Updated 6.15pm with message from Daniela Caceres
A crowdfunding campaign for Daniela Caceres, who lost her partner just a day before he planned to propose, has reached its target in less than four hours following a Times of Malta story published on Friday.
The fundraiser, which aimed to cover the cremation costs and other financial burdens left behind by the sudden death of 28-year-old Arturo Acevedo saw an immediate surge of donations that pushed the total past the original €6,000 goal by Friday morning.
His fiancée’s target was to raise €6,000 in the next 30 days and by 11.30am on Friday the cause had already raised €6,300.
By 4.30pm on Friday it had raised over €7,000.
In a message to Times of Malta, Caceres thanked the newspaper “for giving voice to our story”. She also thanked “all the kind-hearted people who helped raise the necessary funds” to help Arturo return to his country “to rest in peace”.
“We arrived in Malta with dreams and hope, and in the most painful moment of my life, I found solidarity, humanity, and support here,” she said.
“Thank you, Malta, for your big heart and for standing by me when I needed it most.”
The appeal followed the tragic story of her partner of eight years, who died suddenly two days before Christmas, after he was diagnosed with an aggressive form of leukaemia just two weeks earlier.
The day after he died, on Christmas eve, his girlfriend Daniela learned that he was planning to propose to her that day. He was secretly planning to pop the question during a dream trip to Paris that the two had planned together.
They had cancelled the trip due to his illness, of course, but his mother told her about the planned proposal the day after he died.
That is when she searched the house for the ring and found it hidden among his work belongings, wrapped in a T-shirt he wore to work. The ring was engraved on the inside with the words ‘24-12-25 Forever’.
Daniela says she found a hand-written note with it, with the words: “Will you marry me?”. She silently mouthed the word ‘Yes’ and put the ring on her finger. She has not removed it since and says she feels she is now his wife.
But Arturo’s death forced her to spend money she did not have to cremate his body. That is why, together with her friends she launched the crowdfunding campaign to help pay for the cremation and the flights back home to Colombia, where she plans to take his remains for a funeral with the family, so he can be laid to rest in his home country.