They follow us wherever we go!

Coincidences have always followed us where we have been and still do - I guess if you are gregarious and talk to people it is bound to happen. On a trip to China in 1996, there were 40 of us in agroup from all over the UK. One of the travellers asked me where we lived - after some generalisation he asked me the name of our village in Gloucestershire - when I told him he said his wife worked in the same village at the agricultural stores some 500 yards away from our home. When I asked where he lived he said Pittville in Cheltenham - somebody on the next table said where? It turned out they lived in the same street!! We were on a trip to Peru to Macchu Piccu in 2003. On the second day a member of our 36 strong group - again from all over the UK - said "I recognise you - you own ..........Golf Club ", I said yes - he told me that his Partner's son had done his work experience with us three years earlier. On the same trip, my wife spoke to another lady and said she thought she recognised her. The other lady said she was sure not but my wife continued that she could imagine her in a white coat - did she work in a hospital? The lady said she worked at Cheltenham Hospital as a radiographer - my wife said - that's it - I am an Occupational Therapist there. In 2001 on a second trip to China I was talking to a lady in our group and she was asking where we came from. I said Gloucestershire, She said that she lived in St Helens in Lancashire and had only been to Gloucestershire once and that was with her brother who was an area Sales exec for a Glos. Company. She said - "I do not know where he worked but we went over a bridge, through some trees and down to a the factory by the river." " Ah, I said, he works for _____ Tyres." How do you know?" she asked. "Well - over the bridge at Gloucester, through the trees - Forest of Dean - and down to a Factory by the River - must be at Lydney" I said * and the name of his boss is John --------" "How do you know that?" I went to school with him!! In 1999, we were in a very difficult situation with a planning application to build houses on our farmyard. Some of the agressive anti's had become quite unpleasant and I took my wife away to Minorca for 5 days as a break. On the third day we hired a car and went to a monastery. After a trip around we settled down on the terrace at the tea shop for cup. After a few minutes, a group sat at the next table - also english. Within five minutes they were discussing a planning application for houses in the Prestbury area in Cheltenham, 6 miles away. They followed that with a discussion about our own application which we had travelled away to avoid!! We stood up and walked away! In the early 90's my wife and I and two friends rented a cottage in the Loire Valley of France for a week to tour the Chateaux. While queuing for tea at Chenonceau I recognised a man in front of us in the queue. I mentioned this to our friends who said - Not Again! I said if he picks up his cup with his left hand it is Dr John -------- who sits on the Liaison Committee betwen the National Coal Research Establishment and our local Parish Council - I represent the Parish Council. He picked up his cup with his left hand! Sitting on a beach near St Maxime on the French Riviera I noticed a mini bus from Lex Mead at Gloucester. Looking around the beach I saw a group of Sub Aqua divers so wandered over to see if they were local to home. They said they came from Cheltenham and asked where I came from. I mentioned our little golf Course which we had built on the Farm and two said they thought they had recognised me - they had played there. However, the organiser then asked my name - it turned out my sister taught his children at Primary school. It runs in the family. Our Daughter, who lives in London with her family, was out one night with our son in law and some friends from work when she was introduced to a friend of one of them who had travelled down from Cumbria for the week-end. immediately Daughter mentions that I her father, used to shoot in Cumbria, near Penrith. She said she could not remmber the name of the village but the pub was called the Shepherds Rest. She said that the game keeper had been a lovely man and that we had visited several times and she had met him. This girl who had travelled down from Cumbria laughed - gave the gamekeepers name to which our daughter agreed and then the girl said she had actually baby sat the children the night before. She had know him all her life! Our son in law's work took him to Singapore for two years and so all the family went. Our Daughter landed a temporary job for the time teaching at one of the large English schools there. One of the Under- heads was talking to her just after arriving and asked her where she came from. Having said London she then said "but I was born in Gloucestershire." "Ah "he commented -" my son is at school there." She immediately said Wycliffe College - "How do you know?" "Just a guess" she replied, " My Grandfather went there, my uncle went there, my Dad went there and I taught there" If you need any more coincidences I have dozens - all true - you can make them happen by talking to people.