So here's the story I owed about 24 hours ago. It's quite long, and I'm not the sort who's really good at telling stories, but I guess putting it simple will be good enough. =p
Most of the time these days when I'm on emergency 24 hours duty, I would volunteer myself to buy dinner for the rest of the squadmates. So obviously to buy what they want, they must first write down their orders on a piece of paper. About 2 weeks ago, my other squadmate got this piece of one-sided scrap paper from the admin office, so that the rest can write their orders on it. Fast-forwarding a little, we were at the food centre waiting for the food to be prepared. After I double checked the orders from the paper, I flipped to the other side, which was a print-out of an email. It was about clearing two interns from the Police Psychology Department (PPSD), and it stated their names and nric numbers. The second name caught my eye.
I knew that person, not very well though, but it was still quite coincident. Her name's Farah, and she used to be my senior in Dunman Sec NPCC. I respected her alot because of her commitment, patience and other worthy virtues. She happened to be the only one from Dunman Sec who made it to VJ, and the same happened to me for my batch. She's currently studying in NUS Psychology and since it is the holidays, she is under internship with PPSD, doing projects which required her to interview commanders of various police divisions. That explained why she had come over to SOC in early June. It was a pity I didn't know she was coming. Never mind.
Knowing that Salman is most likely taking up Psychology at NUS as well, I decided to be a little angel and help him. Haha. So I emailed him telling him about this senior (or rather a friend now) of mine that I know who's in NUS Psychology and asking him if he would like to find out any information from her pertaining the course. It wasn't long before he replied with a few queries he has about the course. I had intended to forward the email to her, but I needed to dig up my drawers to find her email address. So naturally, I put off doing so.
Yesterday, the 4th of July, I was walking at Tampines Interchange towards my bus at a few minutes past 7pm, when I coincidentally bumped into Salman. So we stood aside near a pillar to exchange a few words. What I thought would be just a exchange of few words turned out otherwise. He was on his way to meet Nicholas (the VJ tracker) to settle some computer stuff. Coincidentally (again), that meant that the 3 of us would meet again, this time impromptu, after I tagged along Salman 4 days earlier to Sim Lim Sqr where we met Nicholas to rectify Salman's computer problems.
As we were talking, someone who was walking by called out my name. As I turned my gaze to the source, I couldn't quite believe my eyes. It was Farah. Then I promptly recalled the email I sent to Salman and how I put off forwarding the email to Farah. There's not even a need to forward the email to Farah anymore because there she was right infront of us! How coincident. I told Salman that Farah was the one I was referring to in the email I sent to him. And the startled expression on his face justified the sentiments I was feeling then. After briefly introducing each of them to the other, I prompted Salman to ask her there and then about anything he would like to find out about Psychology.
So the conversation went on and on, and in the words of Farah, 'it is amazing how the three of us can sustain this conversation.' It was simply incredible how the two of them, being strangers just a few minutes ago, could really click well. It made me ponder about collision of souls, and the wonders it does.
Farah felt that the name 'Salman' is quite 'a rare name in this generation', and almost spontaneously, Salman quizzed her on what my islamic name is. She initially responded with very common names like Ali etc, but when I told her that my islamic name is also quite 'a rare name in this generation', her next answer had me and Salman looking at each other, very astounded. For anyone who does not know, my unofficial islamic name is 'Yusof', and that was exactly what she said. And that was like super super unbelievable. Out of so many possible islamic names, she mentioned the correct one. What are the odds of this man!
As she was about to leave to take her bus, I happened to casually ask her if she stays in Tampines. And yes she does. She happens to live near Dunman Sec, which in other words, is also very near Salman. In fact, their blocks are more or less directly across each other. Another small coincidence.
After she took her leave, I tagged along with Salman to meet Nicholas. I just wanted to meet him, say 'hi' and clarify to him that I did not intentionally accompany Salman this time round and that I just happened to bump into him. Haha.
On the short bus trip back home, I can't help but feel amazed at what had just happened. It wasn't just a small coincidence. It was one coincidence after another, and every event just seemed to link together very naturally.
How often does one experience that? =)
