I was going to the court the other
day when the security officer on duty called me over. I was a bit nervous
thinking that maybe I had done something wrong it being a court and everything,
so I checked my phone to make sure that I had switched it off no need to be
thrown in a cell for contempt of a court order and I couldn’t say I had
forgotten to switch it off with the warning on the wall screaming down at me
“SWITCH OFF YOUR PHONE COURT IN SESSION”.
So I went where she was and she was
greeting me so cordially like we were long time friends, but I guess she sensed
from my blank look that I didn’t know her and that’s when she apologized
profusely but I could sense that she still did not believe that I wasn’t the
person she had thought, so she explained that I resembled a certain lady from
her village and she actually swore that we could be mistaken for twins.
That wasn’t the first time someone
had mistaken me for someone else, there was another incident where a friend saw
a certain lady on the street and almost hugged her thinking it was me.
This got me thinking, how many of us
have gone through the same experience, some even through dangerous or embarrassing
moments with people who mistook them for someone else?
It could be while walking to
work, in a matatu or maybe while taking care of your business then you meet a
stranger who is very sure that he/she knows you and is quite irked that you are
being a snob and acting like you are better than the individual because you
don’t want to acknowledge them which could even result in insults or being
called off.
Jennifer (not her real name) says
she has had strangers greeting her and sometimes even strange men hug her on
the streets to the chagrin of her husband thinking that she is a girlfriend or
a friend from college, but the most recent was when a neighbor she has known
for a long time told her that a stranger had paid for her fare claiming that
she was her sister.
Kate says she has been mistaken
severally by people who thought she was someone they knew. she cites an
incident where a stranger hugs her thinking they know her and she is too polite
to correct her so she continues to chat with them but later on informs the
person that she doesn’t remember where they met and that’s when the person
realizes their mistake.
She however recalls an episode, she
says was the most embarrassing moment in her life; she mistook a strange man
for her boyfriend.
Kate says she had gone to the market
to shop for some groceries when she saw a man across the road and mistook him
for her boyfriend, whom she had not seen in a while and actually thought that
he had come for a visit without informing her as a surprise and yelled at him to
wait for her.
“I literally ran over without even
minding the passing vehicles and just jumped on him, hugging him so tightly, I
only realize after a while that he was struggling to free himself and let go,
you can’t imagine my shock not to mention embarrassment when I realized that he
was not my boyfriend,” she says, “the poor man probably thought I was some
desperate woman or lunatic and couldn’t wait to untangle himself from my tight
embrace.”
There is a belief, though not proven
that every one of us has a double somewhere on this planet and there are others
who believe that there are at least six or seven people who resemble us.
When the US president Barrack Obama
came into the limelight many people came out as his look alike and during the
campaigns, when Barrack Obama was vying for his second term in Whitehouse there
were those who attended campaigns and some went as far as addressing the public
in rallies.
Reggie Brown and Louis Ortiz are
some of the people who have been impersonating the US president since he was
first elected, Ortiz even went to the inauguration where he was signing
autographs and posing for pictures.
Although they are professional
impersonators and they are paid to perform, we sort of get inkling to how it
would feel like having another person looking exactly like you to the extent of
others confusing the two of you.
Our very own Walter Mong’are carried
the day during Kenya’s second president Daniel Arap Moi reign as he
impersonated the president: grapevines had it that some folks in Eldoret
fell for the trio’s (redykulass) antics thinking that it was the president.
Movie producers have also
capitalized on this belief ,with movies such as “the parent trap” where two
girls who look so much alike meet in a camp but although they turned out
to be twins we could see the friction between the girls as each one of them
tried to set herself apart by trying to outwit the other. Some
movies have characters of kings or royalty having commoners as their doubles
which really captivates the viewers’ imaginations and sort of bridges the gap
between royalty and commoners
And although some people may embrace
the idea of having a look alike not everyone is ready to accept the uncanny
feeling that there is someone else out there who looks exactly like them. It
may be fascinating and great to imagine that there is another you out there but
when faced with the reality we may react differently.
According to a Montreal photographer
Francois Brunnel who is compiling a collection of photos of people whose
resemblance to each other is striking it is a bit uncanny to meet your double
without warning. “It is a little bit of a nightmare to meet oneself without
warning” he says.
Personally I would love to meet
someone who resembles me, then I will be able to see with my very own
eyes exactly how I look like which really tells you what I think of the mirror,
just the thought that there is someone out there who resembles me is ecstatic.
According to Kate however, she is
unique and there is no need for another person to look like her, “Am unique and
the way I look sets me apart from others so I don’t think I would like to meet
someone else who resembles me it is like taking the thing that make me away,”
she observes.
She feels that it would be weird to
have someone else looking like her without having any blood relations adding
that some people may take advantage of the situation to commit crimes or play
tricks on people.
Although we might have doubles
somewhere on this planet, that does not take away or rob us of our identity and
purpose here on earth.
We have our characters, believes,
faith, cultural and social backgrounds which set us apart from others and just
because a person resembles you does not make them to be like you even your own
twin can never have the same character as you there’s always something that
sets us apart so resembling some criminal or lunatic does not really make you a
criminal or craze too.
Different cultures have different
words for the look-alike phenomenon. The French use the word 'sosie,' or
double. In German, the word is 'doppelganger,' a term also adopted into
English.
Supposedly, according to
superstition encountering your doppelganger can be a sign of bad luck, as it
maybe your evil twin; you know what they say about seeing two black cats at
same time.
We are unique not because we
resemble or do not resemble other people but because of who we are inside and
what we have accomplished or intend to accomplish in life, the people we love
and those who love us, our culture, beliefs also add value to our lives and the
idea of having a look alike should only motivate you since there was a need for
two or more of you to live in this world and enjoy it
