Our love story
First date
It wasn't the typical first date. I hadn't been on a date in a long time and didn't know Brandon well. I had decided on going to dinner at a pizza place in East Rand Mall. One of my friends worked in the mall, so I thought if the date was horribly awkward, at least I'd have some back up. I arrived about an hour early and was extremely nervous! It felt like that hour took years to pass. Eventually I got the phone call from Brandon to say he was sitting in the restaurant waiting for me. I asked him which table he was sitting at so I could find him, and he said "Come find me, let's see if you recognize me". Needless to say I wasn't too pleased with this idea as I have a terrible memory and wouldn't notice a snake if it was sitting right next to me. So I walk up to the restaurant with my heart beating deafeningly in my ears and my hands shaking.
Engagement
It was the most unexpected, random but yet extremely romantic proposal I could ever imagine. So where to begin… Let’s start with 2 years ago, in June, we had decided to go for a short holiday to Durban with my soon to be mom-in-law, and some family friends. I love going to Durban because a lot of my family live there, so whenever we go, I get to visit them. The trip started like most of our trips to Durban and there was absolutely nothing suspicious that made me suspect anything. I had arranged to go visit my Ouma, Aunt, and Caz on the Saturday for lunch. Saturday morning started like a perfectly normal Saturday morning. I was immensely excited to go visit my Ouma. It came time for us to leave, so Brandon put their address into the GPS and off we go. We were chatting for most of the trip about all sorts of nonsense including how weird Durban’s traffic, driver’s, and roads are. On the highway we were on there were random little roads that come off the highway. Not the roads we are used to, where to get off the highway you take the offramp, no, these were random little narrow lane roads that you’d expect to find somewhere in the country side. Instead here they are out of nowhere coming straight off a massive four lane highway with no robots or stop streets, just a random gap through the barrier where a small tar road appears. So, Brandon decided to go down one of these random little roads so we could see where it leads to. At this point we were almost running late for lunch, so I started stressing because I don’t like being late. Then I realised we are actually on holiday and this is actually interesting, so take a deep breath, put your stress aside, and just go with the flow. Needless to say, this little narrow road led to more little narrow roads, and after turning into a few different roads I had lost track of where we were and where the highway was. The view was absolutely beautiful! All these houses surround by forests of trees and greenery. One of my most favourite things about Durban is all the greenery and how the trees almost overtake the roads. After a while Brandon realised that we were lost and should probably make a U-Turn and go back the way we came. He found this enormous property where the gate was open and he decided that this was the perfect place to make a U-Turn. The property was absolutely breath-taking! Not a house in site, just the long drive way in the middle of a forest of trees. It was June, so the leaves on the trees had turned to Autumn colours and had made a thick carpet of red, orange, and yellow all over the ground. Brandon turned off the driveway and onto the thick carpet of leaves so he could make a U-Turn. As he attempted to reverse it seemed as though the car had gotten stuck. Brandon got out the car to go investigate, I decided to stay in the car. Next thing I know Brandon was by my window telling me to get out the car and come have a look at the tyre. Needless to say, here I started panicking again. All I could think is here we are stuck in the middle of nowhere in this forest on some random person’s property and we have no idea where we are. How were we going to explain to someone where to find us? So, I took a deep breath and opened my door so I could go have a look at the damage. I turn to un-buckle my seat belt and noticed Brandon doing something weird out of the corner of my eye. As I turned to see what Brandon was doing, there he was on one knee in the middle of a forest with this little box in his hand. I am not even sure what he said to me because at that point my brain had hit overload and shutdown! I couldn’t believe this was happening! Eventually I rebooted myself in enough time to hear those magic words “Will you Marry me?”. Needless to say, with the biggest smile on my face I said YES!!!!!! The most unexpected, random, emotional moment of my life. By the way we weren’t stuck and we weren’t lost, Brandon knew exactly where we were the whole time! And I am so happy to say that after all of this we went to go visit my Ouma, and she was the first person to see the ring on my finger! There is nothing more special than knowing that I got to share the most amazing day of my life with my Ouma, Aunt, and Caz. My late Ouma might not be here to see us getting married, but at least she got to share in the day we got engaged.
