Your craziest co-incidence?

I'm fascinated by co-incidences. Can you tell me of your nuttiest?

Example: i dialled a wrong number from Oz. Ended up ringing a phone box in a village where an old lady answered. She knew my sister, who lived in the town. Strange..

BM

I worked on a J-1 in New Jersey 16 years ago. While working on a board walk in a small resort I got chatting to one of the locals who it turned out was a lost relative.

A cousin of my grandmother's had run off to America in 1910 and lost contact. This was his grandson.

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Hi Brian

It's certainly a coincidence. But it's not at all strange. What would be much more strange if these things did not happen at all.

Did you ever hear anyone telling you that they dialled a wrong number but did not know the person? Probably not, because these things are not remarkable. But if lots of get wrong numbers, one of us is likely to dial someone we know.

In your case, you just dialled someone who knew someone you know. You had dialled a particular area code , so it's even more likely that someone there will know someone, anyone you know.

The fact that you phoned from Australia, makes no statistical difference, but it does add to the apparent strangeness of it.

Brendan

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

This kind of co-incidence is partially the subject of a fairly new area of science called Network Theory (check out a book called "Linked" by an author named Barabasi or another book called "Nexus: Small Worlds..." is also quite good).

There is one particular part of the subject called Six degrees of Separation which states any one person is only 6 links away from any other person in the World thus giving rise to the "Small World" idea. The reason for this is that the human society network is made up of "hubs" i.e. people with lots of connections and they make the link from any one person to any other very short. Graphically it looks a lot like a big chart showing all the airport flight routes across the world, the big hubs like Atlanta, London etc make it possible to go from any point to any other point in just a few hops.

Anyways, either of the books above are quite interesting, this network theory that gives rise to the Small World idea also is an underlying driver behind economies, the spread of Aids, the Internet, and terrorist cells.

So in response to the OP this kind of co-incidence can be put down to pure luck but there is a theory and reason behind it. In a way its not just a mere co-incidence. I mean, statistically that old lady you rang accidently probably shouldnt have known someone you did but the basis of the network behind human society made it seem a very strange co-incidence.

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Only ever met two people from Malaysia in my life
First in Dublin who worked with a friend and the other I worked with in London

Both of them had gone to university togther and where very good friends

Only found out by jokingly stating "I know a guy from Malaysia perhaps you know him"

Popoulation 23,953,136 (July 2005) means that a bit of as stretch

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

My friend was on holiday in China with her boyfriend whose mother lives in some remote part. She met my brother who was touring the world (and had already been away for 18 months) in a most un-touristy part of China that he happened to go to because of a guy he met in Thailand was from there and suggested he visit to see 'real china'.

Another completely different co-incidence ... my husbands aunt and uncle are both called Bernie L*******. She goes by another name so it only became apparant during the wedding ceremony that they had the same first name and surname. So his aunt did not have to change her name when she got married ... and thay are not related to each other ... and not from the same place either.

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Either these are coincidences or i am cursed

1. Was in Charles de Gaulle airport the day the Concorde crashed (one and only time in my life i was in the place)
2. Was supposed to fly home from Newark airport on Sept 11th....flight delayed surprisingly enuf
3. The next time i was in NYC was 2 years later - the night of the black-out
4. Started work in London shortly afterwards - first week there the tube went down because of a power cut

There are actually more of these kind of events but cant remember them this late on a sunday night!

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

A number of years back I was travelling to Australia and as we were going to be stopping in Melbourne for a few days enroute to Sydney a friend of mine gave me the name and address of a good friend of hers to meet up with for a few drinks. My friend had mentioned that her friend was only back in Melbourne after travelling around Oz and had stayed with her aunt who is a nun in Perth.
So anyways, we had stopped in Singapore for a few days on the way and were sitting in a pub when a Belfast lad heard our accents and came up to chat to us. After a few hours chatting (and multiple pints!) we got to talking about where we were going in Australia and we mentioned that we were stopping off in Melbourne for a few days before going on to Sydney.
Ah right he said, I'm just after coming from Melbourne, was with my brother and a few of his friends. In fact, he said, they're just back from travelling around Australia. Cool I said, what parts did they visit? Ah all over really, they spent a fortnight in Perth and get this - they stayed in a nunnery with an aunt of one of the girls!
.... I nearly fell off my bar stool!! So we ended up hand delivering a letter to his brother written on the back of a beer mat!!

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

WarrenBuffet... I think you owe it to the rest of us to let us know where you are right now..what you are doing & what your travel plans are!!

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Ninsaga - was thinking the same as you while reading this post - don't want to meet this guy at any airport I intend on travelling to

I live posts like this but cannot think of any worthy stories of my own to add in!

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Warren,

Are you sure your life was not made into a movie?




I wouldn't leave my house if I had been at all those locations

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

i was once offered a job in the U.S. and it turns out the interviewer was the roommate of my fiancees sister.

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Some years ago I had an old Vauxhall Cavalier which I sold privately. A year or so later I was driving back to Dublin from Waterford and on a complete whim decided to detour via Courtown. Got lost and spotted a chap working outside his house and stopped to ask directions. I didn't hear what he said cos I was staring at the car parked in his driveway - my old Cavalier!

Sarah

www.rea.ie

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

The freakiest coincidence is always turning on the radio to hear that song you've been humming for the last few minutes playing. I always try to convince myself that I've heard someone else's radio playing without realising it and that's why I was humming it but sometimes there's just no way it could be. Particularly freakish when it's an old or not often played song.

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

Here's a funny one-I had just come in from college one evening and the radio was playing away in the background.I asked my flatmate what the time was, and just as I asked, the dj on the radio said " and the time now is half past five.....!"


d

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

In 1984 I worked briefly with a certain lady. Left the job and never gave her a second thought for about 15 years. Then one day out of the blue (at the supermarket checkout), her face came in to my mind and I found myself thinking about her for a few minutes, wondering where she might be now etc. One hour later I was driving to work (not the original place of employment) and pulled up at a traffic light - looked to my right, and My God... there she was in the car next to me, I never got such a shock in my life. how does this happen??

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

ophelia said:

In 1984 I worked briefly with a certain lady. Left the job and never gave her a second thought for about 15 years. Then one day out of the blue (at the supermarket checkout), her face came in to my mind and I found myself thinking about her for a few minutes, wondering where she might be now etc. One hour later I was driving to work (not the original place of employment) and pulled up at a traffic light - looked to my right, and My God... there she was in the car next to me, I never got such a shock in my life. how does this happen??

Click to expand...

That is nuts.

I was trying to avoid a person at Crimbo, went to town thinking 'I betch I'll meet her...'

Lo and behold and hour later guess who I was making gammy smiles st?

Lol

Life; I LOVE it!

BM

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

I had a dream one night about walking through a field with a girlfriend and we come across this old stone breaker beside a disused quarry and she explains what it is as it was an implement I'd never heard of or seen before (in real life or in dreams!). Thought nothing of it until some months later I'm walking through a field with a new real live girlfriend near her home place and in the distance I see an unusual old implement. So I say to her 'I bet that thing over there is a stone breaker' and she confirmed that it was and it was positioned exactly as per my dream with remenants of stone underneath it and everything. So I married her...

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

There's no such thing as a coincidence. It's synchronicity.

Re: Your craziest co-incidence

When I was younger I was looking at buying my first computer. Scanned the ads in the paper and my Dad suggested I look the phone number up in the book to get an idea of where the seller was. So as I looked for similar numbers I found the persons entry in the phone book.