Three at a time?

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understandinguncertainty.org was produced by the Winton programme for the public understanding of risk based in the Statistical Laboratory in the University of Cambridge. The aim was to help improve the way that uncertainty and risk are discussed in society, and show how probability and statistics can be both useful and entertaining.

Many of the animations were produced using Flash and will no longer work.

I grew up and went to school in Northumberland, in the north of England. At school, I was good friends with two girls, Debbie and Morag, who were best friends with each other. I didn't keep in contact with either when I left school and went to University, in Brighton, at the opposite end of the country. Four years later, I started a job in Kingston-upon-Thames, on the west side of London and over 200 miles away from Northumberland, and had forgotten completely about these two girls. One day, after work, I popped into Sainsbury's in Kingston to get some shopping done. Whilst wandering around with my basket, I saw a woman pass by the end of one of the aisles. 'That looked just like Morag' I thought, but dismissed it as I didn't get a really good view. A couple of minutes later, in another aisle, someone said 'Hello', and I turned round to see Debbie, who I'd obviously not seen for 4 years. We both said what a coincidence that the two of us should meet such a long way, and so many years, from our school. I mentioned that bizarrely, I'd just seen someone looking like Morag, and had Debbie kept in contact with her? She hadn't, she'd lost contact after school when they both went their separate ways. A moment or two later, Morag walked down the aisle, and met us both again. None of the three of us had seen or heard from either of the others in four years, and we met again within seconds two hundred miles away.
Total votes: 492
Date submitted:Sat, 14 Jan 2012 08:57:43 +0000Coincidence ID:3589