On the evening of January 29th, 2026, I stepped out of the office at Farringdon riding a wave of sky-high relief. I had just sent off reports I’d spent weeks writing for the Audit and Risk Committee, and my brain felt like it had finally been granted parole.
Instead of my usual Wu-Tang essentials, Rakim, or worship playlists, I reached for my headphones and, for reasons still unclear to me, hit play on Coldplay Essentials. Growth? Fatigue? Fate? Who knows.
It’s a neat slow nine-minute walk from my office to Farringdon station. And this is where we get to the juicy part.
At about 6:36p.m, 5 minutes or so to my train hitting the platform, I felt a gentle tap on my shoulder. I turned around and found myself looking up at a warmly smiling man, easily 6’3” or 6’4”, who said something I completely missed. I’d seen his lips move, but Coldplay was doing its thing.
I slid my headphones off.
“Viva la Vida, right?”
Reader, I froze.
Here’s why: I do not sing. Ever. If public singing carried fines, I’d be a law-abiding citizen for life. My headphones are practically fused to me , the only times they come off are in the office or once I’m safely locked inside my car at the train station. So no, I wasn’t singing Viva la Vida.
What I was guilty of, however, was foot-tapping. A subtle, rhythmic, entirely involuntary foot-tap. And somehow, from behind me (or wherever he came from) this man had clocked my taps, decoded the tempo, and correctly identified the song.
So tell me: how does a stranger, in under 5 minutes, reverse-engineer a Coldplay track from nothing but ankle movement?
Superhuman. That’s the only explanation.
Submitted by B.Afari