Page 16 | What is the strangest coincidence you've ever experienced?

libbyb · 05/02/2017 18:54

One of my friends has a friend on facebook (and probably in the real world too) with the exact same name as my daughter!!!

DagenhamRoundhouse · 05/02/2017 18:54

Not sure if this counts as a coincidence but it was surreal.

Years (many) ago, in a cinema in Hammersmith watching the film 'The Sweeney'. In the film Regan is filled with drink by villains and set loose to drive home. He drives down the road the cinema is in, and was stopped by a policeman a few shops up from where we were sat in the cinema!

macaronip1e · 05/02/2017 18:58

Worth a listen if you like these stories

m.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/489/no-coincidence-no-story

Norfolkgirl1 · 05/02/2017 19:05

I love that Tesco!

Rhayader · 05/02/2017 19:05

Many years ago when we were kids we went on holiday to Italy. Upon getting to the check in desk at the airport my dad said his name, lets say "Joe Bloggs" and the response was "Which Joe Bloggs?"

There was another guy with the same name on the same flight. We we arrived at the resort we weren't given a villa with a private pool which is what we had booked, but a villa that shared an extra large pool with another villa... with the other Joe Bloggs from the plane. Turns out they thought we were all together XD

Enkopkaffetak · 05/02/2017 19:14

Really enjoying these mine is a bit odd in a way I guess.

25 years ago I dated this guy who I really liked. On my 21st birthday he suggested I with 2 of my friends come into London to meet him and his brother, instead of doing what had originally been agreed. I agreed after quick chat with my 2 friends. 1 was all "YEAH lets do it" the other was a lot more reluctant but said " ok if you 2 want to do so"

So we go and we meet brother in Soho. Basically it was love at first sight for brother and the girl who didn't really want to go. They get together and marries (20 odd years now) and then move to the country she (and I) are from .

So British Mark is married to Brit from DenMark

Boyfriend broke up with me and I remained in touch with the married couple but eventually after they move to Denmark loose touch with them.

One day on a whim I looked them up on facebook and we reconnected.. Now exchange a few messages here and there. One day I was looking over my friends list and I notice I have 3 friends in common with my female "cousin" (my stepdads niece) but 4 on her brothers facebook. So I click on brother to see who else he might have that I know. Turns out it is Mark. He had been my cousins teacher in a boarding school and they had kept in touch. This would have been about 2 years before I decided to look them up again.

myfavouritecolourispurple · 05/02/2017 19:19

In the late 80s I was on a school exchange trip in Germany and I was with my exchange family in a cafe/restaurant. The father said he thought the waitress was English so we asked her where she was from, and it turned out that she/her family had bought a house from my father in the 1960s.

A lady who ran a B&B we stayed in in Scotland said she once met a lady in an overseas airport who had bought her house. She didn't know the lady, she had got talking to her because the plane was delayed and they'd asked where in Edinburgh they were from etc etc.

There are a few mutual friends in Facebook too - someone I was at primary school with studied with someone whose daughter was at nursery with my son. Another lady I worked with knows the mother of a lad who regularly competes against my son at athletics competitions - we live in the south of England, she lives in Sheffield. And a guy I worked with from Manchester has a mutual friend with someone I run with.

Panicmode1 · 05/02/2017 19:20

When I started as a graduate in a large multinational, there was a secretary with the same name in the same department. I often used to be given her pay and holiday allowance - brilliant for me, not so good for her as they were paid a lot better than we were! It took HR several months to stop getting it wrong.

One weird coincidence was when we were little and we went to stay with my mother's French bridesmaid in France on the way through to our villa in the south of France. When we got to my mother's friend's house, there was a note on the door saying, come to X's house, they are expecting you to join us. We went round and it was the home of a French professor and his Canadian wife. She said that she liked to play a "who do we have in common game" with new people. my parents smiled politely not thinking that we would have anyone in common. About an hour into the evening, it turned out that her father had been in the Canadian navy and knew very good friend of my father's who had run a naval base in the States for a while....!

Another was when I was in Egypt, visiting a friend of mine who was studying Arabic. We were going up Mount Sinaii with a couple of my uni friends - it was dawn and we were wanting to see the sunrise. When we got to the top, there were two guys there - one of whom had been at school with my brother and had often stayed with us in the holidays.

bunnyrabbit93 · 05/02/2017 19:20

When I was younger I was always told that when someone in your family is pregnant someone else will get a ringworm ! And to my amazement someone did. It was my cousin on my dads side (not super close to them ) and the week I found out I was expecting my daughter he got one

BearAusten · 05/02/2017 19:22

My first boyfriend's first name is the same as my dh's surname. *My dh's first name was the same name as my father's. *Someone at my dc's school has the same name as myself, her husband as the same name as my husband.

Latenightreader · 05/02/2017 19:23

First term at university, I went to visit a friend at Birmingham. They were having a 70s night at the Union so I borrowed an outfit from someone on my landing. Halfway through the evening someone said "Durham - I have a friend there. Do you know her?" Despite there being several thousand students, not only did I know her but I was wearing her clothes.

mycatwantstokillme1 · 05/02/2017 19:39

A neighbout of mine had a son I watched grow up since he was about 9. When he was 18 he decided he wanted to find his biological dad and asked if he could come round to use my laptop. Turns out I'd known his dad when I was 16 and he'd gone out with my best friend. They reunited

Frazzledmum1977 · 05/02/2017 19:39

My work colleague recommended a popular online dating website. He had met his dw on there. After lots of frogs i met the one. A few months into our relationship we realised the dw of my work colleague went to the same school with my partner and
their parents still live fifty yards
apart.
I moved cities to be with my now dh and she moved in the opposite direction to my home city!

RainyDayBear · 05/02/2017 19:44

I went to the wedding of a uni friend (who was originally from 200 miles away), and got chatting to the grooms parents. Not only did they know my tiny hometown up north, they used to live a few doors down from my boyfriends parents!

Kahlua4me · 05/02/2017 19:46

My mum and dh's mum were in hospital together having us. We didn't meet again until we were 32.

Turns out too, that he was friends with my db and some of my friends during our teenage years without us ever knowing each other.

cowshindtail · 05/02/2017 19:47

Some years ago I went to 2 funerals a few months apart of the only 2 men I have known who were amputees.They had the same 2 hymns at both funerals-they and none of their families knew each other.The hymns were all things bright and beautiful and the old rugged cross.

sassyannie · 05/02/2017 19:47

I was an au pair in Geneva when I was 19. In McDonalds one day, a girl looked vaguely familiar so approached her to say hello. Turns out she too was an aupair, fair enough, but we also went to infant school together fleetingly....

Mexicantortilla · 05/02/2017 19:49

Got a rescue dog many years ago, brown and white springer spaniel already named Ben, when he died got another brown and white rescue spaniel already called Ben, he died after a good life and I decided not to have another dog, I've just got a horse, went to see horse and when I got there it was brown and white and called Ben, he's settling in nicely!

piggypoo · 05/02/2017 19:54

In 1990, in a nightclub in Birmingham, I got chatting to a good looking guy, we meant to exchange numbers, but didn't, I went back to London where I'm from, but he was always at the back of my mind, eight years later, while working at a job in London, who should start at the same company? the very same guy! He remembered me straight away, and said he'd never stopped thinking about me, we started going out, and are celebrating 19 wonderful years together, he's my soul-mate! :)

boodlesandpoodles · 05/02/2017 19:57

My BF before DH ... was nice, handsome but things didn't work out for whatever reason. I used to go out of my way to bump into him in the very early days. Fast forward 12years DH and I happily married with DC's living in a small village... who moves in next door... yup BF from before DH... rather odd

yaela123 · 05/02/2017 20:14

Not me but my DH: He was traveling around South America when he was in his early 20s (before we were going out) with a friend. They were at the top of a pyramid in Mexico at 2am (waiting for sunrise). There was only one other person up there. This other man comes up to him and says 'you're [DBIL]'s brother aren't you?'. Turns out it was his brother's old best friend from primary who he hadn't seen for 6 years.

Then... 1 month later in Guatemala they bump into the same friend again in a hostel and their rooms are next door!

You can't make this shit up

DaisyEmma · 05/02/2017 20:18

Bought some lovely old plant pots on eBay, collection only, so collected from a nice couple locally in N London. Approx 2 years later I met a lovely girl through my NCT group, it was only when I first went to her house I realised it was her and her husband we had bought the pots from years before!

Same friend, we were at a social gathering and chatting with another older woman who I'd never met before, but was a friend of her family. Ended up talking about where we went to Primary school.. (I went in London but miles from where we were all living then) She said she used to work as a nanny near that school, mentioned the road name, I said my best friend lived on that road, and joked 'not number 36!' She completely stopped talking and stared at me, before saying, 'yes. Number 36' turned out she had nannied for her and her brother before we met at school.

blueblah · 05/02/2017 20:18

on my birthday a few years ago we were celebrating in the pub and chanced upon a nice woman whose birthday it was also, so we celebrated together and she came round my house for beers after. I didn't see her again for a whole year, when exactly on my next birthday (and hers) I randomly ran into her in a garage! I wished her happy birthday and she seemed pretty shocked, as was I...!

DieDeutschLehrerin · 05/02/2017 20:19

This is identifying but I was born (7days late) on my Dad's 30th birthday - 4th April. My DS was born 8 days late on the 2nd February at 22:44. He was a Ventouse delivery having been stuck for over 2 1/2hrs. I find it very pleasing that of all the minutes that had passed, that was the one he was forced into the world.
Also, I have a younger sister (hello - I know she reads mumsnet) born 2 years 8 months after me, who was due on the 4th of the month but came on the 3rd (my mum always said she was taking account of the leap year). When I had my Dd she was also born on the 2nd of the month, like her big brother, 11 days late leaving exactly the same interval (to the day, again, including a leap day) between her and her brother as there is between me and Dsis. As random as these things are, I do find them oddly comforting.

firenze86 · 05/02/2017 20:20

Everyone in my (very large) family has a birthday either the day before or the day after everyone in my husbands (very large) family