Alex’s perspective: Jeannie and I met when we locked eyes across a crowded Hinge dating app. Fortunately for me, we both swiped right, and we began chatting immediately. Whether you know her as Jeannie, Virginia, Virjeannie, or something different altogether, you probably know how… delayed…she can be at responding to messages. After a few slow messages back and forth, I hail mary-ed a dinner date question and we agreed to grab sushi. We met at one of my favorite restaurants, Yume Sushi in Falls Church. After some wonderful conversation and some bangin suush, we eventually discovered that I knew her younger brother through one of my college roommates. Jeannie sent a picture of me to her brother to which he responded, “that’s Maggie’s old roommate. Nice guy”. With that validation, there was nothing standing in the way to stop Jeannie from falling deeper and deeper in love with my charm, my wit, but most importantly, my beauty. After dinner, I walked her to her car where we shared an awkward first kiss as I exhaled directly onto her face. Lucky for me, that didn’t stop me from getting a second date. The rest, as they say, is history. Jeannie's perspective: After finally giving in to signing up for Hinge, I ended up swiping on the guy Hinge deemed “Most Compatible” for me. He had a handsome picture feeding a giraffe and another picture holding a cute little dachshund, so how could I say no? Shortly after Christmas, we set a date to meet at Yume, a delicious sushi restaurant in Falls Church. One of my Hinge prompts was “Prove to me that chivalry isn’t dead.” And boy did he prove it. He was a gentleman from the start. From sending me a lengthy paragraph about how to find parking at the restaurant, to saving the last piece of each type of sushi for me in case I wanted it. It’s like he knew tasty food was the way to my heart. The conversation flowed so easily and in many fun directions. That day, I learned that one of my green flags was a grown man confessing that one of his own red flags is that he loves Pokemon. (Little did I know at the time that he would totally trade me in for a super rare Pokemon card). Later into the night, the conversation came across mutual acquaintances. I’ve never met him before but he’s an Asian who went to Virginia Tech, so of course we would have some mutual acquaintances. Little did I know that one of our mutual friends would be my own little brother! The cherry on top was finding out Ben only had good things to say about him. Before the date ended, we already had our second date planned for a couple days later on New Year’s Day of 2023. What wasn’t planned was the date turning into a 10 hour event starting with a matinee movie, driving to Lighthouse Tofu only to find that it was closed, choosing to eat at the K-Market food court as a delicious backup, grabbing drinks at Guapo’s, then ending with a walk around Shirlington. After all that, I still didn’t want the night to end and absolutely could not wait to see him again. Shortly after the second date, we discovered that we were both Leos. His response, in true puntastic Alex fashion, was, “I can be your ‘mane’ man. I ain’t ‘lion’! We would have a ‘Simba’otic relationship!” And that was the moment I knew I had to cancel my Hinge account. Today, I can’t wait to keep planning dates together for the rest of our lives, as husband and wife. Thanks Hinge!

Alex’s perspective: Jeannie and I both love Japanese food (see Yume story), culture, efficiency, etc. When we decided to take a trip there together, I knew that it would be the perfect place for me to propose. I worked with a Tokyo based photographer to choose the ideal location. Since we were planning to visit during the spring, I decided on Shinjuku National Park to capitalize on the beautiful cherry blossoms. The morning of our first full day in Japan, I convinced my fiancée to be to wake up early and take cherry blossom pictures at the park. We arrived at the park gates around 8:45 AM knowing the park opened at 9 AM. Unfortunately for us, the line to get in was several hundred people long by this point. Apparently I wasn’t the only one with the plan of getting to the park early to beat the crowds. However, the photographer that I hired happened to be the 10th or so person in line. We hopped in line with our photographer and I introduced Jeannie to her. At this point, you could see the dots connecting in Jeannie’s head as we stood in line. “Alex told me to wear something cute? He suggested that I curl my hair? He hired a photographer? Why did I make a big fuss about waking up early and scootin our butts over here!?" Needless to say, the jig was up. Once we were in, we headed straight for the location my photographer had identified. After a couple of pictures, I knelt to the ground and completely blanked out. The entire speech that I had been practicing came out as a nervous, “hey hun, you know I love you, right?” At some point in my rambling, apparently I asked if she would marry me. She said yes, and they lived happily ever after. Jeannie's perspective: The morning of our first full day of Japan, Alex had planned for us to visit the cherry blossoms. It also happened to be the coldest day of the 2 weeks we were there! So when I asked if we could reschedule the Cherry blossom day, of course he said no. It also had to be the day we took cute selfies so I had to dress up and look cute. He was probably already so stressed, and I didn’t help at all by being pouty about wearing a dress in the cold weather. We planned to head to the cherry blossoms and this man was in such a rush, he said no to stopping by a bakery. I should’ve known something was up when he said no to tasty pastries. But it wasn’t until we got to the line of the cherry blossom park when he pulled me to the front of the line that I really started to have an inkling. Shortly after I said “it’s not nice to cut the line!”, he introduced me to our photographer, Miki, who would be taking our photos. Then I knew. Miki led us to a beautiful cherry blossoms tree she had scoped out the day before. On the way there, we ended up seeing another couple getting engaged. Secretly, I was really hoping I was next! Then after awkwardly standing and posing together in front of the tree, he turned to me and said, “Hey Hun, you know I love you right?” Then popped the question. Needless to say, I wasn’t thinking about how cold it was anymore. I was too busy thinking about all the reasons to say yes! ❤️