There is a popular story on social networks and entertainment sites: one girl prayed that God would send her a hamster, and soon the animal literally fell on her head. We have verified the accuracy of such publications.
The viral posts say: “This incident once happened in Sweden during a reality TV show. One person told me why his conscience was tormenting him: “When I was little, my friend and I decided to parachute a hamster from the balcony of a high-rise building. We made a basket, a parachute, put the hamster in the basket and released it. But the unexpected happened. A gust of wind picked up our parachute and carried it somewhere far away. I still can’t forget about it. How could I do this to a living person? creature?" And then suddenly the phone rang in the studio. The caller asked: “Did this happen in such and such a year?” The man answered in the affirmative. "In the summer, when was the Stockholm city festival?" “Yes, yes, yes,” the man hurried. "I know what happened to your hamster." "What happened to him?" — the surprised studio guest couldn’t believe it. “My daughter asked me for a hamster for a long time,” the woman continued. “I once answered her: “Don’t even ask. We will have a hamster only if the Lord God Himself gives it to you." The daughter childishly raised her hands to the sky and said: “Lord God, give me a hamster!” Then we went to the city for a holiday. Suddenly my daughter said: “Mommy, it seems to me that God answered the prayer! Look!" At that time, a hamster in a basket fell right from the sky on a parachute into her hands." Such publications can be found in Telegram, Facebook And "VKontakte", on entertaining websites and in collections jokes.
In Russian, this story began to spread from 2014, and at first it was published only Christian sites and blogs. With its help, their authors tried to prove that God answers the prayers of believers and that miracles can happen even in everyday life.
Searching for keywords in English did not bring significant results, but in Swedish it turned out to be much more productive. The earliest mention of this story found by Verified is dated October 2007. Swedish Internet user with the nickname Enigma then wrote on his blog: “I was listening to a program on [public radio station] P3 the other day, and somehow there was a conversation about strange animal stories - people were calling and telling them. I almost died laughing when one guy, with slight remorse, told me about a hamster that he or his friend sent flying with a parachute - they wanted to see if he could fly like that. Only then the wind picked up the hamster and carried it far, far across the square, and it landed right in front of some mother with her little daughter. Imagine: such a hamster is flying with a parachute! A-ha-ha-ha."
Author of another blog in an entry from December 29, 2008 told an almost identical story, only it involved not a hamster, but a guinea pig. In addition, there was the name of the program in which her friend heard the story on Christmas Eve - Karlavagnen ("Big Dipper"). This is a popular evening talk show that has been broadcast on Swedish public radio since 1993 - although on station P4, not P3, as mentioned in the Enigma blog.
On the radio station’s website there is a fragment of the broadcast with the title “The guinea pig that flew by parachute" In the recording, a man called the studio named Anders Emmerstrand says:
“It happened sometime in the late 50s in Stockholm. Me and my friend Einar - we were about ten years old. Einar finally received the gift of the guinea pig he had dreamed of for so long. We took her on a toy train. She felt great. We had a lot of fun with the guinea pig. This was the most expensive thing for Einar. Then we built a parachute for the guinea pig. They took a plastic bag, a ball of yarn, and so on. Einar went downstairs to the sidewalk, and I took the elevator up to the tenth floor of the building and went out onto a balcony area. I stand there, leaning over the railing, shouting down, asking if everything is clear. Einar below shouts that everything is okay, and I release the guinea pig into the air, the parachute opening beautifully. But the guinea pig does not fall down - a gust of wind blows. A gust of wind blows the guinea pig across the rooftops towards the center of Stockholm."
According to Anders, he and his friend were never able to find the animal and he still doesn’t know what happened to it next. At this moment, the presenter says: “Believe it or not, we have a person who knows,” and broadcasts a call from listener Else Parment from the city of Umeå. She said:
“We lived in Stockholm, in Farst. Me, my husband and daughter were in Hötorjet Square. My daughter looks at the sky and says: “Dad, look, my guinea pig is flying there, God sent me a guinea pig.” She prayed every evening to be given a guinea pig. Here's your explanation, Anders. The guinea pig went to the girl who wanted it so badly. She said every evening after evening prayer: “God, don’t forget, I want a guinea pig.” And it’s strange that you didn’t hear anything, because there was a whole commotion on Hötorjet. The guinea pig got stuck in a tree on the way down after flying. My husband wanted to climb the scaffolding. The police called a fire truck and we found a guy who had climbed onto the fire escape. He took my cane and hooked the plastic thing with the stick.”
The file was uploaded to the radio station’s website on August 22, 2011, but the commentary notes: listeners liked this story so much that its recording was repeated. The date of the live broadcast was not indicated, however, on one of the Swedish forums discussing this story, we found memories of those who heard it back in 2003. At the time of publication of this analysis, “Verified” was unable to obtain information from station P4 about when this conversation was aired for the first time.
In 2012, I published this story (in the version with a hamster) in my magazine one of the largest parish communities of the Lutheran Church of Sweden. The article said: “When they told me this story, I immediately remembered the words of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount: “Ask, and it will be given to you” (Matt. 7:7). The story is understandable, but there is something surprising in it that points to God's providence and the presence of God in our lives. It was a wonderful coincidence that these two people were able to contact each other after so many years and solve the mystery. An unusual greeting from heaven!”
Russian Union of Evangelical Lutheran Churches supported tight communications with the Church of Sweden. Probably thanks to this, the touching story migrated to Russian-language Protestant websites, and from there to blogs and social networks.
Thus, the viral publications appear to tell a true story that took place in the 1950s in Stockholm. Only in reality it featured a guinea pig instead of a hamster, and its participants talked about what happened to them live on a popular talk show on Swedish radio, and not on Swedish television.
Cover photo: Perplexity
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