A Small World After All

Reflecting is a very big part of my day. I reflect when I wake up, in the shower, in the car, during breaks...
Okay, I think about the past a lot in other words.
And I do have a lot to reflect on. But recently I've just noticed something that's been happening a lot more than usual lately.

I call it- meeting up with old friends.

And I do this all the time when I go back to Malaysia, and I WILL if I ever get to go back to South Africa. But this time, it's not in the normal circumstance. I am meeting people I met in Malaysia and South Africa in OTHER places, and not the places I originally met them in.

Elaine being one example. I have met up with her here, in Perth. Definitely not the place where I first met her. Okay, so it was a holiday for her, and it wasn't as if I chanced on her at the mall or something. But I find it amazing that I have actually met an old friend in a different place.
I have also met An Qi at UWA here, when she pounced on me after a sudden realisation that I did not actually know she was here. I must admit, I was incredibly surprised, but it was really really good to see a familiar face in a slightly strange and new place.
My parents had some friends over in Indonesia, and we quite literally crashed into them at a Malaysian Association function here in Perth to the delight of the elders. In fact, the lady saw my little sister, and thought that it was me for a split second before realising that surely I must have grown and changed in the ten years that she had not seen me.
Another example would be Lu, my amazing history partner in South Africa, whom I know is coming to Malaysia for a holiday. And whom I will most definitely be meeting up with when I do travel back. I am already tres excited for this visit. :P

All of this has, or will occur during this year.

Other surprising instances are meeting the friends of friends in a different place.
Ti is a person I used to know at choir. When I arrived in Australia, I met an old classmate of his at my current school, when I realised that she was Malaysian, and happily attempted to increase my connections upon this realisation.
Another example would be a friend I knew in Malaysia, and the Australian exchange students whom I met in South Africa. The Malaysian friend moved to Melbourne, and straight to the school where the exchange students came from.

Much more recently, my mother went to work today, and found- gasp, shock and amazement: a Saints Boy. Yes, a Saints Boy. And apparently, he went to Saints at the same time as I did, and apparently was in the same grade as I was before he moved here recently. Not that I know him. In fact, his name does not even sound familiar at this point in time. But just the idea that someone so close, yet so far is in a very similar situation as I am in is...well, incredible.

And much as I whinge about my lifestyle- the constant moving, the erratic changes in accent and culture, the leaving of friends...this is the only thing that could possibly make up for some of the hurt and pain over the years. The idea that people will be coming to see me, the idea that I will see them again somewhere. Changed or the same, old or young- they will be there and despite everything that's happened over the years, we can still sit back and laugh like the ten, twenty, thirty years between us never happened.

After all these examples, it really is a small world after all.

Mishy <3