I walk into the lift at about 5:20 pm, already a little late to be able to catch 5:45 pm condo bus from Clementi. I walk in and see another person in the lift. We exchange a friendly smile, as anyone would to a stranger meeting for the first time, and we went back to our own end-of-the-day thoughts. Suddenly I realized that I have seen him before. But when, where? Accenture has 5 floors in the office, so he could actually be a colleague from floors 32 to 35. May be I met him in a meeting or short conversation near the barista. But I couldn't remember.
After about 30 seconds of deep dive in my memory: I remembered! We met at the dinner with Steve, a common friend. Actually a friend of my wife. Steve lives in Malaysia and was visiting Singapore with his family and friends. He invited us for dinner and we all went, along with my toddler. And this friendly person I just exchanged a smile with was sitting just next to me, keeping my glass of whisky always filled.
I approached him, not having enough time to think what to say, I just started verbalizing what was on my mind, "We met at Steve's dinner." He looked at me and said, "you look familiar". I repeated, "We met at Steve's dinner!". His eyes just brightened and with a big smile he extended his arm for a nice handshake. He asked, "do you work here?" I said, "Yes, I work at Accenture." He also worked in the same building but on 38th floor, another company. I was so pleasantly surprised that I didn't know what else to say. I could only add what I felt, "It's really nice to see you again!".
To be able to meet him exactly today, about a week after the dinner with Steve, was such a random event. There are more that 40 floors 4 lifts, usually super crowded that we can't see everyone's face when you enter a lift. So random! I work at the same place for almost 5 years, we probably were in the same lift in the past, crossed each other, we will never know. I left at 5:15 from the office to take the lift, but I forgot my phone in a meeting room, and I had to go back to fetch it. If I didn't forget my phone I probably would have taken a previous lift. The fact that I was in the office, was also a coincidence because often I work from home. The fact that we met at the Steve's dinner was also very random. That evening I was willing to stay home to respect the kid's bedtime, but we decided to go in the end. The fact that my wife is friends with Steve is because they both decided to do executive MBA from Manchester in the same year and Cohort. It's all such an interesting combination of random events. And these are the randomnesses I can see from only my point of view. What about the random sequence of the events in other people's lives which all somehow fitted together for me to meet Baven Chin again today.
Randomness, You make me wonder!
