Brazilian magnet

When I was preparing to backpack around Europe everyone who’d done so in the past told me that I would meet tons of people. They claimed that there were oodles of travelers all over the continent doing the exact same thing that I was doing and I would likely find people with whom I could hop from country to country. Things didn’t turn out exactly that way; I’ve met more people than I can count, but so far no one whose schedule matched up enough with mine so that we could cross borders together. Until now.

I honestly don’t remember meeting them, but Marcus and Philippe are two Brazilians who’ve been traveling across Europe in the exact same path as I, staying at the exact same hostels, at the exact same time. They claim that we met in the large, 18-person dorm room that I stayed in when I was in Amsterdam, but I talked to so many people when I was there that our brief conversation doesn’t stand out in my memory. After Amsterdam the three of us traveled to Prague, but stayed at different hostels so we didn’t run into each other. But after Prague, they spotted me walking down the street with Liz outside our hostel in Vienna.

“Don’t we know that girl?” Marcus later recalled saying to Philippe.

“Yeah,” Philippe answered. “We met her at our hostel in Amsterdam.”

“Huh. I wonder if she was in Prague before Vienna like us.”

A few days later as they were riding a train to Venice they discussed the possibility of running into me again.

“What if that girl is at our hostel in Venice?” Philippe said. “That would be too weird.”

“There’s no way,” Marcus said. “Amsterdam, Vienna and Venice ? No way.”

But there I was, sitting in the lobby waiting to use the Internet, when Philippe strolled downstairs and spotted me. I didn’t notice him, but he immediately turned around, marched back up to his dorm room, looked at Marcus and said two words: “She’s here.”

Marcus instantly knew what he was talking about and laughed for fifteen minutes straight. They talked about the possibility of me being a ghost or even a stalker. “I wonder if she’s going to Florence and Rome too. Oh my god,” Philippe said. “I can’t believe that out of all the hostels in Amsterdam, Vienna, and Venice, we’ve ended up at the exact same ones at the exact same time.”

Later in the evening as I was walking down the hall to my room, I saw Philippe walking toward me. He smiled and said, “Hey! Can you believe it? Amsterdam, Vienna and now Venice!”

I looked at him and knew I had met him somewhere, but could not place him for the life of me. “Yeah …” I said, trying to figure out what the hell he was talking about. “Were we at the same place?”

“Yes!” he said. “We met at the hostel in Amsterdam and then again in Vienna and now we’re at the same one in Venice!”

“Ohhh,” I replied, embarrassed that he remembered me and I didn’t remember him. “That’s crazy!”

“Were you in Prague after Amsterdam?”

“Yep,” I said, “Stayed at Atlas Hostel.”

“Oh my god, we were in Prague at the same time too! You’re following us, aren’t you?” he laughed.

“No – you guys are following ME!”

That evening the Philippe, Marcus and I sat around a table on the deck of our hostel and marveled over the fact that we’ve been unknowingly traveling together for the past three weeks. They told me that they’d had several discussions about me and noticed that I make friends really easily because they never see me without people around. I admitted that I don’t remember meeting them at all, but that they certainly look familiar. We exchanged stories and they told me at which hostels they’ll be staying in Florence and Rome, so there’s a possibility of meeting up again in the future.

Stuff like this blows my mind. Not only have I been following the exact same path as two other backpackers in Europe for the past three weeks, but they’ve been completely aware of it the entire time and had discussions about me on numerous occasions. How often do you get a chance to find out that strangers have been contemplating your existence? It’s nice to know that I’m not completely anonymous over here. It may have been in a strange way, but at least I know I’ve made an impact on someone.