A 6-year-old boy’s ultimate birthday wish is apparently to serve others. And he’s proving it by using money he saved for a Disney World trip to help Hurricane Dorian evacuees in South Carolina.
Jermaine Bell turned 7 over the weekend, and his family has been saving up money to go to Disney World. But as Hurricane Dorian set its sights on the Southeast, Bell wanted to instead spend Labor Day weekend in South Carolina.
He told WJBF – “The people that are traveling to go to places, I wanted them to have some food to eat, so they can enjoy the ride to the place that they’re going to stay at.”
South Carolina is under mandatory evacuations along the state’s 190-mile coast and turned all lanes of Interstate 26 into a one-way evacuation route heading west as the storm threatened to impact the state.
Last week, the 6-year-old was out with his family along Highway 125 in Allendale, S.C. with two handmade signs to serve evacuees hot dogs, chips, and water as they headed inland. Allendale is located about 90 miles west of Charleston.
He told WJBF – “I wanted to be generous and live to give.”
Bell ended up serving nearly 100 evacuees during the day.
Bell’s grandmother, Aretha Grant, said her grandson did more than just serve food and drinks for evacuees.
She said – “He actually even prayed for a family while they were here in reference to their house being OK when they got back, so that was really tear dropping.”
Bell said he hopes when Dorian finally passes by he could continue to make his way to Disney World for a birthday celebration.