09 Jan Best Friends Of 60 Years Discover They’re Actually Brothers Completely By Accident

Some of us are lucky enough to say we’ve had a best friend since our early school years. You’ll constantly talk about growing old together, raising families and being best man or maid of honor at each other’s weddings, but sometimes life can get in the way and the two of you drift apart.

Well, that certainly wasn’t the case for Alan Robinson and Walter Macfarlane, who became best friends 60 years ago after meeting in the sixth grade while growing up in Oahu, Hawaii.

They were inseparable as children, aged just 15 months apart, both born and raised on the beautiful island, and then going on to play football together at Punahou. There was a remarkable relationship between Alan and Walter, but little did they know just how close they really were.

Both men had grown up never knowing their real parents. Macfarlane explained that he never knew his real father and that Robinson was adopted as a child. Robinson said, “I had a younger brother that I lost when he was 19, so I never had nieces or nephews. I thought I’ll never know my birth mother, I’ll never have any nieces or nephews.”

But fast forward to 2017, and without telling each other, both friends decided to use DNA matching site Ancestry.com in order to find their real families.

Macfarlane’s daughter Cindy Macfarlane-Flores explained, “We started digging into all the matches he started getting.”

The top match was a person with the username ‘Robi737’ and the test showed they had several matches including identical X chromosomes, meaning there was a strong chance they were siblings.

It then clicked. Cindy explained, “as a nickname, everybody called [Alan] ‘Robi’ and he flew 737s for Aloha Airlines, he was a pilot”.

Macfarlane had been searching for answers about his father, but ironically, Robinson also used the website to discover more about his family.

After what must have been an emotional phone call, the best friends figured out they shared the same birth mother.

“It was a shock,” Macfarlane said.

“Yeah, it was shock, definitely. And then we thought about it and compared forearms,” Robinson said.

“Yeah, hairy arms, that did it!” Macfarlane shouted.

The two friends-turned-brothers, shared the news with their friends and family on Saturday night.

“It was an overwhelming experience, it’s still overwhelming. I don’t know how long it’s going to take for me to get over this feeling.” Robinson revealed.

The brothers are now are making plans to travel and enjoy retirement together. “This is the best Christmas present I could ever imagine having,” Robinson told reporters, as his now-niece, Macfarlane-Flores, echoed, “It really is a Christmas miracle and we’re just so happy that we found it”.

The post Best Friends Of 60 Years Discover They’re Actually Brothers Completely By Accident appeared first on Viral Thread.