World's tallest man feared he would step on world's shortest
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The world’s tallest man revealed that he asked Guinness World Records officials to keep him away from the world’s shortest man when they met, because he feared that he would step on him.
Guinness World Records holder Sultan Kösen, an 8-foot-3 man from Turkey, met the world’s shortest man, Chandra Bahadur Dangi, in London in 2014.
Dangi, who was from India, stood at 1 foot, 9½ inches before he died in 2015.
“I kept asking officials to keep them away from me,” Kösen told Turkish YouTuber Ruhi Cenet. “I was very afraid to accidentally step on them and break their bodies.”
However, Kösen said in 2014 that the unlikely duo hit it off.
“I hope from now on we become really good friends and do more things together,” Kösen said, according to the Mirror. “I’m inviting Chandra to Turkey. Hopefully, he will come.”
Kösen, 40, also met the world’s shortest woman — Indian actress Jyoti Kisanji Amge, who is 2 feet, ¾ inch tall — while in Egypt in 2018.
Kösen, who still holds the tallest living man in the world title, revealed that when he met the smallest people, he couldn’t actually hear anything they said, because he was so tall.
“I never heard what they said. They talked, but I didn’t hear their voices,” said Kösen, who Guinness World Records said in 2009 was the first man over 8-feet tall measured by the organization “for more than 20 years.”
Kösen almost lost his crown in 2022 when Sulemana Abdul Samed, 29, from Ghana claimed that he measured a whopping 9 feet, 6 inches. However, it was later revealed that the equipment measuring Samed was faulty, thus allowing Kosen to keep his title.
According to the world’s tallest living man, his height came at a price. Kösen revealed that he was unable to go to school because he couldn’t fit in the chairs and has never been able to hold down a job due to his stature.
“I’ve worked in various jobs, but never had a stable one,” he said, noting that his primary source of income now is being a record holder and traveling all over the world.
However, he’s never gotten tired of people gawking at him.
“A person should do what he does with love,” Kösen said.
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