A Leeds Uber driver “adopted a granny” who was in floods of tears in his taxi, rather than dropping her home.
Manzoor Khan, known as Manny, 66, has been looking after 83-year-old Patricia ‘Pat’ Wilde for more than nine years. The Bradford man, who drives his taxi in Leeds, recounted how retired laundry worker Pat was crying her eyes out after he’d picked her up from the hospital and felt compelled to look after her.
Pat says she "loves" Manny and his family, including wife Rashmeen and daughter Sabina, who she "trusts with her life". All she has to do is push a buzzer and they'll come to help.
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Manny, who’s a father-of-four and grandad-of-one, said: “She didn’t have no family or nothing. I said I would look after her and I’ve been looking after her ever since.
“I do almost everything for her, I take her to the doctors, I do her shopping, I look after her house, her bills and stuff like that. A person needs care all the time.
“If she ever needs me, all she has ever got to do is give me a phone call. She is part of the family now, we adopted a grandma.”
Pat said: "It feels as if I've got somebody I can trust and go to if I don't feel so well. Manny and his family have been very very good to me.
"I love them and I trust them with my life. If I want anything, all I have to do is push a buzzer and he'll come to help."
Manny spoke about the fateful journey from the hospital nine years ago when he first picked her up in his taxi. He said: “She was crying, and she said she’d lost her brother David. He’s all she had in the whole world. She didn’t have any more family, no kids, no one.
“I brought her to my home. I thought, I can’t drop this lady off and just say ‘Here you are love, see you later.
“I said to my wife her name was Pat, her brother has passed away and she’ll be stopping with us for a while. We made her a pot of tea.”
Pat said: "I thought it was very good of him. He took me to his home and gave me some chicken and chips. Rashmeen gave me a blanket and said I could stay there as long as I wanted."
'Loneliness is a disease'
Pat then stayed at Manny’s for six weeks. She bonded with Manny, Rashmeen and the kids. Manny, who’s a British-Pakistani, said he took some flack from his community at first due to Pat’s funeral arrangements for her brother.
Manny said: “I fell out with a lot of my community because she wanted her brother to be cremated. They said because I’m Muslim, cremation is not allowed. But it was her doing it and she’s Christian.”
At the end of the initial six weeks Pat told Manny she intended to move back to her home. Manny, who by this point had grown a lot of affection for her, told her: “Loneliness is a disease and it will kill you. You don’t have to be poorly.”
Ever since, Pat comes to their house every tea-time, regularly watches telly with them and then they walk her home. They did that regularly for eight years until the pandemic hit and Pat had to isolate.
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