Somewhere beyond the sea

Rachel and Michael have frequently been at the same schools since 2007 attending both Stanford undergrad and UCLA graduate schools together, but somehow never met each other until 2017 (or did they?... more on that later.) In May of 2017 they were both guests at a wedding of mutual friends (thanks Maxine & Alex!) in San Francisco, where Rachel caught Michael's eye. At the end of the night he asked for her phone number, but instead she only let him add her as a Facebook friend. Undeterred, Michael decided his PhD experiments could wait and cancelled his flight back to UCLA, spending the next 2 weeks couch-surfing in the Bay Area determined to woo Rachel. Eventually somehow Michael's passion for the science of sleeping in late convinced Rachel to give him a chance.

Date 0 - Friday: An impromptu meet up at the CoHo on Stanford campus where Michael had to shoo away his nosy wingman/wingwoman from being too obvious. (Yeah, are you sure you really needed that coffee Ed+Karen?) Date 0.5 - Saturday: A slightly less impromptu day that started at San Francisco Union Square where Rachel was volunteering at the Taiwanese Cultural Festival. They had a good time drinking boba and eating 粽子 (including a boxful for the road). From there, they took a long impromptu stroll along the Embarcadero taking in the sights. Dinner was at The Slanted Door where Rachel ordered baby back ribs and discovered Michael's disdain of messy finger foods. The sun had set but they weren't done yet. Decided to watch the acclaimed movie Your Name at the nearby theater. Michael kept trying to hold Rachel's hand in the dark but she was too focused on the amazing animation. She finally held his hand on the car ride home and they shared their first kiss as Michael dropped Rachel off. Date 1 - Sunday: Michael & Rachel's first official planned date, at the Walt Disney Family Museum in the San Francisco Presidio. They admired precious artifacts like Walt Disney's violin and Michael shared his love for the history of all things Disneyland. Afterwards, they took a trip across the Golden Gate Bridge to watch the sunset. (Michael was borrowing Maxine's car that weekend and didn't realize the toll would be charged by license plate. Her dad was very confused to receive a bill 1 month later.)

For an entire month, Michael kept exclaiming to Rachel that it must be destiny that they had somehow been waiting 10 years to meet with so many missed connections. They discovered they had so many mutual friends during their time at Stanford. Michael learned that Rachel was a part of the "Roble dorm letters scandal," where the big block letters ROBLE was mysteriously replaced to spell ROBLY by some mysterious instigators. Rachel learned that the giant "Nyan-cat" cutout during graduation wacky-walk was made by Michael. They learned that at UCLA with Michael in graduate school and Rachel in law school, they were eating the same MSTP seminar food, as Rachel's brother was in the same MD-PhD program as Michael and would bring the same leftovers home. They even learned that in 2014 they were somehow both in Taipei 台北 for New Years Eve, watching the same fireworks show just a few blocks apart (although Rachel was watching from a high-rise skyscraper while Michael was in the street). Finally Rachel couldn't keep it in any longer. After a month of letting Michael think they had never seen each other before, Rachel revealed that they had actually met all the way back in 2007 during Freshman year when a friend had introduced them and even tried to set them up as a couple. They said hello in the hallway once in Stern Hall and then Michael never talked to Rachel again... So turns out it was his own fault he had to wait 10 years to be reunited with Rachel.

Declassified logs from Operation MRY On February 23rd 2019 Michael flew Rachel to one of their favorite towns Monterey, CA to visit the world-famous Monterey Bay Aquarium. They took off from Santa Monica Airport in a Cessna 172RG and followed the gorgeous California coast along Hwy 1, up past Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Big Sur, before finally arriving in Monterey. Santa Monica Airport (SMO) 10:03AM: SMO Tower: "Cessna 78D, right turn at the shoreline approved. Runway 21 cleared for takeoff." Over Santa Barbara (SBA) 10:49AM: Cessna 78D: "Santa Barbara Approach, Cessna 78D 6500 feet VFR to Monterey" SBA Approach: "Man everyone's going to Monterey today. What's happening up there?" Cessna 78D: "Umm... nothing?..." Salinas In-n-Out 10:57AM: Kiwi Team Six assembles at their mission staging ground (and also enjoys a Double Double and fries). Monterey Airport (MRY) 12:22PM: MRY Tower: "Cessna 78D, enter right base, Runway 28L cleared to land." Little did Rachel know that Michael had assembled an elite covert group of co-conspirators designated as "Kiwi Team Six" to help document and celebrate the day. Rachel by no means noticed the camouflaged group of people wearing sunglasses and hats on the airport terminal balcony taking photos. Nor did she think it was strange that Michael told he to just leave their luggage with the airport front desk clerk. They took a short car ride to the Monterey Bay Aquarium and began a carefully choreographed route, with Kiwi Team Six hot on their trail. At one point, a Kiwi Team agent was spotted by Rachel and had to abort to maintain the integrity of the others. Michael & Rachel enjoyed their favorite Open Ocean exhibit with free swimming tuna and their favorite Mola Mola Sunfish. At the end of the day with the vast Pacific Ocean and Kiwi Team Six by their side, Michael got down on one knee and proposed. #OperationMRY comes from the airport code for Monterey airport (MRY) as well as being short for "Michael & Rachel say Yes!"