Coincidences

Years ago I was invited by a senior woman at the college in London where I worked, to go to Arizona to talk about some work I had been doing, at a conference. When we got on the plane, her husband was a lad I had been at school with thirty miles away, thirty five years earlier, who was in the same class as myself from 11 until 16. Coincidences are more common than we give them credit for, the world is actually quite small in surprising ways.

Oh yes!! Plane to holiday isle - thought another passenger looked like my GP from 20 years back. Disembarking, discovered it was her. She invited us round to her apartment- (just retired) good amount of banana liqueur consumed and it all came out - the frustrations of being a GP, advising idiots how to avoid XYZ - they don't take the advice and keep reappearing with 'XYZ'. It was really lovely to see her in a human context. - But of course amusing too.

Slightly different but I worked with a girl in a small shop (there were only 5 of us so I knew her well) for 2 years whilst at uni.
At the Xmas party at the end of the second year I found out she was my cousin. Our dads we’re brothers but my uncle hadn’t seen her since she was 2!

We were house-hunting in a completely new area several years ago and arranged to see a house we liked the look of.

The estate agent showed us around. The owner was sitting in the garden reading. She turned around when she heard OH's voice. "Hello Mr - she said. I thought it was you!" She was the solicitor OH had always used and the week before she'd drawn up our will for us! She made us tea, which was a bonus on a house viewing.

(We didn't buy her house. It wasn't quite right for us.)

Walking through a shopping centre in Australia on holiday I bumped into a woman who had rented the house next door to us for a while here in UK.

On holiday in Corfu we found a couple also on holiday who had stayed in the same hotel as us in Austria two years earlier.

An aunt was on the same flight from Majorca and we had no idea she too was on holiday.

Forty nine years ago my DH and I were on our honeymoon in S.Spain at a very remote resort. We were sitting by the pool, during our second week and there sitting next to us was a childhood friend of my DH. She recognised his voice. We have been friends ever since!

About 10 years ago DH had a new work colleague. Over a period of 2 years or so I kept hearing him talk about 'Jane Doe' this, Jane Doe that, Jane Doe the other etc. Then one day at a social event, I found myself chatting with Jane Doe and we soon recognised each other - we had been in the same class at school. We were all living and working well away from our home town.

I bought a necklace from eBay and had to send money to a house 250 miles away. I realised the lady was the neighbour of my husband’s aunt and she had arranged a birthday party for her, so I had a photograph of her!

When I was in my fifties, a new younger teacher came to visit prior to taking up post. After chatting to her for a few minutes I had to ask if her mum was a twin, as she looked and spoke so like twin girls who had been in my class when at primary school, but hadn't seen for over forty years. She replied that she was. I asked P. . or P . .? She confirmed which one, and was amazed that I could have worked that out after five minutes, particularly as everyone told her that she looked like her dad!

I was standing in a queue in a small post office in Cheshire.
The lady in front of me was sending a parcel to Canada for her grandchildren.
I spoke to her and said that my son and family were in Canada and it transpired that both families lived in the same small town in British Columbia.
I mentioned the name of the family to my grandchildren and coincidentally one of the daughters was in the same class as my elder grandson.
The other people waiting in the queue were fascinated by the coincidence as were we.

I live in Ontario and my sister who lives in Edinburgh was visiting. We were sitting on my local beach when a man nearby who heard our accents came over to chat. His business was erecting ice skating rinks in the UK and turned he had hired my sisters son and girlfriend the previous winter to help out.We could not get over it, what were the chances of that encounter!

It's a small World......
While walking on a headland path with my friend who I was visiting in Australia, a family were walking towards us from the opposite direction.
They asked us where the path lead to and my friend was just about to explain, when we spotted a turtle in the water below and as we were all watching it, I asked the oldest couple if they were on holiday, he laughed and said that they had lived in Australia for over 25 years but he had kept his strong accent and they were originally from Gozo.
I said that my Daughter in laws family live there and he asked me her name. He knew her Father who had left the Island for London many years before and her Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles still living there.
He gave me his name and asked me to take a photo to give to my Dil to show her family the next time she went to Gozo.

Some years ago, while travelling from East to West in Florida, we stopped half way in a very pretty small town. We noticed that it was twinned with a Scottish town, though not ours in NE Scotland, but only about 70 miles away. A few years later, while at his local bowling green DH got talking to an American visitor. When DH asked where he came from, he named that lovely town in Florida, saying that DH would never have heard of it. He was very surprised indeed to discover that we had explored and had lunch there.

I was in labour with my son and my mum arrived....she began talking to the midwife and it turned out that I was the second baby she'd delivered 21 years earlier!

I was in Kashmir in the early 80's with my husband, staying on a houseboat. Two young Australians arrived late on Christmas eve and we got into conversation over supper. They were living about a hundred yards from us in London.

Met my Dh on s night out only to fimd out we lived on the same street and had never seen each otjer needless to say we shared a cab home

We got friendly with a couple from London on a 3 week walking holiday in Canada. 5 years later we were waiting in a line to board a boat to the Scilly Isles and they were a few steps behind us. We obviously like the same kind of holidays.

My daughter was at the bus stop on her way to work when the chap next to her who she had never met in her life before said to her 'Did you live with your mom in ..... Rd when you were little? You're the spitting image of your mother. ' Turned out he was our milkman and he recognised her because she looks like me.

The weirdest thing happened to some friends of mine. Three generations of them were emigrating en masse to new Zealand. The teenage granddaughter was very unhappy about it. One day she was on an online chat room, (or whatever they call them!). A girl came on, and she asked where she lived. "New Zealand." "Oh, we are emigrating there soon. Which town do you live in?" "A small town called D.........." "Oh! That's where we are going to live!"
Not only an amazing co-incidence, but they were both the same age, and would attend the same school.
Needless to say, she couldn't wait to emigrate, then, and meet her new friend. Her Granny was convinced that it was Divine Intervention, and who would argue with that?

I showed a photo to my Hairdresser of my ~Son's newly acquired Cockapoo and she showed me a photo of one her friend had just had. "Gosh, could be twins" we said. Turns out her friend and my Son collected their puppies on the same day at the same time from the same Breeder and yes, they have the same father so are half siblings !

I was on a coach tour today f NZ Got talking to the man sitting next to me
Turned out he was my Father’s golfing partner from Bognor Regis in Sussex

Went to Hong Kong a few years ago with DH’s sister and brother and partners. Hotel was nice but very pricey breakfast so on the first morning we walked to the end of the road and found a cafe. I was standing at the counter waiting to order and someone tapped me on the back - a man I had worked with. We had both retired recently and he and his wife were staying in the same hotel for a couple of nights en route to Australia.

Years ago I was on a short cruise from Cyprus to Egypt and at the dining table was a lady,she had come to Cyprus as her daughter had died through carbon monoxide poisoning in Cyprus, she showed us photographs of her daughter in body bag at the dining table, and she mocked my ignorance of gazpacho soup, I was very kind and obliging to her and understood her pain , but when I look back I wonder why she was on the cruise and so 'nasty'

I was at a party in Wiltshire and asked someone where they came from recognising a Scottish accent , he said I wouldn't have heard of the place but he told me anyway. We were raised in the next street to each other.

My son bought his girlfriend home who he'd met at college. She told us she used to live in our area but her parents had moved when she was 9. Then my son asked what school she'd gone to as they were the same age. Turns out it was the same one that he'd been to. We looked at my son's school photo and there they were together standing on the same row. The next week he went to meet her family and he realised her mum had been his English teacher at his secondary school. They were meant to be. Sadly I lost my son to cancer when he was 26 but his girlfriend, now 36, remains one of my best friends.