We’d like to remind Forumites to please avoid political debate on the Forum.
This is to keep it a safe and useful space for MoneySaving discussions. Threads that are – or become – political in nature may be removed in line with the Forum’s rules. Thank you for your understanding.
📨 Have you signed up to the Forum's new Email Digest yet? Get a selection of trending threads sent straight to your inbox daily, weekly or monthly!
The Forum now has a brand new text editor, adding a bunch of handy features to use when creating posts. Read more in our how-to guide
Your Before Sunrise/Before Sunset moments
fufu_banterwaite
Posts: 1,599 Forumite
I watched Before Sunrise again yesterday – it really has to be my favourite film of all time.
For anyone who hasn’t seen it it was made in 1995 and stars Ethan Hawke as an American student who is on a train back to Vienna where he will fly home the next day to the USA. He randomly bumps into Julie Delpy on the train as she is travelling back to Paris. Sensing they are developing a connection he convinces her to get off the terrain and they spend the day and night walking around Vienna talking, going to bars, visiting galleries. The next day he flies home to USA.
For people who like their films with dialogue and feeling it is fantastic. A follow up was made called Before Sunset in 2004, which was Oscar nominated and is equally good. Then a further follow up was made last year called Before Midnight – again Oscar nominated, I haven’t seen it yet but have it to watch.
Anyway I’m looking for any stories of random meetings leading to you making a brief connection with someone when you least expected it. I’ll try and illustrate it by giving a couple of examples from my own life.
Back in 1997 I was 18 and I and 7 school friends celebrated us having done our A-Levels by going away to Turkey together for two weeks. For all of us it was our first holiday without our parents and for most of us our first time so far away from home. And although we didn’t realise it at the time, it was the last time we all spent time together before we went our various ways to Universities and into the world of work.
Needless to say with the freedom, sun and cheap beer we all had a great time. Plus, with us all being from a single sex grammar school, the fact there were plenty of girls around our age doing the same thing for us was quite a bonus too!
About a week in I got chatting to a girl from Manchester at the hotel bar. She was there with her sister and staying in the same hotel. We instantly connected – we laughed at the same things, liked the same TV programmes, listened to the same bands.
For the next three or four days we were pretty much inseparable. On our last night together we walked down the beach in front of our hotel and sat on the rocks and watched the sea lapping up again the shore. We didn’t talk much, but I can remember we could hear the faint hum of the busy town a couple of miles off, and we just sat there with our arms around each other as the moon rose, not talking much as we both knew our time together was coming to an end.
I said goodbye to her the next day and we then left two days later. We had swapped addresses and sent each other a couple of letters, but then we both went off to Uni just a couple of months later and obviously we had other people to meet and other things to enjoy.
I guess this was one of the last times something like this could happen as back in 1997 this was the days before emails and mobile phones (or certainly they were in their infancy and neither of us had them) so all we had was each others home addresses and landlines. I remember in the couple of letters we swapped we talked about coming to visit each other, but it never happened and I never saw or heard from her again.
My other one was when I was travelling from 2009 to 2011. Myself and my two friends bought a car and were driving across Australia. We were on our way to Canberra and at the last minute rather than drive then entire 250 miles we decided to stop at a town called Albury to break up the journey.
We checked into the YHA and aside from ourselves there were only two people there. One was a middle aged Australian guy with a fascination for trains and buses and the other was a cute Australian girl who was moving from Tasmania to Albury for work.
We got chatting to the Australian girl and shared dinner and some wine with her. When my two friends went off to bed myself and the Ozzie girl sat up talking and drinking wine (and watching a terrible Australian TV programme called ‘Matlock Police’) until 4am. Then we kissed and went our separate ways.
Then next morning she as up earlier house hunting and we left to go to Canberra. I have never seen her again since that day, but the difference is that as that occurred in the modern world we are now friends on Facebook and swap messages every now and then on there!
Apologies for such long posts – but does anyone have any Before Sunrise/Before Sunset moments? Oh and make sure you check out the films!
For anyone who hasn’t seen it it was made in 1995 and stars Ethan Hawke as an American student who is on a train back to Vienna where he will fly home the next day to the USA. He randomly bumps into Julie Delpy on the train as she is travelling back to Paris. Sensing they are developing a connection he convinces her to get off the terrain and they spend the day and night walking around Vienna talking, going to bars, visiting galleries. The next day he flies home to USA.
For people who like their films with dialogue and feeling it is fantastic. A follow up was made called Before Sunset in 2004, which was Oscar nominated and is equally good. Then a further follow up was made last year called Before Midnight – again Oscar nominated, I haven’t seen it yet but have it to watch.
Anyway I’m looking for any stories of random meetings leading to you making a brief connection with someone when you least expected it. I’ll try and illustrate it by giving a couple of examples from my own life.
Back in 1997 I was 18 and I and 7 school friends celebrated us having done our A-Levels by going away to Turkey together for two weeks. For all of us it was our first holiday without our parents and for most of us our first time so far away from home. And although we didn’t realise it at the time, it was the last time we all spent time together before we went our various ways to Universities and into the world of work.
Needless to say with the freedom, sun and cheap beer we all had a great time. Plus, with us all being from a single sex grammar school, the fact there were plenty of girls around our age doing the same thing for us was quite a bonus too!
About a week in I got chatting to a girl from Manchester at the hotel bar. She was there with her sister and staying in the same hotel. We instantly connected – we laughed at the same things, liked the same TV programmes, listened to the same bands.
For the next three or four days we were pretty much inseparable. On our last night together we walked down the beach in front of our hotel and sat on the rocks and watched the sea lapping up again the shore. We didn’t talk much, but I can remember we could hear the faint hum of the busy town a couple of miles off, and we just sat there with our arms around each other as the moon rose, not talking much as we both knew our time together was coming to an end.
I said goodbye to her the next day and we then left two days later. We had swapped addresses and sent each other a couple of letters, but then we both went off to Uni just a couple of months later and obviously we had other people to meet and other things to enjoy.
I guess this was one of the last times something like this could happen as back in 1997 this was the days before emails and mobile phones (or certainly they were in their infancy and neither of us had them) so all we had was each others home addresses and landlines. I remember in the couple of letters we swapped we talked about coming to visit each other, but it never happened and I never saw or heard from her again.
My other one was when I was travelling from 2009 to 2011. Myself and my two friends bought a car and were driving across Australia. We were on our way to Canberra and at the last minute rather than drive then entire 250 miles we decided to stop at a town called Albury to break up the journey.
We checked into the YHA and aside from ourselves there were only two people there. One was a middle aged Australian guy with a fascination for trains and buses and the other was a cute Australian girl who was moving from Tasmania to Albury for work.
We got chatting to the Australian girl and shared dinner and some wine with her. When my two friends went off to bed myself and the Ozzie girl sat up talking and drinking wine (and watching a terrible Australian TV programme called ‘Matlock Police’) until 4am. Then we kissed and went our separate ways.
Then next morning she as up earlier house hunting and we left to go to Canberra. I have never seen her again since that day, but the difference is that as that occurred in the modern world we are now friends on Facebook and swap messages every now and then on there!
Apologies for such long posts – but does anyone have any Before Sunrise/Before Sunset moments? Oh and make sure you check out the films!
0
Comments
-
Come on there must be at least one person who has had a Before Sunrise moment – meeting someone for a few minutes, an hour, maybe a couple of hours, making that instant connection and then you both disappear off your separate ways never to meet again.
Could be someone you sat next to on a long plane journey, someone you got chatting to whilst waiting for a bus, someone you met on a holiday. I want to hear the stories!0 -
y*a*w*n.
No, none that I can remember of.0 -
I feel very sorry for you then Hercule (if I may call you that).
Any stories like this one – didn’t realise someone had started a similar thread eight years ago.0 -
where did the money saving bit come into it?LIVE SIMPLY * GIVE MORE * EXPECT LESS * BE THANKFUL0
-
I guess you must not have been on this forum much Asparagus - lots of the threads have no relation to money saving (ie at the time I viewed this the thread below it was “What age is inappropriate for a child to see a parent naked” – don’t think that has anything to do with money saving either!)0
-
Well it is relevant if the parents cant afford any clothes :rotfl:
Sorry could not resist0 -
I never had those moments and I regret it.
My life has meaning, but it's my kids and I will give them the opportunity to experience this.0 -
Kind of had a moment like that, I was on a school trip to Alton towers when I was 15 and got talking to a guy in the queue for oblivion. Ended up spending the whole day with him and felt there was a connection.
It kind of never went anywhere though as I was only 15 and he was 17.
Thought that was the end of it but when I was 16 I found his number and randomly texted him. From there we met up again and then ended up going out with each other for 18 months.
So not quite a moment as we did see each other again but that was down to chance
This is a system account and does not represent a real person. To contact the Forum Team email forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com0 -
Thanks MessedUp that was the kind of thing I was looking for though
I like those kind of stories.
PS - I love Sheffield!0 -
Oh yeah! I had that moment, on holiday after I got divorced,
but it's in my head and that's where it'll stay! Sweet!0
This discussion has been closed.
Confirm your email address to Create Threads and Reply
Categories
- All Categories
- 354.3K Banking & Borrowing
- 254.4K Reduce Debt & Boost Income
- 455.4K Spending & Discounts
- 247.3K Work, Benefits & Business
- 604K Mortgages, Homes & Bills
- 178.4K Life & Family
- 261.5K Travel & Transport
- 1.5M Hobbies & Leisure
- 16K Discuss & Feedback
- 37.7K Read-Only Boards