One single thread of gold tied me to you

Some may call it chance - we call it fate. Ali and I met on Valentine's Day in the Los Angeles airport before boarding our group flight to Sydney, Australia. Though we went to different colleges, we both participated in the same study abroad program at the University of Sydney, along with our officiant Caitlin. As I was the last of our ~60 person group to arrive due to delays, Ali immediately looked at me and said, "Hey, go grab a burger while I watch your stuff. It's a long flight." After grabbing food, I joined the rest of the group playing spoons while waiting for the plane to board. Ali, Caitlin and I hit it off immediately, asking questions about where we came from and why we chose Sydney. Although I sat in the very last row of the plane (actually the last row, unable to lean back for 16 hours), both Ali and Caitlin waited for me after landing in Australia and we never spent a day apart for the next 4 month.

If there is one thing to know about Ali, it's that she's a major pop-culture buff. So when she saw that Katy Perry was going to be on The Morning Show in downtown Sydney, we immediately made plans to wake up early, skip class and wait outside the studio. We showed up to a nearly empty crowd, said hello to Katy and Ali even got her iPhone signed. It happened so fast, but we had already decided to skip our entire day of school and had no intention of returning to campus. We spent the rest of the day walking around and exploring the downtown area. Being new to the city, we had no idea how the buses or trains worked, so we walked through the rain to our now favorite place in the city, Darling Harbour. We spent the whole day talking - about our lives, friends, family, school, plans for the future, past relationships, everything. I felt immediately drawn to Ali, as did she to me. It was one of my favorite days from our time in Australia and I owe Katy Perry a HUGE thank you for bringing us together that day.