It sounds cliche to say it all started with a swipe, but that's pretty much how it went. Alyssa was in the US but swiped on Tinder as if she was in Doha, which messed with the location settings and somehow, Matt, all the way in Bahrain, made it into her potential matches. They matched and immediately realized that with living in different countries, friendship was the likely path forward. But days-long conversations led to a feeling of more which led Matt to book a ticket to visit a girl he'd never met. Matt visited Alyssa in Doha at the end of September 2021 after 2 months of messages. There was a pretty immediate sense of ease and a spark that never quite went away. They dated long-distance for the rest of the school year, and in August of 2022, Matt moved to Doha where they live now with their two dogs, Tully and Darcy.