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What are the chances of that happening?
After ten days in New York I was pleased to be heading home last Friday evening. Pleased and tired, as I thought to myself in the Club lounge at JFK.
Anyway, I board the plane and head up the stairs to 64A . I busied myself for a minute or two, sorting out my bag and settling in so I could go to sleep as soon after takeoff as possible. To pass the time in the meantime (we ended up on the ground for far too long before we took off – a problem with a Friday evening departure from JFK, as far as I can make out), I flicked through High Life with no particular interest. Although not a very frequent flyer I have now become accustomed to keeping my head down in club seats before departure, when you have someone in close proximity facing your direction. I glanced up all the same at the guy in the next seat. Then I glanced again. “James?*”, I said. “London_Traveller!”, he replied. We are old friends and had no idea we would be in New York at the same time, let alone on the same flight home, let alone sitting in 64A and 64B.
Anyway, we chatted and chatted, and every so often either one of us stopped to shake our head in disbelief of the coincidence.
It made what would have been a very ordinary flight into something special. I still can’t quite believe it.
Has this happened to anyone else? Or if not quite this, any other odd flying coincidences?
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Not exactly, although when I settled in to 64B when flying LHR-JFK in December, I looked up when being offered a Kir Royale and realised that the CC member on the upper deck was a young lady that I had worked with over 10 years ago, and in fact had not seen since 2001.
That made for a very pleasant trip, as we got to reminisce and put the world to rights over the course of the next 7 hours !!
Once a long time ago sat down in wt+ and discovered a former boss was sitting next to me. As I have always disliked the guy I was reasonably warned by the fact he had fallen on hard times (running a sales team for BT radianz and in a godawful shell suit). I was less pleases that he wanted to spend the entire JFK to LHR flight catching up with too much alcohol. One of my worst flights.
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A few years ago, I went to Australia (from the UK)
One day, we had a trip to the Great Barrier Reef. Sat on a floating platoon I noticed a work mate just walk buy. "oi" I shouted.
Strange that at the time, my company was only about 50 staff at the time and I should bump into one of them (who for some reason I did not know was in Aus and vice versa) in the middle of an Ocean on a floating plank.
Unfortunately, I was dressed in a wet suit and he had a camera around his neck.
In Grand Carnaria, bumped into a friend from home. Again, neither of us knew each other was there.
Bumped into a few people at various airports (Only UK airports)
One other strange thing. I was in New York (for my wedding) with my wife (both live in the UK) and about 40 family and friends. Walking around New York, it is amazing how many times you bump into other people you know. I realise they were in New York because I invited them, but still strange that I'd bump into at least 8 or 9 of them each day without any prompting/arrangements.
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Sat in the front middle row of an AA flight to RDU just after Christmas. Right next to a mate from work. He was driving at the other end, so peace reigned.
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In October last year I was in the Virgin lounge awaiting a 9.30pm Sunday departure to Mumbai for work. As I walked to the food area I heard my name called out which I assumed was the colleague I was travelling with. Turns out it was an old school friend who I hadn't seen for a year who was travelling, along with his wife, to attend a wedding.
Once on the plane I realised that they were sat one row behind me so had I not bumped into them in the lounge I'd have definitely seen them on the way to the toilet mid flight. In the end we took advantage of the onboard bar and sat there for the first few hours catching up on each other's news.
The coincidence, and seat placing, was definitely unusual but what I found most surprising was that, given he is notoriously stingy, he'd paid his own money to fly Upper Class!
We once ended up chatting to a family from the East Midlands at Paphos airport (sat next to them in departures when the flight home was delayed). A few months later we were on the last day of a California holiday, savouring breakfast in a large hotel restaurant in San Diego when the exact same family came and sat at the seats next to us - very weird!!!
bmi GLA-LHR when diamond class (biz) was operated on domestic flights when three quarters of the plane was thus configured. It was pre 9/11 and as we queued to board I bumped into an old friend. As we went to sit in our seats we found out we were seated next to each other.
Waiting for a BA flight in 2003 I was in the lounge at JFK when an ex colleague called my name out. The truly spooky thing was the last time I had run into him was in 2001 again at JFK when we were both transferring onto an AA flight to Rochester. Both of us were based in the UK so meeting twice in JFK was an extremely rare double.
Most surreal experience was sitting on a KLM flight NCL-AMS next to my ex-girlfriend's father. She called it off so not to bad and I got on with him when we were together.
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Flying back from DXB to LHR I spotted one of our partners leaving the lounge so went to chat with her on the plane - she was in F and I was in WT+ so it turned out to be a brief pre-departure hello!
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You look familiar...
I was in Ravello, Italy once with Mrs. Zhivago, when we got talking to an elderly American couple on the terrace of one of the villas. I couldn't quite place why, but they both looked familiar, especially the lady. After about 20 minutes the conversation came round to one particular subject and then the penny dropped - I used to work with their daughter in Moscow. I had never met the elderly folk before, but the family resemblance to their daughter was that strong!
Not quite meeting a long lost friend but have been on a flight flicking through the inflight magazine to see an article about my company with several pictures of me at work.
There were many people who during the flight were whispering 'thats the man in that picture' or asking the crew if it was me and some even came up to me to ask!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by stuart101
Not quite meeting a long lost friend but have been on a flight flicking through the inflight magazine to see an article about my company with several pictures of me at work.
There were many people who during the flight were whispering 'thats the man in that picture' or asking the crew if it was me and some even came up to me to ask!
On a slightly related note I was once flicking through the Ryanair magazine (yes I know...) only to discover that their 'Stewardess of the Month' (pictured in uhm 'beach friendly' attire) was working on the flight. Cue a large number of passengers looking at the magazine, then her, then back at the magazine. Not me of course though...
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It is a small world out there, and have had numerous chance meetings around the world, and on UK domestic flights but not international flights yet.
One of the reasons why you should always be nice to people, as people has a tendency to pop up in the most unexpected of places.
Like the guy in The Great Barrier Reef, I met a former school friend/farmer from Northumberland while in a remote bar/pub/cafe between Cooktown and Cairns last month by pure chance.
I've had a similar but different situation ... I was called away at very short notice to meet a client in Utrecht. I was sat in 1D on the flight home AMS-LHR when a rather inebriated young chap tried to pass through the CE curtain to the lavs - crew asked him to use the rear toilets as they were busy serving pax. He protested so I turn round only to find a young trainee from our firm who had called in sick 2 days earlier. I made sure he noticed me. He wasn't a trainee for much longer.
. I busied myself for a minute or two, sorting out my bag and settling in so I could go to sleep as soon after takeoff as possible. To pass the time in the meantime (we ended up on the ground for far too long before we took off – a problem with a Friday evening departure from JFK, as far as I can make out), I flicked through High Life with no particular interest. Although not a very frequent flyer I have now become accustomed to keeping my head down in club seats before departure, when you have someone in close proximity facing your direction. I glanced up all the same at the guy in the next seat. Then I glanced again. “James?*”, I said. “London_Traveller!”, he replied. We are old friends and had no idea we would be in New York at the same time, let alone on the same flight home, let alone sitting in 64A and 64B.
