Bob Geldof received an emotional thank you from a waiter whose life was changed by Band Aid.
The 73-year-old singer established the supergroup in 1984 to record 'Do They Know It's Christmas? — which he co-wrote with Midge Ure - to raise awareness and funds for famine in Ethiopia, and he still sees the positive impact the money raised has had on people from the African nation.
During a recent trip to Montreal, a room service waiter originally from Ethiopia "threw himself" on Bob and told him how he and his sister had been taken to Band Aid-funded orphanages and schools after their parents had starved to death.
Bob told Billboard magazine: “He pulled out his wallet and he took out a photograph of himself, his wife and a six- or seven-year-old kid.
“They were wearing Manchester City football kits; I said, ‘Man City, lame, but great kid. How’s he doing at school?’ And [the waiter] threw himself on me and buried his head in my chest and said, ‘Thank you for my son. Thank you for my life.’
“It’s a lot to take on. You can’t say, ‘Well, it’s not actually me; it’s, like, millions and millions of people.’ But if it came down to just that, just that little boy in his Man City shirt, then 40 years — well worth it.”
Bob and Midge are amazed both Band Aid and the song - of which they have just released a new version, featuring vocals from previous recordings mixed together - are still going strong after almost 40 years.
Midge said: “It was meant to be a six-month project spending the seven, eight million pounds it generated.
“Of course, within that six-month period it grew from a record into suddenly putting together Live Aid…and compounded by the fact that nobody thought for one nano second that if you make a Christmas record it might just get played every year.
"We could only focus on the Christmas of ’84 going into ’85; if we could get it to No. 1 over the Christmas period, great. But we never saw life beyond that.
"The last 39 years has proved that wrong.”
