," Marcia said.

She had nothing but praise for Juanita.

"It's not courage but something else that must touch you to do something like this," said Marcia in her soft Jamaican accent. "That's the way God touched her, to touch other peoples lives."

Then there is Helen Rees, a college professor, medical doctor and world expert on HIV-AIDs. Dr. Rees, who lives in Johannesburg heard Juanita on the radio being interviewed about Random Acts. She described Juanita's project as "extraordinary."

"The thing that really struck me was this issue of human giving, of altruism," Dr. Rees said. "It's actually in all of us. There's a human bond. You can't go and touch someone without giving to them."