To ask Strangest Place you have bumped into someone you know?

[TomLee475]

I was in Germany recently and bumped into someone I used to work with in India.

Another one that may out me.

At my parents' wedding dm's bil recognised my df's bil - he'd taught him maths for navigation in the RAF.

Not someone he knew but when DH and I flew to Cape Town we discovered we were sat behind the exact same couple who had sat in front of DH on a flight to Cape Town 4 years earlier. That was weird!

In a cafe in Istanbul, suddenly realised my arch-enemy from school was sitting at the next table (awkward!).

On one holiday in Europe I bumped into two school mums (separately) - one in a restaurant in France, one in a shop in Italy. Probably haven't ever bumped into them in our home town....

My mum was walking down Lombard Street in San Francisco (the wavy street), and passed my best friend walking up.

When I was a young teenager a boy I had met on a caravan in holiday in Essex turned up in the corridor of my all girl’s grammar school in Kent. He said hello to me so it was definitely him. It was weird as he was totally out of my league and we didn’t even know each other’s surname so it wasn’t a stalker thing as there hadn’t even been a whiff of romance. I wish I had asked him why he was there as I’ve often looked back on it as a bit of a Truman Show moment. All I can think of was that he was applying for a job of a caretaker or something?

Backpacker hostel in Malaysia

A bit further afield, one of my best friend’s exes turned up as a neighbour on our compound in the Middle East. It was all a bit awkward as he was a bit of an arse and was still with the woman he had dumped my mate for...fortunately she never came to visit.

My mum bumped into someone from her work at a nudist beach once - that was pretty awful!

My husband also met someone who knew him on a nudist beach ( in France) - who greeted him with the words “Mr G G ! I didn’t recognise you at first without your glasses !”

At a beauty spot in Mid Wales, heard “Hello....” and it was someone I’d met on holiday the previous year.

My Dh went on holiday to one Spanish resort the one year, then went to Majorca the next and bumped into someone he had met in the first resort the previous year.

I’ve also seen people I know at motorway service stations far from our home area.

Oh and another weird one...in a restaurant in London once and DH was talking about someone he worked in Israel with fifteen years earlier. As he finished this story the bloke from the story walked past our table and said “excuse me are you...”! All we can think off that it was some Darren brown subliminal thing and he had seen him earlier in the date but it hadn’t registered...it was crazy!

My dh bumped into 2 completely separate people he knows at a service station about 200 miles from home. So odd.

Absolutely LOVE threads like this!

I 'bumped' into my next door neighbour in a business meeting - 4 hours away from home!

My best friend (biggest Oasis fan ever) bumped into Liam Gallagher walking down International Drive in Florida

Forgot one!

I was going in for a routine operation ten years ago in a HUGE hospital.

So I get there on the Monday morning as scheduled, am shown to a bed and next to my bed was an ex with his new partner! I never said anything to her!

(Spent 5 days in hospital with her too, we got on fine and had a laugh)

Oh another - my DH gets on with everyone, but this one guy at an office location 2.5 hours from home really took a dislike to him, and often would end up having a go at him for trying to do his job. Turned up at my friends wedding, horrible man was her bloody Dad!!

Not someone I knew as such but was on a cookery course when I lived in Hong Kong with just one other lady. We got talking and she said that her sister lived in my home town in the UK. For some reason I said ‘Is your sister Edna Smith’ (not her real name) and she said yes! Turns out her sister is my next door neighbour!

We live in the UK. Went on holiday to Spain with my mum as a teenager. Got to the beach and set up in an empty spot, vacant towels in a spot next to ours. Owners of vacant towels come in from the sea, the dad was a colleague of my mums from about 15 years previous 😱

Also turned up to a holiday let in a tiny French village with my now DH. Owner had taught him in primary school 😱

On a beach in portugal, ran into the girl who bullied me at brownies. I was only about 8 and was convinced she'd followed me out there to ruin my holiday

Not me but my uncle was at Notting Hill carnival and ran into his brother who was fostered at birth. They hadn't seen each other in about 30 years but instantly recognised each other in a crowd of over a million people!

Disneyland Paris. 2 families I knew!

And an acquaintance of my mums at our hotel in Zante

This is such a weird one but my husband and I went to a festival years ago, benicassim. We met another couple there and spent four/five days on and off drinking with them, going to restaurants etc. We lost touch when we returned.

The day of our wedding last year (in a hotel, in Cheshire), we bumped into them again at the main bar! They’d randomly decided to visit the area. We now maintain better contact!

Been climbing one night in the peak District and stopped to offer some guy walking into town a lift. He gets in we chat on the way into town and I drop him at a station.

Few weeks later I'm at a party in London and one of my mates comes up to me and says oh namechanged meet my friend

And it was the guy I'd given the lift to

Giving birth, and who should be my midwife but the mum of one of the kids I taught. It was awkward for a minute or two, but she was lovely and I stopped caring once the really painful bit started. She promised not to tell anyone how sweary I was ☺️

On the tube in my twenties, had legs crossed demurely at the ankles and a woman getting off at her stop tripped over my feet. It was one of my old work colleagues (who I hated) and I bet she thought I'd done it on purpose. I did laugh though, couldn't help it as it was a proper face-plant. She dusted herself off and left without looking at me.