hi y'all,
Something amazing just happened this evening.
Before I go into events of that, I need to give you a little background. It may be a little wordy, but its very relevant.
Waaaaaaay back in July 1997, before my worldly travelling days, before I had even had an inkling or a twinkling of an idea to travel, I was an idealistic, wide-eyed, uni student/greeny/hippy lad taking part in a week-long environmental student conference in Townsville, in far north Queensland.
Mid-way thru this week, a large number of us took a field trip out to the magnificent and utterly beautiful Magnetic Island for the day. Somehow or other, I lost my group and missed the ferry back to the mainland, and so had no other choice than to hang around the beach and wait for the next one, some 2 hours later in the evening. That was no biggy, it was a gorgeous day, with a very peaceful orange-glow sunset dipping over the horizon, and I had bumped into this pretty cute back-packing travelling girl who had also missed the same ferry.
We got to talking, and got along really well, and kept each other warm as the sun faded and it got a little chilly down by the water. Back at the mainland, that evening I was supposed to attend some lecture or dinner or something at the host university, but after having missed that ferry, I also missed the last bus back to campus. I could've walked - it would have been a looooooonngg walk! - but Lisa offered for me to stay at the hostel in her room that night and I would catch up with the conference in the morning. I could hardly refuse!
It was a very covert, sneaky operation getting me into the hostel and her room as it was now very late and no 'guests' were allowed. It was really only then that we realised we hadn't eaten, and the hostel kitchen was closed, and all that Lisa had in terms of food in her room was a tin of peaches in syrup.....but no utensils....and no can-opener!!! Ever the prepared boy-scout-Tony however, had his trusty Swiss-Army knife on him. It was kinda romantic in a rustic kind of way, sharing a can of peaches in a tiny backpacker room with a virtual stranger under a veil of secrecy from the landlord!
Anyways, I stayed the night, jumped on a bus the next morning and rejoined the conference. We swapped email addresses (back in 1997 email was only just coming to the fore as well) and have sporadically kept in touch over the years. Our nickname for each other ever since has been 'Peaches'. I vaguely remember saying that we'd catch up again sometime in the future, saying that I'd be in Canada one day....but not really believing myself. I'm sure she had her doubts too.
Fast forward to 2005. I'm sitting in the lounge at home, a little bored, watching a DVD of Before Sunrise - the one with Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy in it. It's very good. Anyway, set in 1994, this storyline is about an American backpacker Inter-railing it around Europe when he meets this French girl and they get off the train and spend 24 hours together in Vienna, before parting ways seemingly to never see each other again. There is a sequal, set 10 years later, when they bump into each other again in Paris.
It was while I was watching the 1994 flick, when the phone rang tonight, and it was Lisa! She's actually Canadian and lives in the Vancouver 'burbs, and rang to catch up. The similarity's here between the movie and my real life are too striking - this was just freaky! The meeting of two foreigners for just one night, the random meeting quite a number of years later...and her phoning while I was actually watching that film. Added to that is the fact that I was planning to watch a different DVD altogether but the disc was missing from its case. This wouldn't have been a story if I was watching Magnolia!!
Is this fate, or coincedence? Was that Magnolia DVD missing on purpose, and did I then deliberately choose Before Sunrise to watch? Did Lisa know I was watching Before Sunrise, and was she aware of the uncanny parallels of the stories? Am i just a complete freak nut-case? do-do-do-do do-do-do-do, twilight zone theme music rises......
talk soon.
Tony
