Dogs are the best, but let’s face it, they don’t always make things easy for delivery drivers. Think of it; people don’t really do it either.
Mark Polchleb, a TikTok-er living in Australia, recently shared a The 5-part video journey begins with an unruly dog and ends with a touching moment of humanity. It all started on July 7, 2022, when Polchleb shared footage of a food delivery malfunctioning, thanks to Dachshund’s incessant barking.
A cruel misunderstanding
Video opens with a close-up of Polchleb’s own face, looking deeply regretful.
“Can someone please tell this Uber Eats man that I am scolding my dog and not him,” the text recorded footage of his face.
It then cuts to a recording from a front-door security camera. A delivery driver just arrived with a bag of food.
As they usually do when the food arrives, Polchleb’The dog barked (a lot) and surrounded the front door. Finally, Polchleb yelled at his dog: “Get out of the door, man!”
The driver, who was now standing just outside the door, seemed to think a customer was yelling at him to get out of his door. He starts to apologize, but with his job he has to take delivery pictures, so he does and then nervously thanks Polchleb and leaves.
At the time he received the food, Polchleb had no idea that he had unwittingly terrorized a waiter. As he explained in the DM for People:
“I didn’t realize until I watched the footage again that he might have misunderstood I was scolding my dog. It’s too late to explain. I can’t stand it when people think I don’t respect them for just doing their job! “
Driver tracking
In his first follow-up video, Polchleb clarified that the driver was actually working for DoorDash, not Uber Eats. The way the DoorDash app works, you can’t contact the delivery driver after a certain amount of time. So Polchleb contacted DoorDash customer service to find out who he was and how he could apologize.
Finally, since the original video has been viewed by millions, Polchleb hopes that one of his viewers can also help him find the driver. Remarkably, that’s what happened.
“It turns out, with the amazing thing that TikTok, it only took two days to track him down,” Polchleb said. “His daughter happened to see my original TikTok after about 7 million views, and I was able to connect with her, and then her dad.”
Above and beyond empathy
Turns out the driver’s name was Sami. The final video of the series shows the moment Polchleb meets Sami in person. He brought him a present and apologized face to face for accidentally shouting at him.
Sami came to Australia as a refugee and is now trying to raise enough money to meet his son in France. Polchleb shared fundraiser The family has made him with his audience, and hopefully, Sami will soon be able to rest and visit his son.
Working as a delivery driver can often be difficult and ungrateful, so it’s heartwarming to see a story like this unfold.
