What are your, "What a small world!" moments?

[Chanel05]

I moved a 130 miles away from my home town 10 years ago. I walked into my new teaching job on 1st September. I was introduced to all the staff and one of the staff members said I had an unusual surname but one he had heard before. It turns out, my new colleague had been in my brother's year at our secondary school all those miles away! We chatted about teachers we'd had ourselves and what a coincidence it was.

What are your moments?

I just can't!!!!

Hilarious!

Online dating. I was dating a guy for a couple months, not talk about being exclusive but had been mentioned and we said we’d see how we were doing after a bit more of dating.

One morning, got a message from a good friend who was going to a guy’s for a hook up and sent me the address for safety. It was his address. Poor guy. Tried to hook up and it was my mate!

Visiting London from Plymouth and doing parkrun. I got talking to a lady whose father is my MP. She grew up a few miles from where I live. (And attended the same secondary school but is around 14 years older)

I went to Chichester and bumped into a friend who lives in Cornwall.

Bumping into one of my Dad’s friends and his wife in the street outside a theatre in London’s West End. We all live over a 100 miles away, but literally bumped into him coming on the opposite direction.

Many years ago, I was having travel vaccinations as going to South America to visit family.
The lady at the clinic told me her Son was travelling around South America teaching in schools.
A few weeks into the trip I went along to pick up children from school, their teacher had heard that they had a visitor from uk, it was her Son!

Met DH via online dating - we lived in separate parts of the country at the time. It turned out we had lived in two separate large cities in different parts of the country at the same time as each other, within a few streets of each other, even knew some of the same people in both cities and frequented some of the same places - had just never met despite having a lot in common!

DH even did the same quite specific job as my boyfriend had in city number 1 with the same boss, they never met each other though!

20 or so years ago I'd moved back to the uk to SW London after a spell abroad. Picked a primary school pretty much at random. Turned up first day to drop the children off and I heard a laugh. Not any laugh, but a particular one that I had hoped never to hear again. It belonged to the girl (now woman) who was next door to me in my first year at uni and who I loathed. She was load and thoughtless and has this awful beating laugh. And now in the same school run as me!

Also at the same school, and quite randomly, was a family we'd been posted to America with. They were nice!

Bumped into someone from my street (in Scotland) while working in China.

Reminds me of my own story!

Met my now ex on a holiday. We lived about 70 miles away from each other back home.

It later transpired that his Mum had grown up on the road I lived in!

I now actually am half owner of a business that the same ex used to work at when he left school! I started working here about 15 years after he left. Even though there were still people here that were there at the time, no-one remembered him, so he can't have been that good!

Went on holiday to Barcelona. One of my (married) colleagues was in the next hotel room along on a dirty weekend with his secretary.

@GingerIsBest
HOw did you cope with the rest of your time? I mean, teachers are constantly interacting with parents? hahahaha.
I’m not someone who embarrasses easily normally, but I used to get a bit flustered when talking to him. My colleagues thought it was absolutely hilarious! 🤣

My ILs retired abroad to the same residence as the parents of a random colleague from a job I left in 2007. Every summer we see her by the residence pool, and now we have to make polite chitchat with her brother too. Nightmare.

I was on holiday this summer and in front of me in the queue for the bar was my team mate from work. We had no idea we were going to the same place.

Went on holiday to Turkey, went to a restaurant and bumped into the couple who lived in the house directly in front of ours

Met a couple at the pool in a hotel in Dubai. Like me and DH, they were travelling around the world for a year. We briefly chatted to them that evening and left Dubai in the morning.
About 6 weeks later, we were walking along a beach in Thailand and bumped into them! Said a quick hello and made small talk about where we'd travelled over the last few weeks and went on our way again.
Another 3 months or so passed and I'd just started working in Australia. Went to the bank in Sydney to open an account and lo and behold, they were also in the bank!

I’ve got 2:
In Hong Kong for a short period while XH was working there. Found myself standing next to a former colleague on the escalator on the MTR.
Went to a Jubilee street party in our village and got chatting to a neighbour of our host. Turned out his parents lived a few doors away from my grandparents in our home town 100 miles away from where we live now. We’re similar age but had never come across each other when we lived there.

I moved to a different city after uni a long time ago. In my current job I was chatting to a colleague I found out that his brother had taught me at school over 30 years previously.

Two for me

Honeymoon in Florida at wet n wild and literally bumped into a lad I grew up with and his wife

Joined civil service and director was the man who was my manager of my year out job in the SE over 25 years ago

I'm from up north and dp from down south

We moved in together in a small town in the Midlands

I was at work one day and got talking to a couple

Long story short,they used to live in my inlaws street (which is a street in the middle of a field and the next neighbour's are 3 miles away),but had moved as housing is cheaper where we live-they live 3 streets away from where we live now

Not only did they know my inlaws but my fil had done a lot of building work for them,they'd gone to my sils funeral,knew dps auntie (they used to go drinking with her) and knew dp well-I had to give the sad news that we'd lost fil a few weeks before

My mil and auntie where delighted as they'd lost touch and I put them back in touch with each other-they speak on the phone every week apparently

Of all the cafes they could have gone to that day,they walked into the one I work at

Had a fling when a student with a Australian student who was in London for the summer. Didn't keep in touch. 20 years later I was in Singapore on business and ran into him in a bar - we had ended up working in the same field and had friends in common.

Really weird one. I left the UK 20 years ago and moved to a Mediterranean country, worked in property rentals for a while and at that time mainly dealt with Brits relocating (well pre-brexit). A Scottish couple came into my shop looking to rent a villa; having lived in Scotland I asked them where they were from etc. To cut a long story short, I found out within minutes the guy had spent time in jail for attempted murder and had also been tried for his part in a gang rape. Very awkward!

It gave me some satisfaction that this guy had travelled thousands of miles to escape his past and a 'friend of a friend' exposed him 😊

I was 18 many many years ago. And I went to be a counsellor at summer camp in the USA. Left my boyfriend, who was going to camp in a he northern parts of USA.
I met a really cool guy and we had a fab summer 😜.
Was I screwed when they were sat next to each other on the same plane home 🙄🤦‍♀️
When I arrived back two months later it was an unmitigated disaster. 😳

Sat on a beach hundreds of miles from home. Children were toddlers and as little ones do they befriended another toddler and siblings playing in the sand.

Ended up chatting to the mum. We both simultaneously called over our youngest children for medication.Turned out our youngest children both share the same not that common medical condition and have the same consultants and surgeons.

Pitched tent in the last available space in a campsite in France.
Next tent family popped out to see who was speaking English. It was a teaching colleague of DF's from the same school