“Well, it’s a small chance, but I’ll try anyway,” is how Sabine Maes, 45, from Odenhout began her call in 2019. She called the man she had met on the train the day before, but did not ask for his number. Now, five years later, she and Bart are still together. For Kelsey, who met the man of her dreams in Efteling last week, she has one piece of advice: always follow your gut.
The call made by 27-year-old Kelsey Smit from Nieuwerkerk aan den IJssel on Saturday via Omroep Brabant is reminiscent of Sabine’s message from 2019. They both encountered a man who they then thought: I want to get to know him better. But this is difficult when you are separated and haven’t exchanged phone numbers.
“I thought he was an interesting guy from the first moment. I was curious and wanted to know more about him,” Kelsey previously told Omroep Brabant. Sabine knows the feeling: “I saw him on the train after a holiday in Scotland and immediately thought: What a nice guy. Soon after, I had a very strong feeling, I just had to reach out to him.”
But there are also differences. While Kelsey didn’t talk to the Efteling Man, Sabine struck up a conversation with the Train Man. “I heard him say something about the Eurostar. I lived there too, so I was able to strike up a conversation. When we were at Rieshof station and I was about to get out, I thought: I need to get as much information as I can about this as quickly as possible, if “I had it, maybe I could look it up online.”
“The feeling was strong, I had never felt this before.”
“My parents came to pick me up and I told them right away. I told them that I had met a nice guy, even though I knew nothing about him. The feeling was very strong, and I had never felt that before.” Unfortunately, her online search for this man yielded nothing, so a message on ontreinflirt.nl and Facebook were later used.
“My Facebook post was shared 1,300 times. Then I received a lot of reactions. When Omrup Brabant wrote about it, it went faster. Then there were also negative reactions.” Sick reactions, Sabine calls them. “Then they say, ‘His wife would like this,’ or ‘What a hopeless situation.’ I can’t handle that very well. Now I see it’s happening again with Kelsey on Facebook. Then I think, ‘Give each other something.'”
“We were the last to leave.”
Sabine received the good news shortly after the call. Bart’s sister-in-law came forward because she knew who he was. The message is still there in your Facebook chat history. What followed was a three-hour WhatsApp session with Bart, followed by a long phone conversation and eventually an appointment at Verkadefabriek in Den Bosch. “We were the last to leave.”
The feeling that she had to do something at this meeting turned out to be mutual. Bart was also still sitting on the evening of the meeting Search on Google With the terms “Udenhout”, “Scotland” and “holiday”, but unfortunately without success.
In August, it will be five years since they first met and they are still a happy couple. Sabine’s hunch turned out to be correct.
And that’s exactly what she wants to convey to Kelsey: Follow your gut. “If she’s feeling the urge to seek him out, then it’s great that she did. I think that’s very brave of her. Especially at this time, because you’re making yourself so vulnerable with a call like that.” She hopes Kelsey will find her “Effetiling Man.” “Even if it doesn’t work out. Otherwise you’ll still have that ‘what if’ feeling all the time…”
You may also find this interesting:
Read Sabine’s original invitation from 2019 here
And here you see Kelsey’s appeal