Cambridge Coincidences Collection

My name is Tony R, I live in Warrington, Cheshire. My hobbies include running and cycling. One day, a few months ago, I was running towards Latchford Locks (Manchester Ship Canal), where I was intending to run across the footbridge above the lock gates. On my approach, I noticed that there was a small ferry in the process of negotiating the lock system. As I don't like to stop running after I have started, I continued to run in a loop around the hard standing near to the lock system. After the ferry had passed, I continued my run without incident. Later that day, I went to my job as an A.A Patrol. I was given a task at The Lowry Shopping Centre, on Salford Quays, where a member had inadvertantly left his interior light switched on, and flattened the cars battery. I arrived with the vehicle/passengers, and whilst I was carrying out my checks, I asked if the couple had had an interesting day, to which they said they had been on a cruise along The Manchester Ship Canal on an old Mersey Ferry. I told them that I had seen a similar ferry earlier that day at Latchford Locks whilst I was running.

My father worked for Commercial Union in their London office and had a lot of dealings with a chap called Doug who worked in the Birmingham office. When I started work for Marks & Spencer in their Baker Street Head Office my Dad told me that Doug’s daughter also worked there. ‘It’s a big place Dad, over 3000 members of staff’ I said, going on to moan about the woman I sat opposite who was driving me nuts. You’ve guessed it, out of all those 3000 people, Doug’s daughter was the woman sitting across the desk!

I travelled round the world in 1979 and was staying with my aunt and uncle in Amberley, South Island, New Zealand . Whilst out shopping with my aunt one day, we met her best friend who told me her son was on his way back from 2 years travelling around the world. She wasn't sure where he was or when he would get home. I left N.Z Australia about 6 weeks later, spent 9 months in Oz, then joined an overland double decker bus trip which would travel (with a couple of flights and change of buses) back to England - nine months in all. We travelled across the across the Nullabor Plain (Oz), through Indonesia, Malaysia and into Thailand where we stayed at a moderate hotel. On Christmas Eve, by the swimming pool, myself and a couple of friends met 2 New Zealand guys. I got talking to one of them and mentioned that I had relatives on the South Island, and asked where he came from. "You wouldn't know, it's such a small place", he said. When he told me, I told him that I had relatives there. He asked their names and said "your aunt is my mother's best friend!".

In 1966 I was walking in Clifton, Bristol one Sunday when one of my old tutors at College3 years previously stopped in his car and we ahd a chat. Not seen him for about 3 years and in the conversation he offered me a job teaching (engineering) part time. A year later afull time teaching job came up which I applied for and got. 45 years on, I'm still teaching non stop since that fateful day. If I hadn't been in that place at that time my life would have been so different. I've never looked back! I think that was a brilliant coincidence?