If someone working at a restaurant found $12,000 lying around, they might be tempted to consider it a very generous tip. Sak Yiengjuntuek, however, took a different course of action.
As People reports, Yiengjuntuek was cleaning up the Thai restaurant that he owns in South Carolina when he came across a sunglasses case that contained $12K.
“I have to find the rightful owner for this,” Yiengjuntuek recalls thinking.
That turned out to be the previous occupant, who owned a Vietnamese restaurant in the space.
After an initial phone call led him nowhere, Yiengjuntuek was able to finally track down the previous owner and give him the money. The previous owner, who said he had cancer, was “almost crying,” Yiengjuntuek says.
“It’s the right thing to do,” Yiengjuntuek says of returning the money. “My family taught me all the time, ‘You have to be honest.'”
Plus, imagine what $12K in karma will buy you.