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I used to work in a night club in Hong Kong. There was a large contingent of western staff there, and us bartenders numbered fifteen and thought we were the coolest guys in the place. After a couple of months, a black lass from the north of England started working as a receptionist; her name was Heather. No big deal, we had a laugh on occasion, and for some reason everyone called her Trev.
After we left Hong Kong we took two months to decompress in Thailand, and did the regular beach thing for the duration of our visas. My younger sister showed up with her partner – they had been traveling for six months, and Thailand was their last stop before heading home. My sister told me that they’d had jolly times in Vietnam with a girl I knew from Hong Kong – the very same Heather.
A few months later we were in Sri Lanka, in Kandytown for the Perahera, a huge street procession involving decorated elephants, people with big hooks in their backs and lots of colour and noise. In one restaurant we drank beer from a tea set; this was because alcohol was banned during the festival but the restaurant owner cleverly got around the ban by serving up beers in the best china.
Sat by the side of the road, watching the procession for hours on end, surrounded by thousands of people, we spied a face in the crowd that we recognised. Who is it? Heather. We all went to the Botanical Gardens the next day.
A year or so later, the night before we left Sydney and Australia forever, Heather had somehow shown up and found us. We spent the night in my room in our apartment, sleeping on the floor because we’d got rid of all the furniture. Heather had arrived just as we were leaving the country.
More recently (over ten years later) I was back in England attending a naming ceremony for my little sister’s children, and Heather had come down for the day.
Heather remains the only person I have bumped into on three continents.
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