If I had a pound/10 kroner for every time nature threw me a curveball. RG's face could one day lock itself into a permanent state of wide-eyed, 'catching flies' kind of wonder, if she's not careful.
Taking into account how small Copenhagen really is, let me yet give you some insight into the kind of coincident-ualities Random Girl is all too accustomed to, for my short time here:
I share a passing joke with a guy with a blond mohawk while working at a festival. About a week later, I see the same guy in a supermarket (Netto – the Danish Tesco’s) and stand behind him in the queue to pay, thinking to myself, “isn’t that…?” A short while later, the same guy walks straight past me at a free Moby gig. A couple weeks later, he walks past me twice at the Aphex Twin gig on my birthday. Within the same week, in that same Netto, he just appears beside me in the cheese(!) aisle. I finally turn and say, “I keep seeing you!” He laughs and says I do look familiar. We establish that we’d first ‘met’ at the festival probably a month before. We share another laugh as we wander the aisles browsing the candy selection, as though we are long lost friends. Later, we exchange contact details (which admittedly seems unnecessary given the frequency of our chance encounters) and part ways with a high five. Cue the laughter later in the day when, heading towards town to see a friend, I bike passed my local bar only to see the same guy again, sitting outside the bar with friends. I jokingly shout, “GO AWAY!!” and we both laugh as I ride off.
I’ve been flat-hunting and out of the blue, a girl I’d emailed months ago before I arrived here pops up in my inbox apologising that she’d never seen my original email as it had been misdirected away from her messages to the ‘other’ folder. She happens to be renting a room again…was I interested? Nice digs. Good price. Perfect timing. Job done.
During my first month here, a young man I'm seeing makes a sudden exit from my life, and as things go, a slow exit from my heart. In the interim, RG meets someone else (randomly, of course) who [wince] just happens to live in the same building as the first guy. This chapter also falls through, but nevermind. Roll on the first guy’s birthday (which I remember only because it’s a week before my own), I find myself in his building that day, by chance, and then go on to spot his brother at a party later that night (see ‘First time for everything’). The following weekend, on my own birthday, I see him at the same Aphex Twin gig where I see mohawk guy. Just over the weekend past, I see a photo of his brother displayed onscreen at a freaking cash point! Wha??? Forgetting someone in Copenhagen is not easy, it seems, no matter how much affirmative action you take to move on. Reminders pop up everywhere. Cut to today, after viewing a friend’s flat in the same neighbourhood as this guy, I wonder whether I might see him and then, just as I am about to take a left turn, he whips past me on his bicycle. I give pursuit (dammit!) and roll along next to him. He smiles, we stop, we talk, he apologises, we laugh and suddenly I have his number again. We walk together and shrug our shoulders in amusement as we both determine the other is due to move house, and that we will apparently be living on the same street come October!
If this sounds embellished or exaggerated, I can only assure you that it is all serendipity or chance or luck or happenstance – potato/potahto - adding that this is how things tend to roll for RG. I’m just seeing it hyper-realised in Copenhagen. I step out of a café on Friday afternoon for a smoke, only to catch my good friend K walking by, and then our mutual friend R popping a wheelie on his bike down the street. Friday night, I needed to make a late change in plans with a girlfriend, only to bike past her at the end of the night for a chance to catch up on our separate nights out. Stuff like this happens almost every day. It’s too frequent to read into, but too frequent to ignore either. It’s… magic! (and yet, I swear it’s all true!)
This city really is small and as cosy as cosy gets, but it’s a far cry from being boring. Brief encounters in a small community mean fuelling the soul in small but more consistent increments, as opposed to the binge and purge approach to London social life. No need to make appointments here, if you sit still long enough, someone you know will come around the corner. Spontaneity is not just a benefit to this ‘cosy’ living, it’s practically a rite of passage.
If I could wax horoscopical for a moment, in Copenhagen: You WILL bump into people you know all the time. You WILL meet people who know people you know and so on. You WILL learn something about the value of ‘accidents’. It could be painful, it could be shocking…but it's always…well, kind of funny too!
Truth is stranger than fiction, as they say (that one is for J, a new acquaintance who impressively confessed to his confusion stemming from his semi-regular and inexplicably vivid dreams of a lower-half-naked Arnold Schwarzeneggar – in his ‘Governator’ years, mind – whoa!) Given the events of the past few weeks, I feel assured that life here has not stopped making me open my eyes wide and shake my head in absolute wonder, as much as any dream could.
Oh, happy serendipity. It's meant to put a smile on your face.
Random Girl
