An email mixup, and how a South African was inspired by a rural N.S. Lions Club

For more than two years, Chester Rudolph looked forward to his weekly email updates from a Lions Club in the rural eastern Nova Scotia community of Sherbrooke. 

There was just one odd thing — he lives on the other side of the world in Cape Town, South Africa, and was never supposed to be getting the emails in the first place.

An email address mix-up meant Rudolph, who shares the name with a bona fide St. Mary's District Lions Club member, was accidentally receiving correspondence from the group since at least June 2019.

"They were coming straight to me and I was enjoying reading them every week," he told CBC Radio's Information Morning on Tuesday. 

In December, Rudolph pointed out the mistake in an email to the club, explaining how his family was inspired by the work of the Lions Club to give back to families in their own community. 

"I think most people would think an email like that would be some kind of a spam or a scam going on, so it was really, really nice to get an email back," Rudolph said.

The story of how the missent emails resulted in an unlikely connection across continents was first reported by The Guysborough Journal.

Hear Chester Rudolph from South Africa and Nancy Chaston from Sherbrooke meet over the phone:

Nancy Chaston, the club's secretary, thought she was emailing club information to member Chester Rudolph. He once told her he wasn't getting her emails so she suggested he check his spam folder.

When Chaston didn't hear back, she assumed the emails were indeed ending up where they were supposed to be.

The St. Mary's District Lions Club meets twice a month, and Chaston's emails to the group include meeting minutes and agendas, schedules, requests and updates on fundraising initiatives.

"So there's nothing that Chester does not know about our Lions club here," she chuckled. 

Rudolph kept meaning to write to Chaston and tell her he wasn't the real Chester Rudolph, but he said life and maybe a bit of laziness got in the way.

But in December, he learned of a recent Lions initiative to help five families over the holidays, and he decided to email the group.

"The reason I'm sending this to all of you is just to show that the hard work and time given to help communities does not go unnoticed and even inspires those 15,174 km away," he wrote.

He said he had been inspired by the Lions initiative, and that his family had decided to put together 24 hampers with food and toiletries to deliver to people in need. 

"How I came into your mailing list. I honestly do not know, but I find myself looking forward to reading what is happening on the opposite side of the world," Rudolph wrote. 

Spreading kindness across continents 

Chaston said she was in "total shock" when she received the unexpected response from South Africa shortly after Christmas. 

"My first reaction was to go out to our members and say, 'Look, folks, I made a big mistake,' but we just never know what our little bit of kindness does and how far it spreads," she said. 

She also apologized to Nova Scotia's Chester Rudolph and promised to add his correct email address to the list. 

As for Rudolph in South Africa, he's no longer going to receive weekly emails from the club, but would like to keep connected with the members in Sherbrooke. 

"It would be nice every now and again to drop an email back and forth with Nancy and the Lions," he said. 

"Maybe I can start some kind of a little community thing [here] and we can keep each other in the loop on what's happening on other sides of the world."