He was hesitant to take the photo at first, but eventually, Ehab Taha realized it was truly a moment to remember.

What he captured was “an incredible display of humanity.”

A disturbance on the train

Taha was riding the SkyTrain in Vancouver in February of 2016 when a tall man stepped aboard and started acting erratically. Passengers were afraid.

The man was cursing, shouting, and pacing erratically.

Passengers moved away from him, but one woman remained.

A display of humanity

The woman’s compassion and her refusal to fear the man touched Taha.

He appeared to have psychological issues or be under the influence, but she decided to reach out instead of moving back.

In a viral Facebook post describing the incident, Taha wrote:

“I saw the most incredible display of humanity on the sky train. A six-foot-five man suffering from drug abuse and\or mental health issues was being very aggressive on the bus with erratic movements, cursing, shouting, etc. While everyone was scared, this one seventy-year-old woman reached out her hand, tightly gripping his hand until he calmed down, sat down silently, with eventual tears in his eyes.”

He said she held out her hand and patiently waited until the agitated stranger was willing to reach back.

He snapped a photo of the pair and posted it along with the story, which he said taught him an important lesson in not judging people.

The pair silently held hands for 20 minutes until the man reached his stop. Then he simply got up, said “thanks, grandma” and walked away.

A kind hand

At that moment, what the man needed was a kind soul. And this woman provided it.

When Taha spoke to her afterward, she chalked it up to the compassion that comes with motherhood.

“I spoke to the woman after this incident and she simply said, ‘I’m a mother and he needed someone to touch.’ And she started to cry.”

Now Taha feels that he’ll be less likely to judge people harshly when they act out of place.

“Don’t fear or judge the stranger on the bus: life does not provide equal welfare for all its residents,” he wrote.

His original Facebook post has now been shared over 60k times.

The reactions

People were humbled by the story.

Commenters on the CTV News story lauded the woman’s actions.

“What a wonderful woman. I hope life treats her as kindly as she did that stranger. I have to admit, I would have been one of those people who edged away,” said one reader.

While it happened 4 years ago, plenty of people were quick to point out that this is the kind of de-escalation skillset that could prevent so many violent police incidents.

“Canadian police forces need to hire her; she can teach them about deescalation and diplomacy,” someone commented.

Taha was glad he was there to capture the moment and learned a lot about putting others before oneself. She certainly didn’t have to reach out, but clearly she had a sense of what the man needed – and she was right.

The woman wasn’t identified, but that only convinced Taha that she might very well have been an angel.

Be sure to scroll down below to see an interview with him about the kind gesture he witnessed.

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Source: Facebook – Ehab Taha, YouTube – CTV News, CTV News