we're getting married

Andrea's POV: I met Christian on the first day of our freshman year of high school in Chinese class. Our seats got assigned next to each other and we had to pass around name tags. So I passed them over, "here you go!" Later in the semester, we ended up having some mutual friends, but never really talked much. One day, I even saw him doing some math homework and tried asking him if he had the same Algebra 2 teacher as me and he said "yeah." On the last day of school my best friend, Sam (now maid of honor :)), and I ran into him and a couple other friends in the hallway and we hung out the rest of the day, and got Rita's Italian ice and pizza after school. We even invited them to Six Flags with us a few days later. Our friend groups collided and we ended up all hanging out all summer long. Christian's POV: Andrea and I first met during our freshman year of high school in Chinese class. We sat next to each other and occasionally partnered together for some of the class assignments. We didn't talk much outside of those activities since I was mostly just interested in learning Chinese for the first time. My first impression of Andrea though was that she was full of life and very energetic as she socialized with her middle school friends that had taken the class before.

Andrea's POV: Going to Six Flags with all of our friends was our favorite thing to do in high school. We went so often that we had a routine of what rollercoasters we did in what order. Specifically, we always tried to go on Nitro during sunset. So that's what we did, but this time as we were on the ride waiting for the drop, Christian asked me out. At the end of the ride, I was smiling and he looked at me and asked "did you say yes?" I laughed and said that I did and all of our friends cheered for us. To top it all off, the operator asked us if we wanted to go on a second time. Nitro will now forever be my favorite rollercoaster :) Christian's POV: On the last day of the school year, our friend groups ran into each other as we were roaming the halls, and we ended up spending the rest of the day jumping from classroom to classroom and just hanging out (the last few days of school were never taken seriously). That unexpected interaction led to our friend groups hanging out many times that summer. Our favorite hangout activity was going to six flags; we found ourselves going there more than five times that summer alone. On our third visit, having gotten to know Andrea much more by then, I decided it was time to ask her out officially. So on our last ride at Nitro, I finally asked her at the very top. I didn’t anticipate that asking her out right before the biggest drop would make it hard to hear her answer, but luckily after asking again once the ride calmed down a bit, I heard her say yes. We were both overjoyed and even more excited as the ride operator let us go another round on the ride.

Andrea's POV: We were on a family to trip to the Philippines and we were spending a few days on the island of Boracay. After a long day of swimming, doing excursions, and walking through town, Christian suggested we go watch the sunset with my parents. I suggested that we could sit by the beach in front of our hotel, but he insisted that we go to the northernmost beach where the sunset was the best. So we took a taxi cart there and as we were walking onto the sand, I saw a few of my relatives who also happened to be there. So we took a lot of pictures and I enjoyed the sunset. All of a sudden, Christian asked for my purse to look for his sunglasses. I was confused, "you don't need your sunglasses, the sun is going down!" But what he took out of my bag was not his sunglasses, but a ring box. My jaw dropped and all I thought was "What? There's no way!" The rest was pretty much a blur, but he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. :) Christian's POV: Andrea’s family and I travelled to the Philippines in February 2024. On February 21, Andrea and I had an early breakfast at the Boracay beach hotel. I had planned that day to be the right time to finally propose. Before fully committing though, I was missing one important part, Andrea’s parents’ blessing. I originally planned to ask for their blessing the day before, but the hotel timeshare info sessions beat me to their time, so the only chance I had was that morning. I quickly excused myself from the table to “go to the bathroom” and started running back towards her parents’ room as soon as I was out of sight. I may have rushed it more than I wanted to, but I received their blessing with joy and was able to move forward with the plan. I helped convince Andrea to do a family sunset photo at a famous beach spot, and Andrea’s parents helped coordinate everyone else involved to meet us there too. We went about our day casually, walking around the boardwalk, grabbing lunch at Island Chicken Inasal, and swimming at the hotel pool, but inside I was also nervously multitasking between planning the timing of the proposal details and rehearsing my prepared proposal speech. Somehow the timing all worked out, and her parents and us were on our way to Lambros Point. I don’t remember anything during that ride except for me continuing to rehearse my lines. Once we got to the beach, we met up with Ryan, Sara, and DJ along with a few other family members. I was impressed that everyone got there in time for sunset and even more surprised that Andrea didn’t seem any bit suspicious up to this point. After many family pictures with the sun finally set, I asked Andrea’s mom to take a picture of just me and Andrea. After a few photos, I asked Andrea if I could see her purse to get my sunglasses and instead pulled out the ring box. I proceeded by scrambling to get the words I have practiced so much out of my mouth, then got down on one knee and presented Andrea with the ring. She was also nervous and shocked but composed a yes, and we all walked back towards the hotel to eat and celebrate our engagement.