Being part of a small community, Rasica and I met when we were just kids. I have always been a close friend of her brother’s, so we stayed in touch as we grew older. As teenagers, we became great friends. We would message each other on AIM about random things going on in our life. We knew there was something between us. We lost touch for a few years, but fate brought us back in each other’s lives towards the end of my time in college. I always knew that I wanted my other half to be someone I could call my best friend, and that was Rasica. I was blessed that she gave me a chance, and now 5 years later, the rest is history.
My earliest memory of Syian is probably when he was about 7 years old and I told him he couldn't hang out with us older cool kids (sorry Syian). Then came along high school, and we became close friends. Friendship blossomed into more, but we knew that the timing wasn't right for us. One day in 2015, Syian randomly messaged me about Drake's album If You're Reading This, It's Too Late. We always had the same taste in music (I used to burn CDs for him in high school), so we reconnected over Drake's epic album. Suddenly, it was as if we were back in high school and nothing had changed. We continued to talk every day for over a year until one day in 2016, we decided that we were each other's forever person...and we never looked back.
I knew that I wanted to propose around her birthday, but I couldn’t make it too obvious. If you know Rasica, you know that she’s a meticulous planner, especially when it comes to birthdays. So, to throw her off course, I fooled her with a nice steak dinner on her birthday. A week later, I told her there was more to her birthday celebration this year. I took her down to her favorite park, Brooklyn Bridge Park, where I had her dream proposal set up on the boardwalk. I was so nervous that I was tripping on my words when I proposed, but I told her that the fact that she still made me so nervous after 4.5 years meant that she was always the one for me. Afterwards, she thought we were just hanging out with our parents at her house, but our friends and I surprised her with an engagement party in her backyard. It was such an eventful evening filled with our closest friends and family, and a day we will never forget for the rest of our lives.