Cambridge Coincidences Collection

Well I Never!

Professor David Spiegelhalter of Cambridge University wants to know about your coincidences!

Simultaneous deaths

My grandparents were married for 50 years and never spent a night apart. They lived in a large terraced house with an adult son, and of course in at that time like most if not all the houses in the area they had no telephone. They were a bit frail and my mum used to pop in every day, often with me in tow, and bring them their shopping. In 1962 grandad suffered a stroke. This must have happened in the early morning after their son, my uncle, had gone on shift.

Dopple-hanger

This is a true story concerning real events, that include a grisly issue: if you feel you may be affected, perhaps have actually experienced similar, you may not wish to read on. It is not my intention to deliberately offend. We were a family of five, so I believed. Three brothers, a mother and a father: what used to be called a 'nuclear family'. It is in the minority in some places. I moved back home in my early twenties for what transpired to be a short time - a year or so, perhaps less.

old near- neighbours

When walking with his dog the other day my cousin, who emigrated to Australia more than 40 years ago, met a 'dog' couple who had walked past his house a number of times. He got to chatting and discovered the bloke ( Nigel) grew up in Enfield, our home town in Middlesex. Furthermore, he was an orphan in St Joseph's home, which was just 200 yards away from our houses (we lived nest door to one another). My cousin had in fact visited St. Joseph's in 1962 as part of his Dip. Ed..

Birthday coincidence

I met a young lady from North Wales when we were both students at Bangor. (I am from Lytham St Annes in Lancashire.) We subsequently married. It turned out that her mother (who died in 1999) and I celebrated our birthday on the same day, i.e., 21st May. Doug. H

Treble Chance

In the late 1960s while I was working as a music studio manager for BBC Radio, my then wife and I were on holiday in the South of France. We decided to visit the Royal Palace in Monaco and parked our Morris Minor in the official car park. As we got out of the car another GB-plated Morris Minor backed into the adjacent slot. Out of this car stepped one Reg K, a fellow BBC studio manager, albeit in a different section.

Parallel Montage

In 1975, I travelled to Namibia with two colleagues, Peter S and Kate M, for the purpose of covertly filming a documentary for SWAPO the liberation movement, conducting a struggle against South African occupation. Kate was the director and Peter and I were responsible for shooting the film; he and I had been working together for a couple of years prior to this. We eventually completed the film.

Birthday coincidence

I have a friend who is really interested in Latvia and Latvian culture. His birthday is July 19. It was through him that I met my boyfriend, a Latvian, whose birthday is July 19. It turns out that the only other Latvian I knew when I was growing up was the father of a friend, though I didn't know he was Latvian then. He's an actor, so I looked him up and was surprised to discover his birthday is July 19.

Coin

I'm originally from New Zealand. I have lived in England for over 20 years. At the weekend I do archery at a large sports field in South East London. One morning whilst going to collect arrows from the target I noticed something small and shiny in the grass. When I picked it up it was a New Zealand dollar. What are the chances of that?

Living at same address

As a student at Imperial College in 1958 I was assigned lodgings in Putney. On returning to London some four years after graduation I took lodgings in a house in Hampstead and formed a friendship with the girl whose parents lived next door. Twenty plus years later, when the young lady had become my partner, we discovered that, as a trainee teacher in Roehampton, she had lodged in the same house in Putney two years before I took up residence there.

Encounter in Rwanda

I was working on a project in Ruhengeri in northern Rwanda, but had to go to the capital at the week-end because of dental trouble. I’d just got back to the hotel after a visit to the dentist, and was having a lunchtime drink in the bar when an old gentleman walked past, looking for a seat. I greeted him “Mwirirwe neza, Mzee.” (Good afternoon, elder.) and he sat down at my table. We started chatting in French, and he said he was from Ruhengeri, and he used to work at the university here. Where was I from? England. “Oh, I have a daughter who lives in Scotland.

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