Cambridge Coincidences Collection

Well I Never!

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

Keys

I lived in a house in Buntingford and found that my front door key (yale type) fitted a cupboard door in a power station in Romania where I was working when I needed to get some technical supplies for which the keys weren't available

Mr Hugh Coulson

In the aftermarth of the Asian Tsunami in 2004 I had been evacuated from the island of Koh Phi Phi to the port of Krabi on the mainland some 48kms away. This was 56hrs after the waves and I was at the international hotel that had been set up as ane emergengcy centre for people to gather and get repatriated, get help and put their name on a list or check if loved ones had put their name on a list, that sort of thing. I was adding my name to said lists at a group of tables with 8 interpreters working away.

Same dream

My teacher had a dream that he gave a seminar together with his aboriginal friend in Austrailia. He got excited. Then he had the same dream the following night. He rang his Aboriginal friend, all excitedly, to tell him. His friend quite calmly replied. What's so strange? I had the same dream! But this is surely an example of 'synchronicity', which is the meaningful connection between to events, distanced by time and space. [Jung] It's only our Western culture which gets surprised about these things, that indigenous cultures take for granted as a reality of life.

simultaneous words - read/heard

I use a computer for both writing and photography and listen to Radio 4 all day!!! I am amazed at the number of times I am reading or writing a word when it is spoken on Radio. Many times my cursor is hovering over a word of even a sign when it is vocalized on Radio. I have even had a word in my thoughts vocalized. This can happen 3/4 times a day. I'm not sure how long this has been happening but can certainly go back at least two years. I would love to know how common this is. Thank you Joy

Location coincidence

When I was 21 I was working on a farm on Samsø a small island off the coast of Denmark, all the workers were young and were from all over Europe. We lived in tents but had access to a barn with electricity and cooking facilities, however it got dark at about 9pm and work started at 4am so we'd sit around with tea and chat or play cards. I was there for over 3 months and one conversation would come up every now and then, I guess to stave off homesickness. We used to describe something about home, on this one night we were telling each other what we could see out of our bedroom windows.

palimpsest

My husband and I were reading in bed together. Totally unrelated books -mine was a book on landscapes, his was a novel by Peter Ackroyd (I think Hawksmoor). I read the word 'palimpsest' and said 'What exactly does palimpsest mean?' He stared at me in amazement, and showed me the sentence he'd just been reading. There was the word 'palimpsest'. He'd been reading that exact word as I spoke it in my question. Whenever I hear the 'palimpsest' (which isn't very often!) it reminds me of that coincidence.

Family - again

I was working in London and mid-morning was travelling on the underground from Bond Street to Trafalgar Square. The doors opened and my son, who was living away from home, was standing facing me waiting to get on.

old friend

I am from the UK. While I was travleling as a student in Crete in 1970 I met a student from Venezuela and we travelled together but i never exepcted to see him again. In 1974 I was training as a doctor in Chicago. As I stepped from the subway on State St (which has a saying that it the one street where you are bound to meet somone you know) he was there. He had no prior connection to the USA and was there visiting.

eight-coincidence

My father, John Edward Blake, was born in 1913 and was the eighth child in the family born on the 8th day of the 8th Month (August).

School friends sister

I arranged a business meeting when I was working in Manchester with someone who had recently moved there from London. I had never seen this person before and only knew them by reputation. As I walked into the room with my PA I commented that a woman in the restaurant looked just like a school friends sister. This turned out to be the person I was meeting.

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