Oprah's seeds bear fruit of kindness

Triangle women help strangers in need

DURHAM -- Oprah Winfrey gave at least four Triangle women a challenge: $1,000, a loaned video camera and a week to be kind to a stranger.

Saturday, Melodie Richardson and Barbara Turrentine-Bowe spent most of their Oprah money on residents of McDougald Terrace, a Durham public housing complex. While friends served up fried fish, grilled chicken and ribs, the cousins unboxed gently used coats and passed out children's books. Kids ran to greet a firetruck that the women invited to join the community event.

Resident Alicia Guzman, snuggling her infant daughter closer to her chest, eyed the food and the neighborhood children playing on a nearby swing set.

"I want to cry just to see everybody together," Guzman said. "I thank whoever did it."

The Triangle women were among about 300 in the audience at a recent Oprah Winfrey Show episode dedicated to the idea of paying kindness forward. In addition to the Durham event, Winfrey's $1,000 debit cards helped victims of domestic violence, Fort Bragg families and a community theater. The women had to capture their good deeds on film for a follow-up show.

Richardson called the McDougald event "Pay It Forward 2006: Durham, North Carolina." The Durham resident and Oprah fan hopes she can make the event annual and gain enough financial support to offer a college scholarship to a needy Durham student.

Sitting in the show's Chicago studio, Richardson said, she immediately knew what she would do with the money. She recalled turning to Turrentine-Bowe and saying, "Me and Buddy are going to feed a lot of people."

For nine years, family friend George Griffin, or "Buddy," has been serving hearty meals in low-income neighborhoods every month. He and a few friends who share his Christian faith usually pay for the food from their own pockets. Griffin said the meat alone usually costs him $600, but he prepares the meal as if he were entertaining an angel or the Lord himself, he said.

"There have been times when I've scheduled this and had no money. I've pawned my tools to be able to do it," Griffin said.

Richardson usually makes several Bundt cakes for the cookouts.

Turrentine-Bowe decided to spend half of her money on Richardson's project because Richardson invited her to the show.

She used the other $500 to pay a month's rent for a woman who moved to Carrboro to take care of her ill twin sister and is now ailing, too.

"That she would do that, to change her life, was really touching," said Turrentine-Bowe, who donated a kidney a few years ago to a brother who has since died.

As of noon Saturday, the money Cheri Young of Raleigh received from Winfrey had inspired family and friends to give an additional $9,300 for Young to pass on to families in financial distress. Young gave $1,000 to Interact of Wake County, a non-profit that provides assistance to victims of domestic violence and sexual assault, and a former victim who received help there. She divvied the rest among families at UNC Hospitals and Fort Bragg.

"It's not about the amount that you give, it's about just helping," Young said.

Marty Hayes, who lives in Chatham County, chose to give all her Oprah money to Walltown Children's Theater in Durham. She learned that the theater company, which provides performing arts opportunities to children who can't afford dance or acting classes, needed money to make floor repairs.

Hayes said she and her husband regularly give to arts organizations that they know well, so she sought out one that she didn't.

"Oprah said give it to a stranger," Hayes said. "It was really a different kind of giving."