Chance encounter

In the mid-1990’s, I was attending an education conference at Exeter University; neither I nor my colleague felt like attending the formal dinner in the evening, so we decided to eat away from the conference. We decided to head out of the city to a local country pub (I’d never visited it before); during the car journey there, our conversation focussed upon the Americans and their bombing of Tripoli in 1986 – we discussed issues of whether the bombing could be morally justified. On arrival at the pub, we were the only people there and proceeded to order food. Not long afterwards, a man (a stranger to both of us) walked in and sat at another table with a drink. After awhile, since we were the only people in the room, we struck up conversation. It transpired that he had spent some time abroad in the past. After talking for awhile, we asked him where he had been. “Libya”, he replied – “I got out of Tripoli just before the bombs came down...”