We often say: “How lucky he was!” - although we ourselves don’t clearly know what this concept means. If you explain it briefly and clearly, then luck is a positive resolution life situations. Some people are lucky in the workplace, others are happy in personal life, still others win the lottery, and there are the luckiest people who always do well, as if their luck is chronic. Even if something starts out bad, then it unexpectedly turns into a happy ending. The names of such darlings of fate can often be seen on the pages of newspapers or on television screens.
The luckiest person in the world is Croatian music teacher Frayn Selak. During his life, he repeatedly found himself in terrible situations, but he always managed to get away with it. His series of troubles began in 1962.
And again, three years later, I experienced a strong shock. The bus he was traveling in ran off the road. As a result, many died. And our lucky guy, again in a state of shock, received only minor injuries.
Another incident
The next event occurred in 1970, when Selak was driving his own car. Suddenly the car caught fire. In a matter of seconds, the Croatian managed to get out of the burning car. A moment later it exploded. Frank was not injured at all.
The subsequent emergency occurred three years later. The old one sprayed gasoline directly onto the running engine. There was a fire. This time, Frayn Selak was left without hair - and that’s all.
Then the luckiest man in the world lived quietly for 22 years. Until one day he was hit by a bus in his own hometown. During the examination, doctors stated the absence of any wounds at all. Just shock.
Last accident
A year later, Selak went traveling in his car. After turning on the road in the mountains, the Croatian suddenly saw a truck rushing straight at him. He jumped out of the car, which stopped over a cliff, and hung on a tree. It was from there that he watched his car fly into the abyss. The result is a slight shock.
Fortune
In his declining years, fortune did not turn away from the music teacher. He was lucky enough to win a huge amount of money in the lottery.
What happened next in the Croatian's life? Different sources provide different information. According to one source, he distributed all the money he won to his relatives so as not to tempt fate any more. His plans were to build a small chapel. Another source says that the luckiest man in the world bought a house, a car and married a woman 20 years younger than him. Frayn Selak also considered his previous four marriages to be disasters.
The luckiest people on earth live quietly, without even expecting any luck.
Ordeal
Almost every inhabitant of the planet at least once at some point own life imagined that he was the most unhappy person. Typically, such sensations occur to those who are going through difficult trials and harbor negative feelings.
Meanwhile, many people who are prone to excessive dramatization often overly exaggerate the seriousness of certain misfortunes. This is especially true in extremely emotional people, as well as for all others - at certain periods of their lives (when extreme fatigue overtakes, in adolescence, during pregnancy, etc.).
At the same time, most of them still really have no idea what real troubles are - those in which it seems as if all the forces of hell have fallen with their might on the only representative of the human race. Individuals who experienced something similar would rightfully be included in the impromptu top list of the most unlucky people on the planet.
At the epicenter of two explosions
It would probably be headed by Tsutomu Yamaguchi. At the end of World War II, this Japanese man had a chance to visit the epicenter of two nuclear bombings at once. We are talking, of course, about the Americans dropping “Baby” and “Fat Man” (as these atomic shells were called) on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the first of these cities, a young engineer was visiting friends when early in the morning he saw unusually bright flashes in the sky, and a moment later he was hit by a wave of explosion. Yamaguchi remained alive, but virtually all of his skin was burned. On the night that followed, everyone who was with him in the bomb shelter could only hear his screams of terrible pain.
In some unknown way, this unfortunate man made it to the station in the morning and went by train to Nagasaki, where, naturally, he fell into the next explosion. . . Tsutomu spent a dozen years in bandages and until the end of his days he was virtually deaf in one of his ears.
Dede Koswar's illness
The accident ruined the life of Indonesian Dede Koswar, who deserved “silver” in the ranking of unlucky people. One fall in the forest at the age of ten - and suffering from incomprehensible “wooden” warts in all subsequent days. As a result, the man was unable to arrange both professional and family life. He can only watch as his lower limbs turn into some kind of branches.
Doctors find it difficult to accurately determine Kosvar’s illness. They see only the coincidence of two factors as the culprits for this situation - the presence of papillomavirus in the Indonesian and an immunodeficiency state. Doctors tried to simply cut off his warts, but they grew back.
It is virtually impossible for Dede to walk on such mutilated legs. His only income is demonstrating himself to the public as a “tree man.”
Unlucky Briton
The top three “winners” of this top list will be closed by the most unlucky Briton - John Line. During his not very long life, he had to go through about two dozen serious troubles. Falling off a cliff, three accidents, being struck by lightning - these are just a few of them. Misfortunes began to “hunt” John from childhood. So, one day he fell out of a tree while visiting his grandmother and broke his arm. On the way from the clinic (after applying a plaster cast), he injured the same limb, but in a different place.
Victim of hurricanes
American bus driver Melanie Martinez could compete with Line in being “unlucky.” Since 1965, her home (wherever she stayed with her family) has been attacked by hurricanes five times - and, naturally, completely destroyed. Moreover, for the penultimate time, one of the specialized television programs helped restore Melanie’s home. However, the house they rebuilt is a real “candy” in terms of equipment and appearance- lived only until Hurricane Isaac.
Fate is a villain
The six most unlucky people would undoubtedly be Yu Zhenhuan, over 95% of whose body is covered with dense vegetation, and American forester Roy Sullivan, who was struck by lightning seven times.
This rating is worth reconsidering for anyone who is tempted to complain about “villain fate.” Compared to the troubles of the above-mentioned inhabitants of the planet, their own will seem only sweet and harmless tricks of Fortune.
Tops the ranking of the twenty most famous unlucky people Bernard Ascherio, who was born in France in 1951. This unique person officially entered the Guinness Book of Records with the honorary title “The Unluckiest Man on the Planet.” Judge for yourself: when he was 1.5 years old, he fell out of his crib and broke his hip. Having recovered and just starting to master a children's bicycle, Bernard managed to get a head injury, and since then the “black streak” in his life has not ended.
Asherio breaks his legs, arms, collarbones, and breaks his head with enviable frequency, regularly getting into car accidents. By the age of sixty, the number of misfortunes that befell his unlucky head had already exceeded 160. This is an average of approximately 3 serious misfortunes per year, starting from the first year of life. However, there were also record months. So, in one of these usually unlucky months for Ascherio, his central heating system burst and several rooms in the house were flooded with boiling water; a week later, a lightning strike struck the home - the TV, food processor and refrigerator burned out; and a few days later he was driving a car and several gas cylinders fell in front of him from a truck crawling in front. Having just repaired the car, Bernard left the service station and was immediately hit by a drunk driver at the nearest intersection.
The apotheosis of the most unsuccessful month in his unsuccessful life was the suicide of a homeless man, who naturally chose the basement of his house for this. What is noteworthy is that Ascherio composed a wonderful autobiography called “Mr. Accident,” where he completely disagrees with the statement that he is an unhappy person. And this seems to be true. Just imagine how many troubles befell him, but he remained alive and not crippled. If you look at it from this angle, then perhaps Bernard Ascherio can, on the contrary, be called lucky.
2. Antonio Salieri
Salieri fell victim to black PR many years before the invention of this term. The world knows him as a mediocre composer who, out of envy, poisoned a genius. Lawyers and psychiatrists even have the term “Salieri syndrome” - a crime committed on the basis of professional envy. Surely he would prefer complete oblivion to such glory. In fact, Antonio Salieri was the conductor of the Italian opera troupe in Vienna, one of the founders of the Vienna Conservatory. His works have been staged in almost all opera houses around the world. Among his students are Beethoven, Liszt and Schubert.
Contemporaries claimed that Salieri was kindest person. When his teacher Gluck died, he took upon himself the care of his children. Shortly before his death, he suffered from a mental disorder. During one of his attacks, he declared that he had poisoned Mozart. When, having regained consciousness, Salieri learned about his “confession,” he was terribly frightened and began to refuse what he had said. At the trial in Milan, the defense managed to prove his innocence. Until his death, in rare moments of enlightenment, Salieri repeated: “I can confess everything, but I did not kill Mozart.” In vain, this sweet man went down in history as an envious loser.
3. Robert Scott
The English explorer of Antarctica Scott had no polar experience when, in 1901-1904, he set out on the expedition that discovered the Edward VII Peninsula, the Transarctic Mountains and explored Victoria Land. The first expedition was successful, except for the fact that Scott did not know how to handle sled dogs purchased in Russia, and way back the dogs decided to die from their hard life. Returning, Scott received gold medals from the geographical societies of England, America, Denmark, Sweden, and in 1911-1912 he set off to conquer the South Pole. On January 18, 1912, having overcome hundreds of kilometers on the ice shell, the British reached cherished goal. Already on the way, they saw a pole with a Norwegian flag: three weeks before them, Amundsen had visited the southernmost point of the planet.
Disappointed, Scott turned back, but not a single member of the expedition returned from the icy desert. Eight months later, a rescue party found their bodies. Scott was only 11 miles short of reaching the supply depot. In his suicide note, “Message to Society,” he writes: “The causes of the disaster were not caused by shortcomings of the organization, but by bad luck in those risky undertakings that we dared.” According to legend, it was Scott who owned the motto that Kaverin put in the epigraph of “Two Captains,” but the researcher pronounced it in a slightly modified form: “Fight and search, do not find and do not give up.”
4. Kerry Packer
Australia's richest Packer is considered one of the world's unluckiest players. Along with Arab sheikhs and arms dealers, he is on the list of 150 gambling whales to whom any major casino will happily provide a line of credit of up to $5 million. The media tycoon, whose net worth is estimated at $3.73 billion, can afford to be a loser. On average, Packer comes to Las Vegas 4 times a year, where he plays big, placing bets of $100-150 thousand. At first he was lucky. In May 1995, he won almost $19.5 million at blackjack. After one of his big wins, the tycoon handed out tips worth about $1.3 million to 500 casino employees. Another time, he gave a $120,000 tip to a waitress serving cocktails. But soon his luck turned away from him, he began to lose and became known as one of the most famous “losers” in the world. Packer set a kind of anti-record in 2000, when he lost about $40 million during several visits to Las Vegas. He lost about half of this amount in baccarat in three days.
5. Pete Best
Managed to get kicked out of the Beatles six months before their triumph. In 1960, the Beatles faced the question of finding a drummer. The choice fell on Best, who had two advantages - his mother (the owner of one of the most popular clubs in Liverpool) and his own drum kit. In 1962, the famous producer George Martin auditioned the guys, but he categorically did not like Pete. John and Paul got rid of Pete, replacing him with Ringo Starr. The single Love Me Do, recorded with the new lineup, took 17th place in the British charts. Decades of worldwide Beatlemania lay ahead. Pete Best was mortally offended and became... a baker. He tried unsuccessfully to make a musical career and consoled himself with five minutes of fame, giving numerous interviews about early years The Beatles and releasing the scolding book The Beatles: The True Beginning. His band still performs Beatles cover songs.
6. Hans Christian Andersen
In his personal life, Andersen (1805-1875) was unlucky. The storyteller treated women as something unattainable and died a virgin. He was often seen entering brothels - he met with prostitutes, but limited himself to conversations. Tall, thin, with small eyes, a huge nose and long arms - this is what the man who wrote The Ugly Duckling looked like. His friends teased him as an orangutan. Andersen loved children, believing that only these pure creatures understood him. However, when children saw the storyteller, they often became frightened and began to cry. Recent years During his life, Andersen almost never left the house, being deeply depressed. Of the 156 fairy tales written by Andersen, 56 end with the death of the hero. In 1872, the last fairy tale “Auntie” was born. Toothache" Andersen seriously believed that the number of teeth in the mouth influenced his creativity. In January 1873, Hans Christian lost his last tooth and immediately stopped composing.
7. Typhoid Mary
The strangest of all manifestations of bad luck is the “John syndrome,” that is, such bad luck in which a person becomes the cause tragic events, remaining unharmed. Typhoid Mary, the American servant who was believed to be responsible for an epidemic that killed 40,000 people in the early 20th century, certainly had such a syndrome. In 1906, members of several New York families fell ill with typhus, which soon spread to several areas. It turned out that in all the houses infected with the disease, a maid named Mary worked in the kitchen. Health inspectors found her responsible for the outbreaks of the disease. She was jailed in solitary confinement for three years. Mary was then released and forbidden from working in the kitchen in the future. Unfortunately, she didn't follow the advice. Five years later, several people fell ill with typhus at the Sloan Maternity Hospital. It turned out that unlucky Mary was working in the kitchen under a false name. She was detained again. Typhoid Mary ended her days in prison in solitary confinement, branded the most sophisticated killer of all time.
8. David Buick
David Dunbor Buick showed remarkable inventive skills from his youth: he received thirteen patents for all sorts of plumbing items, including a sprinkler with a rotating head for spraying water, an overhead flush toilet cistern, and a fundamentally new technology for enamelling cast-iron bathtubs, which is still used today. He could have become a multimillionaire, but it occurred to him to sell his plumbing business for a mere $100,000 and get into the internal combustion engine business. The car project turned out to be successful, but Buick, inexperienced in business, was unable to take advantage of it. His partner Whiting met the founder of General Motors, W. Durant, and negotiated a merger with him. General Motors got rid of David himself. Subsequently, he confirmed his reputation as a bad businessman, went bankrupt while trying to create other automobile companies, and worked as a clerk in the provinces. In 1929, forgotten and penniless, he died of cancer, and cars bearing his name were sold in the thousands and were known to every American. After David's death, Buick was robbed again, using his family coat of arms as a factory emblem.
Edward Wood is one of the most odious figures in Hollywood. Two years after his death, he was officially recognized as the worst director in the history of cinema. The paradox is that Edward loved cinema more than life. Only absolute mediocrity prevented him from becoming a genius. Starting his career in the 50s, Wood made low-budget horror films and cheap porn films. He had original views on directing. He considered any person on the street to be a brilliant actor. One single take was always enough for him, and even if in the frame the actor touched the green carpet with his foot, representing grass, Ed declared that the movie itself is still a convention. In order not to spend money on expensive location footage, he took from an editor he knew pieces of location filming that were not included in other films, and edited them into his films. Ed Wood died in 1978 in complete poverty. After his death, the director became a cult figure, his work is studied in American film schools, and the famous “Plan 9 of outer space", awarded the title of "The Worst Movie of All Time", appears in The X-Files as Agent Mulder's favorite film. In 1996, Wood's fans created the virtual "Church of the Heavenly Ed Wood" (www.edwood.org) with the motto "Ed died for his art, we live because of him." In the same year, Tim Burton’s film dedicated to the “worst director in the world” was released.
Sisyphus, the son of the god Aeolus, the lord of winds and storms, managed to deceive the god of death Thanatos and was severely punished for this. In the afterlife, Sisyphus is an eternal loser, he is condemned to roll a huge stone up a high steep mountain, which rolls down from this peak every time. This is Sisyphean labor - useless and joyless work that has to be done every day. Well, it’s not for us to tell you...
A resident of Croatia who considers himself the luckiest person in the world - he managed to get out of seven major disasters- and hit the jackpot in the lottery. Moreover, he decided to play the lottery for the first time in the last forty years.
Frane Selak, 74, who won £600,000, said: “I'm going to enjoy my life now. I feel reborn. I know God has been watching over me all these years.”
Seven disasters of Frane Selak:
Train and icy river
The first time the Croatian was truly lucky was in 1962, when the train on which he was traveling from Sarajevo to Dubrovnik derailed and fell into an icy river, Ananova reports.
Then seventeen people drowned, and Frane Selak almost died with them. He managed to swim ashore, suffering from severe hypothermia, shock, bruises and a broken arm.
Airplane and haystack
A year later, he fell out of a DC-8 airplane between Zagreb and Rijeka when the plane's door suddenly burst open during the flight. As a result of this disaster, 19 people died. Selak landed on a haystack and suffered shock, bruises and cuts.
Bus and river
In 1966, the bus in which he was traveling to the city of Split tilted and fell into the river. Four people died. Selak swam ashore with cuts, bruises and, this time, even more shock.
burning car
Disaster number four happened to the Croatian in 1970. The car he was driving on the highway suddenly caught fire. Selak managed to get out of the car a few seconds before the gas tank exploded.
After this incident, his friend began to call the lucky Croatian “Lucky”. “He told me then,” Selak says. - “You can look at everything that happens to you from two sides. Either you are the unluckiest person in the world, or the luckiest.” I preferred the latter."
Hair and a faulty pump
Three years later, Frane Selak suddenly lost almost all the hair on his head. A leaking fuel pump sprayed gasoline directly onto his car's hot engine, fanning the flames through the breather.
Road accident
In 1995, Frane Selak's sixth disaster occurred. On one of the streets of Zagreb he was accidentally hit by a bus. The lucky Croatian escaped with a “slight fright” this time too - he received minor bruises and inevitable shock.
UN truck and mountain gorge
The following year, Selak was driving his car in the mountains when suddenly, as he rounded a bend, he saw a UN truck barreling toward him. His Skoda crashed into a road fence, broke through it and hung on the edge of a cliff. Selak managed to jump out of the car at the last moment. After a short flight, he landed on a tree, from where he was able to follow the flight of his car into a mountain gorge, which exploded 90 meters below him.
Frane Selak married unsuccessfully four times. After his lottery win, he remarks philosophically, “I guess my marriages were disasters too.” With the money he won, Selak decided to buy a house, a car, and a speedboat. After this, he marries his beloved, who is 20 years younger than him.
A player's poker career includes different periods. At a certain period of time, a poker player experiences many winning moments and regularly plays in the black, which naturally satisfies everyone. This time is called upstreak. However, there are no victories without defeats, and the game of poker perfectly demonstrates this expression in practice.
Almost every poker player at least once in his career fell into a losing streak (downstreak), from which not everyone can get out. On bad days, the player's mood is zero, the bankroll gradually decreases and many begin to blame their unlucky fate for everything. But are poker players who cannot control their emotions and get out of a deplorable situation with their heads held high so unlucky? This question will be answered in the affirmative by the stories of people for whom the failures of poker players will seem like just an empty phrase.
Roy Sullivan - struck by lightning seven times
American security inspector national park Shenandoah in Virginia became famous throughout the world for being struck by lightning seven times and even surviving. This result could not be surpassed by more than one person in the world, so Roy was immortalized in the Guinness Book of Records.
The chance that a person will be struck by lightning at least once in his life is 1 in 3,000. The chance that lightning will strike a person 7 times = 1 in 22 septillion.
Kostis Mitsotakis is the only person who did not win the lottery in his village
The story of the Greek director is not as formidable as that of the previous hero, but also deserves special attention. In 2012, almost all media outlets dubbed Kostis the unluckiest person of the year, and one can agree with the editors.
At that time, Mitsotakis lived in the village of Sodeto in northwestern Spain, which has a population of 70 people. In the twelfth year, all the residents of his village purchased El Gordo Christmas lottery tickets, which were distributed by the local housewives association. In the end, it so happened that every single ticket was a winner - the residents divided the sum of 600 million pounds among themselves. And only Kostis was left with nothing, because by chance his house was bypassed.
The chances of winning the El Gordo lottery are 1 in 100,000.
Ivan Lester McGuire - free fall
The US citizen worked as an operator at a parachute school. On another working day, he had to make the jump and capture everything on camera. As a result, he took his camera with him and forgot to put on a parachute.
The chance of dying while skydiving is 1 in 143,000.
Eric Norrie - Danger Magnet
Many people called this American one of the unluckiest people on the planet, with which we can agree. Eric has had many bad experiences throughout his life: he survived an attack by monkeys, was bitten by a rattlesnake, struck by lightning, and a shark tried to kill him. Fortunately, Norrie always managed to get out of every situation alive.
The chances of being attacked by a shark are 1 in 11.5 million.
The chances of being bitten by a venomous snake in the United States are 1 in 37,500 per year.
Henry Siegland - initially dodged the bullet that eventually killed him years later
Not everyone will believe this man’s story, because it looks like fiction. Back in 1883, Henry Siegland abandoned his girlfriend, who could not cope with her emotions and committed suicide in upset feelings.
The girl's brother, beside himself with grief, loaded his gun and headed straight to Henry to avenge his sister's death. When they met, the brother shot Siegland in the head and, deciding that the bullet had reached its target, shot himself. However, it so happened that the bullet ricocheted off into a tree trunk and Henry survived.
A few years later, he decided to cut down this tree so that it would not remind him of those times. Since the tree was very large, Henry blew it up with dynamite. During the explosion, the bullet hit Siegland directly in the head and he died.
Violet Jessop - woman on the ship
Violet worked on the Olympic, which sank. She was on the Titanic, whose fate is known to almost every person. She also stayed on the ship Britannic, which, like previous ships, sank under water.
Melanie Martinez – 5 houses destroyed by hurricanes
A native of Louisiana hates bad weather, because in four terrible elements she lost four houses. The woman's last home was destroyed in 2005 - Hurricane Katrina left virtually no trace of her house.
After another tragedy, the organizers of the popular American TV show decided to help the unfortunate woman and completely restored Melanie’s house, investing more than $20,000 in it. A few years later, the fifth house was destroyed by a hurricane.
The chance of being affected by a major hurricane in Louisiana is 4% per year.
