How We Met
It all started with a swipe on Tinder one Sunday afternoon. This guy looked cute, and I noticed we worked at the same company. I was just an intern there, so I was dying for any chance at a full-time job. I swiped, started a casual conversation, and agreed to lunch a few days later. After instantly clicking, I knew it had to be more than a potential future “in” at the company.
We bonded over a few more meet-ups within the week, but a few days later, I was heading back to school to finish my senior year! Eugene visited me a week into school. We saw each other a few more weekends and talked endlessly until we realized we started dating without an official start date.
We stayed together during all of my travels: Eau Claire, Washington, D.C., and Madison. It wasn’t until our fifth year together that we lived in the same zip code. Otherwise, we lived 30+ minutes away. Eugene put in a lot of effort to visit me on the weekends. His loved visiting me in DC. During that trip, we woke up one morning and spontaneously headed to NYC for a few days. Lesson learned: never take a car through New York tolls ($$$).
We share extreme wanderlust and a passion for traveling. Together, we visited 17+ states together and over eight countries, including India! Most recently we toured Europe over winter break, where we hiked in the Swiss Alps and Eugene proposed in Prague (more to come on that in a bit)!
On the weekends, we fell in love with each other as we explored the outdoors. Our most important and special memories were formed over s’mores, hiking, and state parks. My most laughable memory with Eugene and the outdoors is when he convinced me to hike the Grand Canyon- down and up- in one day.
How He Asked
It was New Year’s Eve. At this point in the trip, I was tired. Nevertheless, he convinced me to catch sunrise at the St. Charles Bridge in Prague, Czech Republic. While on the bridge, he was hoping someone randomly on the bridge could assist in capturing the moment. The first person he asked didn’t even know how to work an iPhone. I had no idea why this was SO frustrating, but now it all makes sense.
After watching the most beautiful sunrise, we walked towards the water with a little bit of cotton candy sky remaining. Little did I know that this photo would be the last one before the proposal! I sprinted towards the area because the sunrise was on its way out. Eugene said he knew then that that’s when he had to propose officially. As he followed me, he grabbed the ring from his pocket.
He started saying all sorts of sweet things and fell to his knee, asking for my hand in marriage. At this point, I blacked out and started to bawl hysterically (literally looked like the meme of Kim Kardashian crying). I apparently said yes, because I don’t remember. Thankfully some thoughtful man from Atlanta caught a few photos of our moment! His camera was in some different settings that didn’t make it perfect for this kind of shot, but either way, I’m SO thankful we have some photos of it. <3
Originally posted on “How They Asked” and posted to this blog with permission. This post was tweaked from the original.