The world is a small place (not original but truer every
day). People often experience interesting and wonderful
travel coincidences. I offer an example from my experience.
In 1976 I travelled to Bombay where a woman I met at a
small dinner party encouraged me to spend some time at the
Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherri (sp?). She had grown up
there in the Ashram. I spent a couple of weeks at the Ashram
on that trip. Ten years later (1985) in Canada I was filling
out a form at a government office in the prairie city where
I was living. The woman who served me asked me about the
Indian style bag I was carrying. She indicated that she was
from South India. When I asked her where, she told me I
wouldn't know the place. It was small not-well-known town.
Inquiring further, I learned it was Pondicherri. She, too,
had grown up there. She was the sister of the woman I met 10
years earlier in Bombay.
I'd appreciate hearing about other ætravel coincidences'
people have experienced. (And, in your opinion, was the
experience fated? Or can it be explaining on the basis of
probability?)
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I was trekking up in the hills in Burma and we came across
a small group of Western trekkers. In the group was a guy I
went to school with who was then living in London and a guy
that serves me coffee in my favourite cafe. Considering
these were the only New Zealanders I had come across in 3
months I was pretty shocked to find I knew 2 out of the 5
in the group.
I did a Graphics degree at Leicester polytechnic and one
of the course assignments was to design a campaign logo to
ban mining in a nearby beauty spot. When completed I sent
them a copy but never heard any more. Five years later I
was sitting in a backpackers hotel in Calcutta and in walked
a traveller wearing a faded old T shirt with my design
plastered over the front. I never did get royalties.
I am an expatriate in Singapore from the States. As part of the experience of living and working in a different culture and in a different country, I expected to encounter lots of exotic, foreign and exciting things. But never did I expect that when a friend (whom I had met via another friend) told me that she was going to introduce a new friend to me, that it would be my elementary school classmate who had moved away when we were 12 years old and whom I had not since seen for 15 years!
When traveling in Belgium in 92, I met two great guys from
Aldershot, England. A few weeks later, in Prague, I heard
someone shout out my name. Since I knew no-one in Prague, I
decided it couldn't be for me. A moment later, I got a tap
on the shoulder, and sure enough, it was Alf and Andy. We
got a good laugh at the coincidence.
In 94, in Budapest, getting off the train, I saw them
again. I keep waiting to see them here in the States....
I went to a Canada Day celebration here in Seoul. I spoke
to a man who had just arrived from Vancouver (my home),
where he stayed for only a day. He did take a whole role of
pictures and since I missed home, I asked to take a look at
them, hoping to catch a glimpse of the ocean. Instead I
caught a glimpse of a friend of mine who'd been standing by
a funny bike that the man had taken a photo of! I couldn't
believe that my friend had ended up in my hands in Seoul
only a day after being photographed!
I was living in Vancouver Canada and started dating an Irish
guy there for about a month and a bit before I moved back to
Toronto. He decided to leave Vancouver, where he was
living, and move to London, England. A year later, a friend
of mine went to England and dropped in to visit with a
cousin. She started chatting with the roomate, and he went
to show her a book in his room and 'lo and behold, my
picture was up on the wall - he was my old boyfriend! We
have kept in touch and I got a very surprised letter from
him and her, as they had never met. What a coincidence!
1.Wanted to share a taxi back from Buchenwald to Munich with
a young couple who were also waiting for a bus taking a long
time - turns out she worked in a hair salon above the shop
where I worked!
2. Ran into the librarian from the Newcastle Uni where I was
a mature age student, in beautiful town Square in Lucerne,
Switzerland.
3. Railway station in Cologne - older sister of friend of my
son from school.Realised my husband knew her too, but from a
Uni course he had done!
4......Shipboard romance nearly 40 years ago,when it cost
100 Australian pounds to travel 5 weeks to London on the
"Castel Felice". Paul was the best dancer in the world, but
he was not "the one " for me. 25 years later, our eyes met
across a crowded transit lounge in Auckland.He was taking a
crowd of tourists to a Gem Show in Tuscon, Arizona. I did
most of the talking about old times, then realised he did
not have a clue who I was! Talk about a let down!
Stranded in a southern Turkish town one day last December -
it was census day and no one was allowed to be out and
about - a bunch of us sat around on the pensione verandah
chatting. There was a young South African guy there and
being an ex-SA (I left in '69 and am a naturalised
Australian) I was interested to know where he was from.
Turned out he went to high school with my niece....
Going back many years - travelling around the South Island
of New Zealand by kombi, gave a ride to a guy from Canada.
About a year later, walked into a small, dingy restaurant
in Kathmandu - that's right, there he sat!!
Happy travelling all.
I grew up in a very small town (pop. 2000)in the rural
northeastern US. My highschool boyfriend's family had had
two exchange students (siblings) stay with them from a small
suburb of Hamburg, Germany. The following year I was an
exchange student in mid-Germany but miserable with my host
family. The organisation finally moved me.... to a small
suburb of Hamburg. My first day in my new school, I looked
up expecting to see a sea of new faces and there was the
sister who had spent the previous year with my boyfriends's
family!
BAck in the summer of 97 I took a vacation to the Turks and
Caicos Islands in the British West Indies. On my second day
there, I went to an island barbeque with my friends. I went
on a run to the bar to get us cocktails. While waiting for
the bartender I looked to my right and standing there was
my brother. Neither of us knew that the other was going to
be there because both trips were planned last minute. And
because of our buzy schedules we dont get to spend much
time together, so it was a great surprize. As an added
bonus he was there with my niece whom I hadn't seen in
about six months. It was a great coincedence!!
Back in '96 I was traveling around Europe with 2 of my friends. We were in Prague, Czech Republic. It was about midnight and we were just wandering around, more or less lost. When out of the corner of my eye I spotted a person who looked like a friend of ours from the states. At first I thought to myself, Nah this can't possibly be Lara. As it turns out it was her and about 5 other friends that I hadn't seen in years. We got together at a local club and drank some "pivos" (beer) together and just caught up. About two weeks later we ran in to them Again in Budapest.
What a small world!
My friend Christine travelled to Sydney 5 years ago. She met
a girl in a bar in Kings Cross who gave her the come on.
Christine explained that she was not gay but they quickly
became good friends. During their first "what do you do,
where do you come from" chat, Christine told her that she
was from Brighton. Her new friend then explained that she
used to date a bloke from Brighton called Kip. After a few
minutes they both realised that not only had they both dated
the same person but they'd both dated him at the same time!
A few weeks later, Kip received a postcard from two angry ex
girlfriends from the opposite side of the world!
Kip is now my boyfriend and he doesn't go anywhere without
me!
I met a mountain biker in Budapest in 1993, we talked about
biking in the evening and after a few days went our separate
ways. Three years later I temporarily moved to Washington
D.C. I went into a bike shop to browse and this guy who
worked there kept following me around asking me various
questions that didn't relate to biking. He asked me how it
was going a few too many times. He finally said, "Don't you
remember me?" I said, "No, I just moved to this town two
days ago, so I surely don't know you." He blurts out,
"BUDAPEST!" Three years later and 8000 km. away he
remembered me. I'm not good at faces, but I remembered our
conversations very well.
Returning after 25 years to Bahrain in the Arabian Gulf,I
went along to the church in Awali, the oil company town
where I spent my very happy childhood. During the service I
was aware of a lady looking over at me and although she
looked familiar, I could not think of where I met her.
After the service she came over to me and said, "you are the
lady who kindly gave me strawberries and cream at
Wimbledon ten years ago." It turned out that her husband
had worked for the bank who employed me to organise their
corporate hospitality marquee during the Wimbledon
Championships and she called in to the marquee to visit and
had a strawberries and cream tea with me. Her husband is
now chief executive of a bank in the Gulf and is in charge
of the Sunday school in Bahrain I attended as a child!
The Lord works in mysterious ways!
Dear Lonely Planet,
Just a short note to say how much we like this show. We
try to watch it every week. Our favorite host is Ian. Can
you please have more shows of Ian. He is the best.
Thanks for hearing me.
Susanne
I wonder if anyone out there has any hints on getting into
Tibet overland from Nepal? Has anyone tried this recently
and could advise me?
Another question I have is, can I obtain a Vietnamese visa
in Hong Kong?
Many thanks to anyone who can help with either of the above!
I was at a party in Switzerland and a guy asked me to dance. While we were dancing, he asked where I was from. When I told him the city, he asked what part - and I told him I lived in the NE section. Then he asked my address - so I told him that too. Then he told me his address, two blocks away from mine, and told me my last name (which I had not told him) - he had been my families paperboy for 8 years when I was growing up, but we had never met until now.
Warning to all travelers about the airplane from
Rurrenabaque !!!!!!
á
When I left Rurrenabaque I went by plane. You have to take
the airplane's from T.A.M. because they're the only ones
flying there. You have to hand in your backpack two hours
before hand. While you're waiting for the bus which take's
you to the airport they searched my big backpack and stole
stuff. The problem is that you don't see your bag till your
back in La Paz and you're not going back to Rurrenabaque to
collect it. The worst of it all is that I am losing faith
in the Bolivian army who are the only ones who are flying
to Rurrenabaque. They are exploiding there monopolic
position and even robbing travelers. So all you Gringo's
travelling there get all your valuables (they even stole
candy) out of your big back and kick the old guy who's
selling the plain tickets because he's my number one
suspect.á
á
If you're able put warnings in the hostals in Rurrenabaque
!!
á
Leon Beckand Verwee
In 1994, during the world cup, I was travelling with a Brazilian friend-roommate of mine around Brazil. We stopped in Salvador, Brazil specfically to see Olodum, a famously wonderful drumming group that preform in the Pelourinho (the old upper part of the city) free on Sunday and Tuesday nights. After one of their shows they invited some of the crowd to see a continuation of their show, informally, in a courtyard behind an old building. We of course were happy to go and we danced for hours. As we were dancing I noticed a familiar face on stage. It was our roommate from San Francisco, Ca.. I managed to get myself to the stage and sure enough it was Claudine. She had met one of the band members of Olodum in San Francisco when they were performing there at some of the World Cup games. It was a bigger suprise when the guy I had met from the band said later that night, "I want you to meet my best friend's girlfriend-she lives in the U.S. too"
I told him when we met up with eachother later in a bar- she is my roommate Claudine!!
Is there anyone out there who loves Spain as much as I do?
I hope to visit someday and possibly even teach English as a
Second Language. Soy yo mas o menos bilingue. Tengo la
licenciatura en Ingles y 10 anos experiencia como maestra de
ESL. Tambien trabajo como interprete educacional en las
escuelas publicas. Cuanto queria saber mas de la tierra de
mis antepasados.
Hello everybody,
I'm Gert from Belgium and I'm planning to go on a trip to Senegal one of this months. As I have no intention to stay in chique hotels, I'ld like to know some do's and don'ts about Senegal. What should I be aware of, what are the best places to sleep as cheap as possible, what about public transport,...
If you have any experience at trekking in Senegal, please let me know by e-mail. I'm looking forward to your replies. If you wan't to know anything about Belgium, don't feel shy, just ask me!!
bye for now
Gert
Here's a few coincidences.
1. I taught English in Japan for 6 years. After leaving, we
travelled through Asai. In a Beijing dept. store a voice
behind me said "Janet sensei??" - a student from my earliest
teaching days who I'd not even seen in Japan the last few
years.
2. Partied in Yangshuo, China on Dec 31 1994 with 2 English
girls, Rachel and Alex. When they left one freezing day in
early Jan. we parted with "See you in Australia in April!"
We made it to Oz by July and at Poste Restante in Sydney in
Sept. a voice said "You took your time getting here" -Rachel
picking up her mail...
3. On a dolphin watching trip here in Hong Kong, a 20
something woman from Omaha, Nebraska, realised that one of
the other people on the boat was her high school art
teacher- he and his family had just flown in the night
before and made a last minute booking for the boat; the
teacher and student hadn't met since high school. OMAHA,
NEBRASKA?? And the girl was visiting another high school
alumni, who had been a one year foreign exchange student. I
think this must be fate... I guess they all went out to
party that night....
Budapest, summer '89: On the advice of a brandnew copy of
Frommer's Eastern Europe guide (hadn't excovered LP yet),
for supper we sought out a Hungarian student dive called
Bohemtanya. The author said they wouldn't understand
English there, just order *this* and *that*... Place was
mobbed, we were standing talking waiting for a booth to open
up; young woman w/ bearded man in one booth (for 4) began
beckoning toward us. Yes she meant us; we walked over; she
said something like, "You are speaking English? Please join
my husband and I." Then she wondered how we'd ever found
the place. I told her it was in my guide. Which guide? I
took it out of my rucksack & she got this strange little
smile. "May I see it for a bit?" After a few minutes she
made a comment about the author. It turned out we were
dining with Rita S. of the Hungarian National Tourist
Office--who was the one responsible for bringing the
guidebook author there in the first place. (We found his
"grateful acknowledgement" in the intro.) The meal was fine.
1. Met an old friend from home (Scotland) up a mountain in Bolivia.
2. Friend (EFL teacher) taught multilingual groups in the UK then got a job in Poland. The person sent by the school to meet her off the plane was one of her old students, the only Pole she had ever met before.
3. Friend was pissed up and asleep on a bench in South Africa when a friend from Cambridge sat down next to him.
4. Met an old school friend of my (Canadian) cousin's on an Italian train. Worked out the connection because of an anecdote about their town's name. I've never been to Canada and I only met this cousin once, when I was 13.
5. Bumped into a guy from Uni in Delhi station.
6. Was showing photos to a class of language students, getting the to deduce where it might be because of what it looked like. One student says "It must be Russia" and she's right and I ask her how she knows. And she knows because her Muscovite grandmother is in the background.
I live in a very small town in Finland, and it seems that
every time a friend of mine travels, they meet someone who
knows me. Must be traumatic.
My choir went to Italy without me and when they got back,
they said they had met a girl on the plain who had been
sitting next to me on a plain to London a few years earlier.
I don┤t remember her though.
A friend of mine went to Germany as an exchange student and
met a Venezuelan guy there. Turns out the guy knew one other
finnish person of the 5 million of us, and guess who it
turned out to be! I had known him during my exchange student
year in Venezuela.
I went on my second language course abroad, to the US and
realised there was this guy on the same course that had been
on the first course a few years earlier in England.
I just found out that one of my best friends, who graduated
last spring and went away to university, is studying with
this girl, who I met in the US (she is finnish though).
Funny, huh? So if you ever met a Finn, chances are they are
good friends of mine, or at least know me. Be sure to tell
them to say hi to me :)
In 1988 at Carlos O'Briens in Puerto Vallarta Mexico I met
a fellow Cal State Chico Alum whom was a brother of a
friend of mine. 1 year later in the Plaza Bolivar in
Porlamar Venezuela I ran into the guy again. 18 months
later at Tivoli in Copenhagen there he was again! And to
top it off - 3 years ago I was woken up in Bob's youth
hostel in Amsterdamn by some very loud snoring - When I woke
the guy up to get him to stop.... You guesed it!
In Ollantaytambo, Peru in 1977 I was talking to a French
guest and noticed he was wearing some Indian (as in Goa)
clothes. I asked him when he had been there and he gave me
a date. I then asked him if he knew a friend of mine and he
said he did and in fact had lived with this friends brother
in Minali. He told me he had been with my friend on this
particular New Years Eve but what he didn't know was that
my friend disappeared that night and was found murdered the
next day.
Nearly one year ago, while i was in New Caledonia, french island bewteen Australia and the fiji islands,i diecied to go on holidays by myself in New Zealand. After some days, i went to a youth hostel called mobidick's where i met a french guy, who was travelling round the world for 2 years. Because i was reading a french guide, we introduced one another and we started to question about which country, which area, which town we both came from. In the end, we realized that we lived only 200 meters from one another!
We travelled for a while together afterwards!!!
nicolas
Several years ago I was hitch-hiking on Magnetic Is. (Qld.
Australia) and was picked up by a guy driving a hire-car.
We got talking, I told him where I came from and what I did
for a job. He asked if I knew a certain lady, who I
actually worked with. He then told me that she was his
wife, and he was just driving back to the hotel to pick her
up.
Here's mine.
5 years ago I went to S-E Asia on my own, and fell in Love
with someone . We spent 5 months living together in
Thailand. Eventually, it was time to return to England, and
we went up to Bangkok (I should mention we are both
English), and spent our last few days together in a hotel
in Bangkok. It didn't work out, but we remain good friends
today. About two years ago he phoned me up and said he was
going travelling indefinately and said goodbye. Ten months
later, I went back to Thailand for the first time, since
we'd been there together. I stayed at the same hotel, and
was obviously thinking about him a great deal (memories
etc.). I went out to eat in a place on the Kho san Road,
and half way through my meal, for some reason, I got up and
went to look at the notice board, the first thing I saw was
a message to him. I couldn't tell if it was old or new as
there was no date, so I went to check the hotel where his
friend (who I also new very well) said he was
staying....not there, so I figured the message was old, and
forgot about it. I woke up the next morning, and I was
getting ready to go to the airport to leave for Sydney,
when I realised I'd forgotten something, and went back down
to the shops, I'm walking along, and suddenly hear a voice
behind me......... you can guess. The last time either of
us had been there was with eachother 3 years previously, he
was on his way back from Sydney, I was on my way to Sydney,
and we were both only there for one day. We had no idea in
the world where eachother were. I believe in fate.
Has to be Fate. Started my journey in Dahab in Egypt where I briefly spoke with a girl from California. A week later we ran into each other again at Tabasco's Hostel in Jerusalem, totally unplanned, and the next week, it again happened in Olimpos,Turkey. Three times in three weeks in three different countries is no coincidence. She has just recently come to Australia and we spent a fantastic month together, and are now totally in love. More than just a coincidence.
In 1993 I was walking in Hyde Park, London when I met two
brazilian ladies from UberlΓndia , Minas Gerais, about
700 km from Campinas , Sπo Paulo where I live in Brazil.
We walked together for one hour taking pictures and she told
me her cousin was the director of the Philarmonic Orchestra
of Campinas . He is a very popular person in my city and a
professor in my university.
Two years later , I was drinking a beer with a friend in
Trancoso , Bahia , when it suddenly started to rain and we
decided to get in the bar. There were two ladies also
having a beer and they entered the bar too. As i look at
the lady , I said "I know where we met before ... remember
hyde Park in London ?" That was a big surprise and a nice
coincidence.
The owner of the bar was enjoying the fact saying "my bar is
famous ... people met up in London and set a date to come
over to drink here :-) "
I grew up in the rather smallish town of Eugene, Oregon,
U.S.A. In 1973, when I was 18, I took my first-ever trip to
Europe with a group of students. In Rome, we met up with
some other Americans at a restaurant, who, hearing I was
from Eugene, promptly asked me if I knew the H-----s. I
did! They lived right up the street from me, and I had gone
to grade school with the youngest daughter. In Paris, a few
weeks later, we were having a late-evening coffee in a cafe
after a ballet performance. Seated at the table next to us,
was a girl I'd gone to high school with....a cheerleader I'd
often seen at games, who was a few years ahead of me. She
was with a pal, doing the Europe thing. Earlier that
evening, someone stole the ballet posters I bought. Kathy
offered to buy some duplicates for me (as we were heading
home soon), and delivered them to me after her return.
Coincidence or fate?....
1) My husband and I were in America (we're Australian) and
had just left an organised tour to do our own thing. On
the spur of the moment, we decided to go to a clothing
warehouse on the outskirts of the city. The hotel doorman
radioed for a mini-bus which dropped people off at several
of them - we climbed inside, sat down, and I heard a voice
call my name. Thought - 'it can't be me they want',
eventually turned around, and saw the parents of a girl I
went through school with!
2) My sister was travelling in England and got chatting to
another Aussie. It turned out that she knew our Mum!
but it was wierd. I had run out of money in Ko Phangan in
Thailand. My brother was on a business trip in Hong Kong.
I hadn't seen family in months, so we were going to meet in
Kuala Lumpur. A typhoon hit Ko Phangan and I couldn't get
off the island for days. When the storm died down I used
the last bit of money I had to phone my brother and make
arrangements to meet in Penang, since the ticket was
cheaper. I could only speak to him for about two minutes,
as the phones kept going out. The last thing I said was
"I'm taking the bus so I guess we'll meet at the bus
station." On my way to Surat Thani, somehow I got on the
wrong ferry and ended up stuck in Surat Thani overnight
with no money while I waited for my transport to Penang at
5am the next day. An Australian guy saw me wandering
around and said "hey, I'm going on the same bus to Penang"
He loaned me a few baht for a room and bought me dinner. I
promised to pay him back when we met up with my brother at
the bus station. Well, the transport to Penang turned out
to be numerous mini vans. The Aussie was on a different
van than me. On the way to Penang, our van was in an
accident, so I arrived in Penang many hours late and at
night and NOT at a bus station, but at the Swiss Hotel (I'm
sure some of you know it). I didn't know what to do, no
money, no idea where my brother was staying, no idea where
I even was (I had no Malaysia LP). After wandering around
town with my pack, I heard my name. The Aussie guy was
having coffee at a cafe. I went over to him and as I was
telling him what had happened I saw what looked like my
brother's handwriting behind his head. It turned out to be
a note my brother had left telling me that if by some
chance of fate I should see this note, he was staying at
the hotel around the corner!!! I never would have gone to
that cafe if the Aussie guy who had loaned me money the day
before hadn't been sitting there. I truly have a travel
angel!!!
I was hitchhiking in Germany in October 93 with a Scottish
girl and English guy (I'm Canadian). We were getting out
of Munich which we had intended visiting for the beer
festival but left after only 3 hours because we couldn't
bear the pissed crowds. On a train to Rottendam-ob-der-
Tauber we hooked up with a guy, fellow Canadian, and agreed
to get a place together for the night.
We were out having dinner (a luxury after a night spent
sleeping cramped up in the seats of lorries with a kind
Danish lorry driver) and were talking about where we'd gone
to school. I mentioned that I'd been at Ottawa U. He
asked which programme. I told him. He said he'd dated
someone from the same programme. It turns out he dated one
of my best friends who I'd lived with in Vancouver the
previous summer. He was all she talked about!
So we took a photo of ourselves and sent it back to Karen
who got a bit of a shock when it arrived! Yes, it's a very
small world.
Holiday 98 in Dominican Republic...meet a nice couple from
Edmonton..that stayed at our hotel
Holiday 99 in Mexico..meet the same nice couple from
Edmonton...also staying at the same hotel at the same time!
Holiday 2000...perhaps we'll meet again :)
1. My parents twice ran into the same family while camping
in Europe (once in '84, and again in ┤88).
2. Kajuraho, India, 1996. I walk into a guesthouse and sign
in, and find out that there is another Icelander staying
there. India is not the most popular destination with
Icelanders, and out of (possibly) 10-20 who MAY have been
in this huge country at the time, the chances of meeting
another one must have been 1 in a billion.
Grassi in Verona, stunning - when and where will we three
meet again ?
When i was growing up in NE USA my mother always used to
compare me to her friend's son who always did his
homework, was top of the class, went to Hot Shot univeristy,
became a nuclear physicist, etc. When i was late 20s i went
to Japan to teach English. In the training class first day
i met a girl from California. When i told her where i was
from she asked do i know this guy. She said he had been her
professor and was always sexually harassing her and was one
of the biggest jerks she had ever met. i enjoyed that!!
while in paris on my first trip abroad i met an Aussie who
had not only been to my small home town for 5 days in
wilkesboro nc but had lived on the beach i frequented for 2
weeks on tybee island georgia...
then a few days later i was drawing in the picasso museum
and a girl stands directly infront of me. i cant see, so i
look up to see who is so rude, and the girl gives a little
scream! It turned out to be a girl from my college!