6 Mar

My Australian email mystery

It started out with a notification that my snowboard was on its way this past summer.  But I didn’t order one as I’d be more likely to die on a snowboard than actually enjoy myself.  Oh, and I’m not a woman in central California, where the winter gear was set to be delivered.  Once I had confirmed that my email address was the only piece of personal information on the order, I decided that it must have been an innocent error and forgot about the incident.

Then I started receiving a series of forwards from a man in Utah with a .mil email address.  After two or three, I investigated and found out that he  had been unintentionally emailing me when he meant to reach his son.  Unfortunately, I never heard back from this government employee when I asked him to clarify what his son’s email address was – and I’ll never know if it was at all similar to my emailnick@gmail.com from Gmail’s invite-only days.

The unintended messages stopped for a time.  And then I started noticing that I was receiving real estate listings from Maitland, New South Wales, Australia.  At first I assumed these messages were spam, but they just kept coming and they honestly looked like a legitimate newsletter from Tony Cant Real Estate:

Seeing as I’m kinda hooked on House Hunters International and wouldn’t necessarily mind moving out of the country, I started actually enjoying these unrequested updates on the Maitland property market.

The Australian connection of the summer strengthened as the months headed Fall-ward, though.  I was next invited to a house warming party by someone named Helen Burfield-Mills on August 4:

No dogs bigger than Turbo please. Otherwise he shouts a lot.Look forward to seeing you.

Helen

And then informed that I should check on my dad by a woman named Judy Fogarty – who refered to herself as “Mum” on August 19:

I shall be out all day, so could you check on Dad from time to time to see if there is anything he needs. Also if it does not disturb him you might see if there is a camera I could use, & also my ipod with the recording device. LOL, Mum

The first message provided no clues, really, especially since the email address in the To: field was mine and the name associated was Nick Smerker.  However, the second message provided my first clue of a real family name: Fogarty.  And a first name: another Nick!  It also seemed like a relatively important message for this Australian counterpart, so I responded:

Judy,

I’m rather certain that you have the wrong email address for your Nick as I’m in the US and my last name is not Fogarty.  Sorry!

Nick

Intrigued now, I was disappointed to receive no reply from Ms. Fogarty.  I was sure the story had reached its end.  Until November 23:

Darling Boys,

I know you have probably organized your excuses, but there is dinner here next Sunday night with the Rawsons, Natasha Rawson & Adam Watson (her intended!) at 5.30-6pm.. & it would be wonderful if you can come. Nick, Adele as well of course. Veg & Non-veg being served. Let me know by Sat..

Rich, Adam has been managing a photographic studio (advertising industry standard) but at this crucial time the studio is closing. So, as he is now freelancing, if you know of any work leads for him it would be greatly appreciated. Robbie Rawson’s new site is timemangement.com (free at present).
Hope all is going well with book & launch details.

Nick, all the best for Saturday & have a good chill today. (except for the garbage!)
We are off to Orange for the Country Classic & should be home late Friday,
All my love,
MUM

Now,  I love a good dinner party and this one sounded great!  The Rawsons sound fascinating and I apparently have a brother with photographic interests.  And who is this Adele?  But, alas, I still know that this is not actually an email intended for me – and one that is probably of some true import for this illusive Nick Fogarty.  To make light of a potentially embarrassing situation, I wrote back:

Judy,

I think you’ve still got the wrong Nick. While dinner sounds lovely, it might be a bit hard for me to make it from Maryland in time!  I’m not sure what your Nick’s email address may be but I’ve received a couple emails from you in Australia (?) and a few from a military man in Utah (also looking for his son) so there must be some common variations on emailnick@gmail.com.

Hope you are able to find the right address (and feel free to air mail some leftovers from Sunday.) 🙂

Nick

Again, no response from Mum.  *hrmph*  Convinced it was pointless to look up Nick Fogarty, I just let the matter drop.  Until this past week, that is, when I received this:

Hi Nick,

this is Monika Estrugo. I’m registered for your web design course that will be starting in the expat learning centre on Tuesday. Actually i was there already last tuesday, since nobody informed me that the course has been postponed by a week.

Am looking forward to the class next week. Would be great if you could inform me if anything changes (time/date etc). Thanks!

cu tuesday!
best regards
Monika Pandey Estrugo

“Okay, now I must know who this is!” I announced.  I told Kate about it, and we were both convinced – for at least most of the morning ready-getting – that I had a doppelgänger in Australia and that this was science fiction novella-worthy stuff.  What would happen should we meet?  Was I to never know that this other tech savvy Nick existed?

My investigation began in earnest the other morning and turned up some interesting findings.  I will lay them out for you now:

1. There are two Nick Fogartys in Australia.  I think.
2. Nick Fogarty #1 lives in Sydney and seems to be a filmmaker and photographer.  He has a portfolio website and a Vimeo account (pretty great stuff in both cases.) This one seems more promising.
3. Nick Fogarty #2 was found on Facebook.  He is in the Apple network and is connected to an Adele via his friends.  I cannot tell if he lives in Australia or not.
4. Judith Fogarty is a real person, and I think she works in Canberra doing governmental planning.
5. Following the email address for “my brother,” I found that Rich Fogarty does indeed exist, is Australian and founded a media company called Concrete Playground.  It looks quite cool (does he need any employees?)

I am rather certain that I’m going to write to at least Nick #1.  I mean, I feel like I have to at this point, if for nothing else than to let him know that his emails are not reaching him.  I also want to find out if Google is perhaps sending mail intended for some permutation of my address (the Monika Estrugo message was addressed to “email.nick”) to me instead – and why.  But now I’m mostly curious to know who this person is.  Let’s hope he responds and doesn’t just think I’m crazy.