“If you could have any three things, what would you want?” Eleven-year-old Ruby Kate Chitsey loves asking that question at nursing homes in Harrison, Arkansas, but it’s not a game. She has set out to realize the wishes.

Ruby Kate has long been close to older folks. Ruby’s mother, Amanda Chitsey, is a nurse at a nursing home, and Ruby often goes along with her. Last May, Ruby noticed a person named Pearl sad for giving up her dog because dogs are not allowed at the nursing home and Pearl couldn’t afford to pay anyone to look after her dog. Ruby also learned that many people there couldn’t afford even what is ordinary. So Ruby Kate decided to do something about it.

She started by asking people there three things they wanted most. Amanda worried that people would ask for things like cars an 11-year-old wouldn’t be able to provide. Instead, they asked for chocolate bars, McDonald’s fries, and even just a prayer. “It broke me as a human,” Amanda said. “We bought as many things as we could that day.”

With their own money, the Chitseys realized about 100 people’s wishes in three months. Then they asked for donations. People in Harrison responded warmly. So Amanda set up a GoFundMe page—Three Wishes for Ruby’s Residents, hoping to collect $5,000.They hit their goal in a month. After Ruby’s story was shared, it raised $20,000 in 24 hours and more than $250,000 in five months. With those funds, the Chitseys could get more creative. For example, they gave a person money for gas to help her to a friend’s out-of-state wedding.

Earlier this year, Three Wishes for Ruby’s Residents became a nonprofit organization （非营利组织）. One of its new goals is to set up a computer in every nursing home in each state. Ruby Kate doesn’t want to stop there. “I consider kindness to be my hobby,” she said.

Radajere Oleita thinks she may have a partial solution for the world’s two persistent problems: garbage and poverty. It’s called the Chip Bag Project. The 26-year-old student and environmentalist from Detroit is asking a favor of local snack lovers：Rather than toss your empty chip bags into the trash, donate them so she can turn them into sleeping bags for the homeless.

Chip eaters drop off their empty bags from Doritos, Lay’s, and other favorites at two locations in Detroit: a print shop and a clothing store, where Oleita and her volunteer helpers collect them. After they clean the chip bags in soapy hot water, they slice them open, lay them flat, and iron them together. They use padding and liners(内衬)from old coats to line the insides.

It takes about four hours to sew a sleeping bag, and each takes around 150 to 300 chip bags, depending on whether they’re single-serve or family size. The result is a sleeping bag that is “waterproof lightweight, and easy to carry around,” Oleita told the Detroit News.

Since its start in 2020, the Chip Bag Project has collected more than 800, 000 chip bags and, as of last December, created 110 sleeping bags.

Sure, it would be simpler to raise the money to buy new sleeping bags. But that’s only half the goal for the volunteers and Oleita whose family moved to the United States from Nigeria a decade ago with the hope of attaining a better life. “We are dedicated to making an impact not only socially, but environmentally.” she says.

And, of course, there’s the symbolism of saving bags that would otherwise land in the trash and using them to help the homeless. It’s a powerful reminder that environmental injustice and poverty often go hand in hand, as Oleita told hourdetroit. com:“I think it’s time to show connections between all of these issues. ”