Cambridge Coincidences Collection

I have lived in Canada for 40 years, and once travelled to the UK for an exhibition at the Telford Exhibition Centre. There was a false fire alarm and we all had to evacuate the building for about one hour. In the crowded parking lot I spotted someone from the west of England whom I knew somewhat from a previous year's show. While we were talking he spotted a friend of his, introduced him, and told me that he lived near Southampton. I asked him where exactly, and he replied Fawley. I said that an old University friend D***** V****** lived nearby in Dibden Purlieu, which I imagined was quite close to Fawley. He said "His son was in my Scout troop". I said "I also have a cousin D***** P****** who I believe lives in Dibden Purlieu, though I haven't seen him since 1951". He said "He is my partner in an engineering business". Both were later confirmed as true.

At about 5.45am on 8 November 2010, returning from a holiday in Singapore, I arrived at Heathrow Airport. After clearing immigration, I still had to catch a flight home to Scotland, so made my way to domestic departures. As I came out of a cubicle in the ladies' loo there, the next person waiting to go in was Muriel, a classmate of mine at North Berwick High School 1953-58. She had just flown in from Chicago where she had lived for forty years. I was catching the next flight to Edinburgh, Muriel a later one. At 2pm the same day, visiting my mum in the sittingroom of the care home she lived in, in North Berwick, I could also chat to Muriel's dad who was there for a fortnight's respite care. Anne

For me, the odd thing about this one is that the coincidence would not have occurred if everyone had been having a normal day. We run a pub in west wales. An engineering project was going on in the area, over several years, employing 'men from away'. A and B (now from East Wales) were on the project, running fairly routine days, and regularly popped in for a drink after work, before going back to their local accommodation for the night. Today, they had finished an hour earlier than usual. Ten minutes later C arrived - he had come down from Scotland (just south of Glasgow) driving an articulated lorry to deliver to the site, but had been told he would have to wait till morning to unload. So he had parked his lorry and come for refreshment too. A, B and C got chatting and realised that A and C knew each other from an earlier existence when they had different jobs and lived in Wiltshire. Any other day and they would not have met.

My wife and I went on a weekend break to Epernay in France before Christmas. While there, we visit the Moet et Chandon champagne cellars. You are taken round the vast cellars by mini railway with a guide. In front of us were an American couple. When the tour was finished we ended up in the shop which sells evrything relating to Moet. The American man was standing next to me talking to his friend and saying that he didn't understand the freezing process to get the sediment out ot each bottle. I interjected an explained it. We exchanged pleasantries and he said that he was a lawyer from Pennsylvania doing a pre- Xmas trip to Europe. We went our seperate ways...... On the Monday I had a meeting with Lockheed Martin in South Kensington with a colleague and we had travelled by tube from our office in Wembley. After the meeting we made our way back to the tube station. As we were walking up to a crossroads, the same man I had met in Epernay on the Saturday walked straight across me and I shouted out to him.