Coincidence – a matter of life and death. Remembering Manchester Arena

I tend to think about coincidence a lot.

Marriage, work, friendships, even death – nearly all that surrounds us is a result of some form of coincidence. Where and how did you meet your best friends, your husband, wife? Why did you get the job and another candidate, perhaps more deserving than you, didn’t? My brother-in-law tells me the answer to the last question, in his case, is Because the boss was fed up with interviews. He’d said to himself: “The next (relatively normal) person that comes for an interview, will get the job.” He happened to be that person.

Sometimes events coincide, over years, to eventually bring us to our current situation. A mere coincidence can decide your fate. Coincidences like these, I have to admit, scare me. This post will reflect on one of them.

As a teenager, I was a huge fan of the British pop band Take That. I’d heard their song Love ain’t here anymore on a long-haul bus journey and was hooked. I wanted to know everything about the boys from Manchester. I wanted to understand what their songs were about. This was the key to why I started learning English. I still remember struggling to translate the question Where have you been? in another of their chart-topping songs, Babe.

My biggest teenage dream was to see Take That in concert – but they wouldn’t come to obscure Eastern Europe. My godmother and my uncle lived in Berlin at the time, so this was my best bet. I worked in my father’s corner shop, saving my money, thinking that I may be able to save enough to see my idols in Berlin. But that was not to be: by the time I had sufficient savings, the band had disbanded with one of their most popular members and my favourite, Robbie Williams, leaving to try a solo career. Needless to say, I was heartbroken.

Fast forward – many years later, when I lived and worked in Manchester, Take That (minus Robbie) got back together and toured all over the UK. They had a number of concerts in Manchester, sort of all the time. On my way back from work I’d see countless buses taking enthusiastic fans to The Old Trafford Cricket Ground, where major concerts took place, the capacity of which is 50 000 people. But the moment had gone. I had little interest in joining those jubilant concert-goers.

Fast forward some more years. I was at work when an email popped into my inbox. The company I was working for was giving away Take That concert tickets. Suddenly, I was interested again. I remember thinking that I may never get another chance to see them; that life, with its unexpected twists and turns, had surprised me, giving me this chance on a silver plate. It was there for the taking and I took it. I responded to the email and booked two tickets, and then binged on some Take That songs, old favourites of mine.

The concert was supposed to be the following week, on a Thursday. The weather was good for Manchester, which was unusual, even in late May. That weekend I called my parents, who were rather entertained at the thought that I was finally going to see my teenage heros, whose numerous posters and photographs had stared at them from the walls of the bedroom that my sister and I shared. And so, I waited for the concert.

It was early on Tuesday morning when my phone rang and woke me up. I looked at the clock: half past five in the morning. I then looked at my phone and my initial angry thoughts of Who the hell is calling me at this time? ceased immediately. The call was from my parents. I sensed something was wrong; I knew this call wasn’t bringing good news.

My parents were frantic with panic. They were having breakfast (they are early birds) and listening to the radio when they heard the latest news from Manchester. A bomb had exploded at a concert venue in the city. There were reports of fatalities.

Needless to say, I was instantly awake, frozen with horror. The venue was Manchester Arena. The Take That concert was supposed to take place there, too. Had this terrible event happened just three days later, I would have been there.

I reassured my parents as much as I could. After we’d finished speaking, I turned the radio on. They were reporting that the previous evening American superstar Ariana Grande performed in the ill-fated venue. She was very popular with teenagers and older children. Many of the victims were said to be really young.

It was now past six in the morning and I started receiving calls and messages from friends, some of whom I hadn’t talked to in years, all enquiring if I was OK. I was, physically – but I was in shock. I couldn’t stop thinking about the coincidence factor; the blind luck that we sometimes need in life. For two years, I worked in offices adjacent to Manchester Arena. I passed the area where the bombing happened at least twice a day, sometimes more frequently.

As the day wore on, reports from the night before continued. Some of these children and teenagers had been looking forward to the concert for months, having received the tickets as Christmas or birthday gifts. In the chaos that ensued after the explosion, many had become separated from their parents or friends. This is where the amazing solidarity and ability to come together that I so admire in the British had come into play. Nearby hotels had been turned into temporary shelters for the young ones who didn’t know where they were or how to get home. There were reports of nurses, doctors, paramedics and police officers, on their way home after exhausting, long shifts, reporting back to work after they’d heard news, so they could help their colleagues. Social media was useful for once: people offering lifts were posting messages and so were youngsters looking for their missing friends.

The reaction of the local authorities was immediate. They condemned the attack and announced that the vigil was going to be held in the city’s main square, Albert Square, that evening. I didn’t go and regretted it very much. For the first time in my life I felt genuinely scared of the possibility of something bad happening to me, or perhaps a repeat attack. In hindsight, I should have definitely gone: I would have found a much-needed sense of comfort and community in the vigil.

Manchester was a strange place to be in the weeks that followed. The central squares were awash with flowers and soft toys, left as tribute to the victims. The skies were perfectly clear as the UK flag flew half-mast over the building of the city council.

Ariana Grande, to give her credit, announced that she would hold a charity concert in memory of the victims and in support of the families of those affected by the atrocity. Many celebrities joined her and turnout for the One Love was incredible. Both the singer and the Queen, Elizabeth II, visited the injured children who were recovering in Manchester Children’s Hospital.

A year after the event that affected so many, a commemorative concert was held, again in Albert Square. I had promised myself that, this time, I would go. And I did. There were many young people wearing T-shirts from the Dangerous Woman tour – Ariana Grande’s 2017 tour. They had serious, sad expressions.

Choirs from all over Manchester performed in the Manchester Together – with one voice ­event, which was broadcast live on the national TV.

The final performance was that of The Survivors’ Choir – a group of children and teenagers who had been at the concert one year previously. They had joined the choir as an effort to deal with the trauma caused by the events of that night.

I will never forget this moving, emotional performance. Many of the young people were clearly upset; a boy, no older than eleven, started crying and was comforted by his mother, but never left the stage.

The last song they sang was Symphony by Clean Bandit and I include the lyrics that now have a completely new meaning to me below:

I’m sorry if it’s all too much,
But every day you’re here, I’m healing.
I’ve been running out of luck
I never thought I’d find this feeling.
‘Cause I’ve been hearing symphonies
Before all I heard was silence,
A rhapsody for you and me
And every melody is timeless.
And now your song is on repeat
And I’m dancing on to your heartbeat
And when you’re gone, I feel incomplete,
So if you want the truth:
I just want to be part of your symphony
Will you hold me tight and not let go?

I started this post with rather light-hearted memories of my teenage obsession with the British pop band Take That. I did see them perform, eventually, later in the summer of 2017, at a different venue. I would have far sooner continued on a bright, cheerful, summer note – but I can’t. For the enormity of this human tragedy also needs to be told.

As the second anniversary of the Manchester Arena attack approaches, let’s take a minute to remember the victims and all those affected by this terrible event.

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Photograph taken on 24/05/2017. The UK flag flying half-mast over the building of Manchester City Council.