It's funny sometimes how the universe conspires to bring people together against seemingly astronomical odds. Mbali and Sam grew up on nearly completely opposite sides of the globe: Mbali grew up in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa and Sam in Denver, Colorado, United States. If that wasn't strange enough, they met in a foreign country on a third continent: Sweden. They came to Sweden for different reasons: Sam came to start his PhD while Mbali came to work as an au pair and eventually as a school teacher. They also moved around in very different social circles; they didn't have any friends in common. While Sam was busy with his PhD work and Mbali with her teaching, they both managed to find sometime to join an online dating site. They happened to match with each other and they connected over their love of travel, food, and meeting new people. It was at this point that Sam needed to defend the first half of his PhD work (called a Licentiate Thesis in Sweden), which required his full attention. He didn't respond to Mbali's last message for a couple of weeks. Once his workload decreased, he came back to the conversation with Mbali. Fortunately, Mbali had not unmatched him in the meantime. What should he say to her after such a long pause? There was only one option: apologize for the delay and cut to the chase. He asked her out on a date and, after she returned from her travels to visit some friends in Poland, she accepted. Two days after Sam had defended his Licentiate Thesis, they had their first date. Later on in their relationship, Mbali told Sam that she was only a few days away from deleting the online dating app when he had messaged her, further adding to the improbability of them ever meeting, let alone get married. Mbali and Sam sometimes wonder what the probability of them ever meeting was, especially in such a distant land. Needless to say, it's probably not very high.