January 2 1984, I attended the 70th Rose Bowl game . It was very unusual for the game to be held on the 2nd, only because the 1st fell on a Sunday. I had delayed my trip to Hawaii . I went to LAX to catch my flight. I was standing in line for my boarding pass and noticed a very pretty girl in line. She had distinctive brown flowing hair. She stepped out of the line and turned an looked at me. At least that's what I thought she was doing. We had eye contact. I inaccurately characterized this as "optic sex" later. I learned from the girl that she was looking at the clock over my head and never saw me! I marched onto the plane and saw the brown haired girl. I looked at my boarding pass and realized I was sitting next to her in row 21 I had seat J and she had H. I smiled at my good fortune. I got pretty nervous and did not speak to her until our flight was in its initial descent. She was so much prettier when I finally talked to her, She was coming back home from a wedding in Colorado . I launched into my favorite wedding plan stories. She seemed mildly amused. Despite my awkwardness we did connect. She could see that I needed an assist, gave me her phone number and suggested we get together. We walked off the plane together fully engaged in each other, so much so I walked right by my sister who said to herself, "Who is that woman?" It was her future sister in law! We dated across the Pacific for 9 months, married in 18 months and just celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary.
5
After seeing the film, A Room With A View, in 1987 I was determined to visit Florence, Italy. In 1989, I had my chance, following a scientific meeting in Budapest. I traveled to Italy for a one week stay in Florence and on my last night there attended a concert of overtures to Italian operas. During intermission, I began a conversation with the man seated next to me and discovered that he was a French composer. After the concert we shared ice cream at the Rivoire Restaurant on the Piazza della Signoria and he invited me to join him for lunch the next day.
Our shared lunch on a balcony above the Arno River overlooking the lovely Ponte Vecchio was magical. I left Florence for a one week stay in Paris where we spent every day together. Six months later, he made his first trip to the U.S. for a three week visit. We continued our transatlantic visits for six years and in August, 1995 were married.
We discovered that James Ivory, the director of A Room With A View, was a University of Oregon graduate, and that his papers were stored in the library. We visited and enjoyed looking through everything related to the film. Mr. Ivory responded to a letter we wrote him and we were thrilled to meet him later when he visited the library.
After I retired, we split our time between Paris and Corvallis. Sadly, our wonderful years together ended with his death last March, but I have been happy to reflect upon our wonderful partnership that lasted for almost 29 years.
3
This is the story of my friend's parents, but it's too good not to share:
It was sometime in the 80s and my friend's mother lived in East Germany. She was desperate to travel and the only way then was to apply to a guided trip to a foreign communist country. Luckily, she got accepted to go on a trip to Russia. On the bus there, she met her tour guide.
After two weeks he proposed to her on the Red Square. They have been married for over thirty years!
2
We were strangers on a 1965 college charter from Kennedy to Amsterdam, and our plane developed engine trouble, landing in Iceland for repairs; so we met in the terminal hospitality suite thoughtfully provided by the airline. We talked, found some background in common, sat together on the plane and in Amsterdam got a pension just to catch up on sleep. Dinner that night at the famous Five Flies, followed by partying with some locals we met and lo, a relationship began to grow. This led to a decision that while we’d make no commitments for the summer, at least we would stay together for a while, maybe as far as Belgium, and from there, maybe together at least to Paris, then to Pamplona, eventually Athens and on and on. Our unplanned itinerary took through 15 countries over 60 plus days on a motor scooter and young love blossomed.
Back home we enjoyed a long distance romance for a year but I was drafted after finishing law school and sent to Vietnam. We lost touch, until about 40 years later. I decided to call Skidmore and asked how to contact her, but the best they would offer was to take my information and if she wanted to she’d call me. She did call and we shared wonderful memories, much as we had done on that first meeting in the terminal in Iceland.
1
I was heading back to Washington from Boston on the Acela Express. She boarded at Route 128 and sat next to me. I offered to charge her phone and thus began a great conversation that didn't end until we reached her destination at Penn Station. As she left the train , we maintained eye contact and couldn't stop smiling at each other. We also didn't exchange names or numbers. I haven't run into her since then and she remains on my mind. Cursed missed opportunity!
1
A true not-love story: I was a flight attendant. I was based in London, flew to Washington DC, and got pulled for a trip to Miami, where I was then pulled to fly to Antigua with a 2 night layover. The crew were all paired off, so I was at the beach-front hotel alone.
I went for a swim in the beautiful cove, dotted with yachts. Soon, I noticed a gorgeous sun-tanned god with wind-swept hair and a white linen shirt. I called up and said hello. He invited me to come aboard. He was charming, a perfect gentleman. We had a great conversation, and it turned out he was on vacation on his family's yacht and would be returning home to the UK soon. It was fate! He lived about an hour's train ride from me. I gave him my contact info and hoped I would hear from him.
I wanted to call everyone and tell them I had just met my husband-to-be. My heart was filled with lust, but I also wondered if he would call once he returned home. Imagine my joy when the phone rang about a week later. He wanted to come to London and take me out.
The day arrived. The doorbell rang. I opened it, and....what happened?!? He was wearing a suit with white sports socks. His hair was slicked with gel. He took me to a restaurant and ordered my meal, filled with meat, even though I had told him I was a vegetarian. He was boring and pretentious. He got rip-roaring drunk and missed his train home, so I had to let him sleep on the sofa. It's safe to say, I cancelled the wedding.
5
Not me.. but my parents..
They met on their 'senior trip' in HS in 1961. Their classes were so small that several schools got together to charter a bus for a trip to Washington DC. Dad's class got on last so he and his best friend had to split up and sit with two different girls. The story is that there was a coin toss. My dad always claimed that he was the winner. They were together until he passed away.
2
On June 12, 1984, I missed my flight to New York City after horrendous LAX traffic. I caught the next available flight, and sat one seat away from Jan and kibitzed on her conversation with the man between us.
She talked about her college experience, and we shared UC Santa Barbara as an alma mater. The other impressive thing about the first leg of the flight was when I ripped open my salad dressing packet and dumped it into our adjoining neighbor's lap.
On the flight from Dallas to NYC, the middle seat was empty so I scooted over and we had a lovely, hilarious, and flirty chat the entire way.
We awkwardly decided to meet up in the city, and watched game seven of the Lakers/Celtics NBA championship, and by the night's end I was truly in love.
The story continues, but let me cut to the chase: tomorrow is our 30th anniversary.
-- Randy Campbell
15
My wife and I met 30 years ago at lost baggage at Stapleton International Airport in Denver. She was coming back from North Carolina and I was coming back from Pensacola changing planes in Atlanta. When we arrived in Denver our bag did not. While waiting in
line to fill out the forms to find our bags she was behind me. We started talking while filling out our forms. I offered her a ride home which she accepted, gave her my business card, and our bags arrived the next day. She called posing as a Delta clerk asking if my bags arrived. The next Saturday we went out and it was all over but the shouting. We have had a wonderful 30 years together with 20 years of
marriage, getting married 10 years to the day that we met.
2
On my commuter train, I faced standing passengers. Seeing a bag on a seat, I sharply said to the lady, “Would you MIND if I sit down?” Regretting my tone, I apologized, leading to conversations with this elegant young woman with an exotic accent. Her story of a perilous wartime childhood, coming to America, and five difficult years in NYC, being fired from modeling work due to her German origin.
She said that I could call in two weeks after I asked her to have dinner with me. Her "call in two weeks” seemed to be a subtle brushoff! Well, I found the courage and audacity to call her that same evening! She skeptically agreed to meet me at a restaurant. Our relationship became closer and in December, she refused my marriage proposal! I became acutely aware that she had some concerns that compelled her to return to her home. She promised to decide whether to return to marry me or to remain in her ancestral home. Well, in 1959, my elation was unbounded, as she arrived on the SS United States and we married two months later.
After her 2015 passing, I was astonished to discover two 60 year old diaries, in extraordinary poetic prose and expressing touching emotions about our future lives!
I can never reconcile the loss of her presence, but am eternally grateful for our exquisite life together! Who could ever imagine a trivial random incident on a train, would lead to a half century of a wonderful shared life?
An unexpected encounter, indeed....
8
Love your title. We weren’t traveling, but I walked into a Miami fern bar, asked a handsome man if the seat he was standing next to was taken, and here we are 33 years later ❤️.
2
I enjoyed these stories, because I love travel, like many, and who doesn't love love?! They were interesting, although, to be frank, somewhere in the middle, they felt a bit like "cliches." However, the last one was interesting. But, it seems to be hard to come across a love story that's not a cliche, especially in a major newspaper like this one. More power to the lovers, though!!!
1
My mother had just died. I booked a ticket home and made my way from my Baltimore apartment to Dulles airport outside DC. Not long after we took off, a tall, Eastern-European-looking guy kept walking the isle, beaming me smiles at each return. I noticed, and thought he either liked me, or had a bad bladder problem.
Sometime up in the air, he patted me on the shoulder and said he’d overheard me telling my seat mate that Belgrade was my end point. He was sitting across the isle, half a row behind. We got to talking. Turned out he too was going to a funeral, his grandmother’s, and that we were both booked on the same continuing flight to Belgrade, our common hometown. In the middle of the night, over the Atlantic, we shared earbuds to my iPod (it was 2006). In Munich we exchanged numbers, and in Belgrade I met his best friend in the arrivals hall.
Once we were both back in the DC/Baltimore area, he gave me a call. We dated, got engaged, and got married the following year. The best friend from the arrivals hall became our best man. It’s been a good marriage for eleven years now. We take our children to Serbia often, and each time they ask to hear the story of mommy and daddy meeting on the plane.
56
@Zvezdana
Nice, but still trying to figure out what "half a row" is.
@Matthew
Good question, the rows were — how can I explain — staggered. So I was not in line with him but a bit forward, but not a whole row forward, just “half a row.”
1
In 2013 I was backpacking through Europe (from New Zealand) and after my accomodation fell-through in Salzburg at the last minute I found myself couch surfing for the first time. About 10 min after my arrival, a tall young man walked in the kitchen. He didn’t actually live in the house and was only visiting his brother for the weekend. He asked if I had plans for the evening - would I like to go swing dancing? We danced for six hours straight to a vintage swing band and the next morning I text a friend to say I had met the man I would marry. Fast-forward to 2018, I’m now living in Germany and expecting our first child early next year. Sometimes fate works in mysterious ways!
8
In 1984 when I was 16 years old I particpated on a bike trip from Rome to London. 7 seeks with no support van just 12 kids and 2 leaders. The first person I met at JFK airport offered to buy me a diet Coke as I only had traveler cheques.He turned out to be my best freind on the trip and the love of my life. We have now been married for 25 years and continue to take yearly bike trips abroad together. Having shared such a pivotal experience together and a similar attitude about travel permeates our marraige as well as our parenting.
10
My wife and I met almost 50 years ago on the commuter train from suburbia to the city. It took several years of commuting together but in the end we decided we liked each other. We have now been married for more than 45 years.
8
My wife skipped studying for her collage finals and became a replacement on a double date. This as a favor for her friend. I sat at a bar and ignored her the whole night. While playing pool in the back for money, she finally approached. Told an old man that instead of playing for money that we should play for her. She was furious and I do not blame her. I told her that I did not say that but if I did I would just have to win. 200 hundred bucks and 30yrs later
2
On a bright August day in 1984, I noticed a beautiful young woman in a sleeveless white cotton shirt, green travel pants, and Israeli sandals in the Amsterdam airport.
As it turned out, she was seated next to me on my flight to JFK. But fate had been kinder to me than I even knew. Seated on her other side was a lawyer named Stuart. He bent the beautiful woman's ear describing in minute detail how he had been throwing up on his vacation from bad food or tainted water or both. I didn't say much. I didn't have to. The more Stuart spoke, the better my near silence sounded. I cut in once in a while and at some point in the flight I knew. This was the person I would marry.
Her mother drove her home from JFK and asked about her flight. She said she had been seated in between a lawyer and a CPA and she had given the CPA her phone number. "What's the matter with you?" my future mother-in-law replied. "You should have given them both your number!"
We married in November of 1985. Thirty-three years later, I am still married to the beautiful young woman in the sleeveless white cotton shirt. As the Rabbi said at our wedding, "It was a match made in heaven."
18
Please please publish more articles and comments like this. This is a beautiful bustling joyful world and all we get to read these days are stories of people being mean to each other.
38
After my last dating fiasco (dating is a soul-sucking exercise), I decided no more. In 2013, I was standing at Gate C42 in the Atlanta International Airport waiting for my flight to Bloomington-Normal, IL when a very handsome man asked me if the flight was on time. Since this was a very large client and the plane was filled with consultants, I asked him to look at the LED sign behind me and continued reading my book. Luckily for me, he was gently persistent.
We have been together for 5 years and just got married last year. If we could have champagne at the gate, we would celebrate Gate C42 every time we fly through Atlanta.
6
My husband and I met in 2000 when we were both visiting Notre Dame as prospective high school students. We were on the small connecting flight from Chicago to South Bend, Indiana. He sat behind me. Neither of us remembers who spoke first but both of us remembers talking. The plane was full of other similarly situated, and similarly excited, students as we were all en route to attend Notre Dame's "Spring Vis" weekend - a four day program that tries to show what life as a diverse student would be like at Notre Dame.
The weekend ended and I decided to go to Barnard because I didn't want to "follow" a boy to school -- my 17 year old sense didn't really comprehend that inaction itself is an action. My husband, along with many of the friends we met that weekend, chose to attend Notre Dame. Those same friends attended our wedding 13 years later.
5
I absolutely loved reading this article and the comments that followed. Thank you to everyone who shared their stories and made me smile on this rainy Tuesday.
I've never found the kind of love to cross oceans for, but these stories bring to mind a flight I took in March 2014 from Fort Lauderdale to Islip. I sat at the window seat, and the most beautiful man I've seen, wearing a suit, sat at the aisle seat. There was a baby crying in the seat in front of us, and we exchanged knowing, "oh boy" kind of smiles. He put in his headphones and went to sleep before I had the courage to say anything of value, but for a moment was able to daydream about the meet cutes you only thought were possible in movies. Glad to know they aren't far off if you have the gumption to introduce yourself!
7
March 1, 2000. I was living in Chicago and working at United Airlines' headquarters there. I'd attended a conference in Phoenix and was heading back home. I'd been with United for only a few months. As an employee, if I was flying for pleasure, I would have been at the bottom of the standby list because it was based on tenure. Because I was flying for *business*, however, I got to board before any of my non-business-travel coworkers.
KACHING! They called my name and I was given a first class boarding pass - seat 1A. There was a guy seated in 1B, but I was on a call when I boarded so I didn't really acknowledge him before I sat down.
Shoot - there was some type of delay, so we just had to wait it out there on the tarmac. Because we were seated in first, however, the purser kept the drinks coming to help alleviate our stress. 1B noticed the dog tattoo on my ankle - turns out we both had multiple pets. "I don't want kids, do you?", he asked. "Nope." And on from there.
He lived and worked in Phoenix but was en route to Chicago to visit a plant in Rockford. We landed at O'Hare and he accompanied me to baggage claim. I got my bag, we kept talking, the carousel stopped - and he admitted he didn't have a bag to pick up. We traded cards.
Thanks to my job, we were able to sustain a commuter marriage for the first couple of years after we married one year and seventeen days later. Now happily living - together - in NC (with 2 dogs & 2 cats). Thanks, United!
10
My co-worker was returning from a conference out in the West. Her future husband was in the seat next to her, he was coming back from a skiing trip. A year later, she was coming back from the same trip. Everyone pretty much boarded the plane, then it was like "Hold it, we have another passenger coming aboard". It was him-he proposed on their one-year anniversary of meeting each other.
2
1978. Amsterdam. I was 27. I had saved up, quit my job, made plans to travel Europe for six weeks, meeting with friends along the way. Solo was easy for three weeks in England. But then I crossed the Channel and suddenly felt very alone, and vulnerable, in Amsterdam. What was I thinking? I was not due to meet with friends for weeks. Language was going to be an issue. I went to all the museums, etc. possible but venturing out at night did not feel right. I would muddle through, I decided. On the way to the train station to go to Vienna to meet friends, I stopped in the American bookstore to get more books. I was anticipating reading in my room for the foreseeable future. I looked up from my perusals to meet the blue eyes of a tall, handsome young man. He had looked up from his book at the same time. The gaze lasted longer than usual. We followed each other around the bookstore, making eye contact. Normally I wouldn't do something like this, but he was quite handsome. I waited for him outside the store to ascertain his intentions. "Why are you following me?" I asked. "Because you are a beautiful girl. Do you want to have a coffee?" he said. He was Dutch. We had our coffee. I explained my situation. I thought I would meet him back in Amsterdam, but he offered to travel with me. He spoke English, French, German. I took a chance. He took a chance. We met in Salzburg in a week, fell in love, and traveled all over Europe. Ultimately it didn't work out but ... ahh! Sweet memory!
14
I met my future American husband in Palma de Mallorca where his aircraft carrier was anchored. I was on a trip from Germany with my young son, parents and brother. At the swimming pool of our hotel, I first got s glimpse of him reading a book and smoking a pipe. “An Englishman!” I thought. We fell in love, I moved to the States, and we’ve been in a very long and complicated marriage situation ever since. Sometimes I fantasize and ask myself what if he’d been an English guy. I miss Europe so much!
4
My wife and I met while backpacking in India in 2009. I'm from LA, she's from Atlanta.
I was between jobs after the financial crisis and did a 4 month backpacking trip through India. She was on summer break from college in London traveling with a friend. We met in a cafe in Varanasi and spent the day together. Next day we went separate ways, but a week later randomly ended up in the same hotel in another city in India. We spent the week together and before leaving she invited me to visit her in London. I warned her I would.
I changed my tickets and headed to London, booked for 3 weeks I stayed 2 months. We were in love. We spent the next 4 years dating while living in different countries. Then moved in together and a year later got engaged.
We were engaged for 3 years and in the summer of 2017 decided to get married. We planned and executed our wedding in 6 weeks. We just celebrated our 1 year wedding anniversary and are happier and more in love than ever after meeting 9 years ago in a cafe in India.
18
In May of 1993 I was flying from Volgograd, Russia to Moscow, returning from a photo assignment for Newsweek magazine. I was with a writer and translator and, as foreigners, we boarded after all Russians had taken their seats (this is no longer practice in Russia, but was common then).
We climbed up the rear staircase of the Yak-42 jet and I started looking for 3 seats together. Seeing only single seats, I called out to my colleagues “I think we’ll have to sit separately.”
Suddenly I heard a voice say (in English), “you can sit here.” I turned to my left and saw a beautiful woman and an empty middle seat, so I sat down. We chatted for much of the two hour flight.
When we landed at Domodedovo airport, my group was met by a driver from Newsweek's Moscow bureau. I asked Galia how she was getting back to the city and she said by bus. We had an extra seat in the car, so I asked if we could give her a ride.
With another hour together, we continued to talk and I learned she had a young daughter, was trying one last time to reconcile with her husband and didn't know many people in Moscow. When the car got to my place, I asked for her number and suggested we might get coffee sometime. I honestly wasn't thinking of a "date" but I did feel something and wanted to keep talking with her!
A few days later I called (she was wondering what took so long!), we met for ice cream and shared our first kiss. We were married 5 years later and last June celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary!
31
I boarded a train to accompany my older brother and his girlfriend on a student trip to Mexico. The girlfriend greeted me and advised that they had saved me a seat. She led me to the other end of the long passenger car and seated me next to a girl who was reading "Clarissa." I noticed that the train car was virtually empty. The girl read and I sighed. Then she looked at me and said, "I can't wait till we cross the border." "Why?" I said. "So I can have a beer," she replied. We have been married for 52 years.
19
Pool room New Orleans 1986. Obnoxious friend upsets beautiful young girl. Chivalrous young foreign visitor (me) tries to smooth the waters. Has enough liquid courage to ask for her number. Shockingly gets number. Married 30 years.
18
Fate stepped in.... An Aer Lingus last minute seat jumble while taxing out of the gate at JKF on a night flight to Dublin, Christmas 2011, my soon to be husband and I were seated next to each other by sheer fate- Both Irish by birth, New York City natives, late 40’s and divorced, we had a lot to chat about- Our main connection was our favorite bar in TriBeCa: The Ear Inn... 3 years later we were married at Christmas in Ireland- It’s the most serendipitous thing to happen to us both. Ever!
18
My wife and I met while driving London double-deck buses in Davis California for the University student run transit, Unitrans. Since the buses were right-hand drive, each also needed a conductor to ensure safety and collect fares. Back then, 1978, most conductors were women students. We were randomly assigned to the same shift--one that crossed railroad tracks--and were often delayed by trains. Needing to kill time until the trains moved off the street, we started talking, eventually leading to a first "movie date" where we never reached the movie due to conversation. I was about to graduate and she was about to leave for a year abroad. We made it work, and nearly 40 years later are finally planning a trip to England, hoping to recreate our meet-up on a bus in London.
13
@Steve Hope you enjoy your trip to London! A native Davisite myself, I was in London last fall for work and had a blast taking public transportation. The new double deckers are beautiful and a wonderful way to see the city.
1
I met my husband in a railway station.
We had both been to the same academic conference, but had not met at the conference. At the end of the conference, several of us shared taxis to the station to go our various ways home. He was in a different taxi, but when we got to the station, we all went to the station café and sat together while we waited for our trains.
I told him about another conference I was organising and gave him my email address so we could communicate about the conference. Then we got our trains in opposite directions.
He came to my conference and even suggested some speakers. Afterwards, he asked me out for coffee. I didn't realise the coffee was a date and nearly invited a colleague to join us. Luckily, my colleague couldn't make it.
We got married just under 2 years after that coffee in the railway station. We have been married 17 years.
16
My father who passed away in 2015 met my mother on the RR train in lower Manhattan in the late 1960s. They were both recent Chinese immigrants who shared a spoken connection at first: she was a nurse from Taiwan by way of Indonesia and Germany and he was an aspiring singer from Amoy (now Xiamen) by way of Hong Kong and Spain. Taiwanese and his native Chinese dialect are very similar. My mother is in her 80s and no longer rides the subway. But, to this day, I have a strong connection to the NYC Subway (even when it let's me down...repeatedly).
13
My 59 year old self walked into the breakfast room of the hotel in Addis Ababa Ethiopia. I was on a group trip to see Ethiopia a year after my husband of 32 years died of cancer. The 56 year old man at the next table was also alone and part of the group. Nine years later we are still together. and traveling We have visited every continent and learned much from each other.
30
These are the best stories - love to read these kind of stories in these turbulent times we live in.
39
My parents love telling the story of how they met.
They were both in the same college, living in the same dorm, but they first ran into each other after a train they were on broke down. My mom was with her friends, my dad was alone. Everyone decided to hitchhike. When a van pulled over for my mom's friends, she asked my dad to join them knowing he was going to be out there for quite some time on his own.
It turned out my mom and my dad were the only two people in the van who were not married. The guy driving the van immediately proclaimed it was destiny and he was going to be my dad's best man at their future wedding. Of course, they laughed it off.
They were married a year later. Unfortunately, no one thought to get the number of the van driver.
14
Thank you for some happy endings in this dystopian age.
28
Max was the cute bartender in my regular pub which had a special on Thursdays where women drank for free (!). I had noticed him but never had the courage to take it any further. One Sunday afternoon I ran into him at Grand Central in the tunnel from the shuttle to the 6 train. Turns out he had noticed me as well. We haven't been apart since that night - we just celebrated out 27th wedding anniversary!
14
From my memoir: Default to Goodness
July 1972
London
We met on Bayswater Road.
“Hello, are you English?” the handsome, young man asked with a seductive accent.
He looked exactly like Omar Sharif in David Lean’s "Dr. Zhivago," and I instantaneously wanted to be his Lara.
“No, American,” I answered. “You have nice hairs,” he said.
“Thank you,” I said.
“We will go for tea, yes?” he asked with great self-confidence. “Okay,” I replied.
Zorba explained that he was from Athens and had come to London to study engineering. Then it was my turn to tell him that I had just finished college and had come to London for the summer to visit Montessori schools.
We agreed to meet the following evening.
He waited patiently in the lobby of my third-class hotel in Paddington. We drank cold beer and ate hot Tandoori chicken in a nearby Indian restaurant.
That was our routine for several days: Zorba picked me up, we ate dinner in an inexpensive ethnic restaurant, then he accompanied me back to the front door of my hotel and left without making any sexual overture.
He was the consummate perfect gentleman.
His English was poor, but compared with my Greek, it was stupendous. We decided to spend a rare sunny afternoon lounging on the green canvas chairs in Hyde Park.
He followed me to NYC in the fall. We married in the winter. Our summers were spent traveling through the magnificent Greek Islands. The marriage didn't last, but it was the most incredible adventure.
21
I was 22 travelling with a friend through Europe for two months in the summer of 1968, the first time I had ever been out of the USA. Our trip took us by train via Greece to Istanbul. The route back to Greece was via Rhodes on a ship, the SS Izmir of the Turkish Maritime Line. The price of a ticket for two nights on the ship in tourist class C, with three meals a day and tea in the afternoon, was $28.00. The ultimate destination of the ship was Haifa.
The condition of the dormitory style cabins meant that many of the passengers, mostly students, stayed on deck. The first afternoon everyone was waiting for the ship to reach international waters so it could start selling American cigarettes as they were not permitted to be sold in Turkey.
One of the students was a young cute Dutch guy. He thought I was Israeli, and mentioned at he end of the day that he hoped we could meet up after we reached Haifa. When I got off in Rhodes, after we had spent two and a half days together, we definitely sad to part.
We corresponded for 5 months, and decided to meet in Paris over Christmas and New Year's.
We were married in Amsterdam in August 1969.
After living together in Amsterdam for three years he decided to come to the USA to continue his medical training. He became a neurosurgeon.
We were married for 47 years until he passed away two years ago due to a malignant brain tumor, ironic.
Kismet......and a wonderful life.
72
I was strolling on the Brooklyn Bridge March 28,1983, when he asked me what the time was in a thick foreign accent. The next days included taking a helicopter ride over Manhattan and dancing in the Rainbow Room. He returned home to Austria at the end of the week, but left me, a 21-year-old NYU journalism student from New Jersey, with an invitation to visit. I visited in August for three weeks, and we spent time in Vienna, Venice, and the Wachau Valley. Pure romance. True love. We’ve been married 31 years.
38
At midnight August 1964 Neal Friedberg and Dori Nahm, having purchased seats on a student charter flight from Athens to Rome, were waiting in line at the Athens Airport. Each was travelling with a school roommate on their first trip to Europe. “Does anyone play bridge?” Neal asked. “We do” Dori responded. While in the air, I played the best bridge I’ve played before or since. We spent the next day in Rome visiting Tivoli Gardens together. We exchanged names and addresses (on paper) and had our first date in New York in the garden at MOMA. Little did I realize that this would be the beginning of many museum visits together. We each headed back to school, I to my last year at Cornell and Neal to Upstate Medical School; the distance between was 90 miles. I had a car, he had an apartment. We are still travelling and enjoying adventures together after 54 years.
31
Many people have met the "one" through formal dating sites, but you can't beat bumping into someone organically, particularly if it's doing something you both love: like travel, art, or something as mundane as grocery shopping. Both parties are more relaxed without the pressure, and generally themselves. And the ice has already been broken for any follow up "formal" date.
12
I was backpacking through China in 2009 using couchsurfing to work my way around the country with a male friend. At a random stay in Lijiang, 20min outside of the city at a house I happened to meet my now husband who was backpacking from Australia- he thought my friend was my partner (no way- like a brother to me!). We chatted briefly and parted ways on our travels the next day. Four days later we crossed paths on a 10hr hike in the Tiger Leaping Gorge and realized we were headed to the same guest house for the night. The realization that my travel companion was NOT my partner, a bit of liquid courage, and exchanged names so we could find each other on facebook resulted in reconnecting online a year later and realizing that we really liked each other more than a chance encounter. He came to visit me while I was living in Japan, a leap of faith and a move to Australia by me the following year-- and here we are, almoat 10 years later and about to have our third child. You never know what travel and adventure has in store- it certainly took my life down a path I never in a million years could have imagined!
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In 1973, my mom, on a scholarship to Germany from Brazil, went on a bus to see the tulips in Amsterdam with a friend. The girls sat in front of each other so they could both be next to the window. A tall American, on spring break, walked on and decided to sit next to my mother. The three spent the day and dinner together. The American took pictures and promised to send to my mom. He did. She sent a thank you note. He sent a thank you for the the thank you note. And then a few thank you notes later, the American invited my mom for a visit to the States over winter break. She came for three weeks. He went back to Europe for his spring break, asked her to marry him in Italy, called my grandmother for permission in Brazil, picked out the ring in Israel. The next time my mother saw my father was him stepping off the plane in Rio (in some wide 70s lapels and snazzy white shoes that made her eyes roll) five days before their wedding. They have been married for over 44 years.
33
I’m not sure if ‘legs’ count as transportation, but here we go!
In March of 2016, I quit my job in New York City to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail (a footpath that stretches from Georgia to Maine, over 2,189mi). I arrived alone, excited to meet people and test my mettle against the elements.
The fourth day is the first ‘stop’ of sorts, at Neels Gap, where hikers could get a hot pizza and have hiking veterans do a ‘pack shakedown’, to toss unnecessary gear.
The group I had been hiking with was (already!) getting off the trail for a few days, but I was buoyed onwards with excitement; across the deck I saw two young guys slinging on their packs, and walking by asked if they minded if I hiked out with them—assuming they would probably outpace me (I’m 5’3”) but glad for a quick chat all the same.
Well, the only thing to do while hiking is walk, talk, and listen, and over the course of a few days (turns out we hike the same speed!), we shared thoughts on the trail, what brought us out, thoughts we had about ourselves, friends and families, about society and the world, laughed with the same humor (Bark Obama & Donald Trunk—well, maybe you had to be there), and found too many common interests to brush off.
We ended up doing the entire trail together, deciding in the AM where to meet that night, and summited Katahdin together. A month later I visited him in Ohio, and we’ve been dating 2 years almost to the day! I got lost in the woods, and found the love of my life :)
17
I was a California girl who took a Caribbean cruise with a co-worker. He was the DJ in the disco onboard, and we met when I asked him to play Electric Slide. He wooed me all week and asked me to marry him the last night of the cruise. I said, “Are you crazy?” After several months of weekly cross-country phone calls, long letters, and a romantic 10-day stay where I lived in San Francisco, I said yes and he moved to California. Our families said we were crazy. We’ve been married 26 years.
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I woke up very early to catch a chartered bus from Ansley Mall in Atlanta, GA, to go to a demonstration in Barnwell, SC, against nuclear fuel reprocessing. It was April 30, 1978. For some reason, I picked the non-smoking bus even though I was a smoker at the time. I chose a window seat. A guy walked down the aisle of the bus and asked, “Is this seat taken?” I said, “no,” even though he looked like a jock and, so, was clearly not my type. Before the bus left, I bought some bagels, and he shared some of the bag of oranges he had brought. We talked the whole ride and decided to walk together during the demonstration although we were dating other people. On the way back, we sang songs. When we got to the mall, he asked me for a ride home because his car was in the shop. I gave him a ride home. He asked me for my phone number and gave me a good-by kiss. We dated for two years and have been married for 38. We have two married sons and an 11-month-old granddaughter.
30
I met my wife while sailing in Japan.
After crossing the Pacific from Canada and doing a full circumnavigation of Japan, I was planning on living on an island in the Seto Inland Sea for a few years while writing a Japan cruising guide. On the way to that island, I stopped at a marina in Fukuoka in western Japan for some emergency repairs, and a woman working in the marina office drove me to/from a dinner party with some other sailors. Repairs finished, I continued on to the island and, a few weeks later, a friend-of-a-friend sailor called and invited me to his home for dinner. I hit it off particularly well with a couple at that dinner, and toward the end of the evening the wife, after learning that I was single, said "You should marry our daughter" -- who, coincidentally, was the woman at the Fukuoka marina -- we all laughed at the ridiculous suggestion given that I am about the same age as the couple.
But after a few emails, a rendezvous in Tokyo, a rendezvous in Canada, and many long Skype chats, we were engaged...and then married just nine months after that first meeting at the Fukuoka marina. After selling my home in Canada and moving all my belongings to Japan, we bought a condo in Fukuoka. I still have the island home and am still cruising Japan, meeting up with my wife whenever and wherever her work schedule and my cruising schedule permit. In a year or two I will swallow the anchor and enjoy being a househusband.
Thank God for emergency boat repairs!
18
She and I were both in Korea to visit extended family, and met through mutual friends while grouping up at a bar for a nightclub pre-drink.
I remember hitting it off with her, but my memory blacks out around 2 am. Apparently no one saw or heard from me until 5 am, when I remember carrying a passed-out friend to his AirBNB. I didn't expect to see her again.
Fast-forward four months, and I post an Instagram story from O'Hare. I'm in Chicago for an admissions interview on Monday, and have the weekend beforehand to explore the city.
She messages me, and it turns out that she goes to school in Indy. We agree to meet on Sunday.
It's much too early to consider it a love story, but I like this girl. This weekend raised the stakes for admission, so wish this Canadian luck NYT readers!
(It's not much of a love story, but I wanted to share the effects of globalization and social media on millenial love lives)
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@Leo
Good luck, and ease up on the drinking, "memory blacks out around 2 am. Apparently no one saw or heard from me until 5 am" is not a good thing, "carrying a passed-out friend" is not a good thing.
4
When we travel by ourselves, if we are confident people, we are at our most authentic -- doing only what we want and doing so only with the people we want. This is an efficient time for risk-taking and quick judgement.
Most such peripatetic romances are irrational (see notes from other readers above r.e. physical attraction) and likely evanescent. But while most of your readers bragged of the subsequent permanence of their connections, even temporary travel romantic connections (done safely and kindly) can be meaningful and memorable, and help grow a globally loving community.
19
Some of my most delightful relationships started with an encounter on a flight. There is something unique about sitting alongside someone on a flight that can lead to sharing feelings that otherwise would remain private. I don't know why this is so, but it's happened so many times that I believe flying next to someone releases inhibitions. Unfortunately, now that I am retired, and fly rarely, I can't take advantage of this situation.
11
In July 1999 I was attending graduate school in Washington D.C. and I left for a one-week vacation in Chile to spend a week visiting my sister who had been studying abroad for 6 months. Our plan was to spend 5 days in the Atacama Desert which required a flight from Santiago to Calama and then a two hour bus ride to the small desert town of San Pedro. While on the bus, another traveler (named Ben) seated across the aisle from us on the bus started up a conversation. He explained that he was traveling around South America for three months before starting graduate school in Iowa. As we all spoke, we quickly realized that we were both from Massachusetts and had grown up just 10 miles from each other. Ben and my sister and I spent 5 days together in the Atacama Desert and then I had to leave, not knowing if I'd ever see him again. Quite to both of our astonishment, several months later we reconnected back in the U.S. and started a three year long distance relationship between Iowa and Washington, D.C. Finally in 2003 after we both graduated from our respective programs, we reunited in Boston and later married in Sept. 2004. We just celebrated our 14 year wedding anniversary and have three amazing children together. And it all started on a bus in the Atacama Desert of Chile.
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@Naomi
"Quite to both of our astonishment, several months later we reconnected back in the U.S. ..." ok, why astonishing?
I think I have a pretty great NY Subway story:
It was early August, 2002. The City was still raw from the 9/11 events as we approached the 1 year anniversary.
It was early morning and I was waiting for the V train on the F/V Platform at 34th Street to take me to the podiatrist because I had damaged my foot a few days prior and needed a few PT sessions.
As I waited for the train, this cute guy caught my eye. The F train pulled in and he boarded. As the doors closed, he looked at me and snapped his fingers, sorta like "missed the opportunity"...
When I get to my office, I email my friends jokingly announce that I saw my future husband.
Two weeks pass and I found myself waiting on the same platform. I look down the platform and there he is again waiting for the F train to take him to his job in Queens.
I decided to take a chance and walked over, introducing myself as the "girl that got away". We both laughed, recalling the last time we had seen each other.
I gave him my number. He called that day and invited me on a date later in the week, promising to call me the day of.
HE NEVER CALLS!
Another month passes by and lo and behold, I see this guy again. Although this time I pretend not to see him and he marches over to me, apologizing profusely, claiming he lost my number! I give him another chance.
We've been together for 16 years, married 10 and have 1 son.
It was meant to be!
109
one the best love stories ever ! @Christine
1
@Christine The Adjustment Bureau!
1
I was returning from a solo trip to Florence where I'd gone to celebrate my 40th birthday. I barely made my connecting flight in Frankfurt. Sat down next to an interesting fellow and we started chatting and didn't stop until he shook my hand in customs and wished me "all the best." Huh, I was sure he was going to ask for my number. The next day at work, my colleagues all wanted to know if I'd met an Italian lover. I told them no but there was this guy on the plane... Just then a package arrived for me at work with a little gift and a lovely letter. How did he get my contact info, I asked him in the email I sent immediately? He had looked over my shoulder while I was filling out my customs form. He had a plan all along. It was a good plan. We just celebrated our 20th anniversary of that fateful flight.
83
I guess there is still hope...
38
This past summer spent 5 weeks in France on a competitive arts grant researching my family history. In late June I sat next to a man on a TGV from Nice to Paris, and while we briefly chatted, I was too shy to ask for his name quickly enough...all I know is that he lives in the South of France.
After returning to the US, I wrote a poem about that train journey, and I would love to share it with my TGV seat mate. I wrote to the French train company with our seat details to try to get his name, but they don't give out such information and would not pass my information to him. I also cast a detailed post via Facebook asking my friends to forward it in the hopes that it might find him. Alas...nothing.
NYT, would you like to help me, an American poet, locate the Frenchman who shared a train journey with me and inspired my first poem about France, the country of my ancestors?
9
@Wendy
Good luck. But curious how "a competitive arts grant researching my family history" works...? What is the connection between arts and genealogy?
2
October 9, 1984- I was on the way home from a visit to California and changed planes in DFW- on the American Airlines flight to Ft. Lauderdale I had an aisle seat across from a handsome man- the flight was delayed in departing by a thunderstorm and we struck up a conversation- when we finally took off, I ordered the last beer and he had to settle for a red wine. My cousin was supposed to pick me up from the airport, but I was concerned that the delayed flight would make it difficult for her to make it, so my new friend offered to drop me off on his way home and of course I accepted the offer- on the drive, I continued to chat as he struggled to listen to the first game of the world series on the radio- when he dropped me off, I told him I would repay the favor with a meal soon- and 34 years later we are still together, but I have learned to watch rather than chatter thru baseball games. Only downside of the whole romance was teaching our children to be wary of strangers, when Mommy took a ride from Daddy when she had just met him...
30
In the mid 1940s, my grandmother had just graduated college in Louisville, KY. She had opted to join the nearby convent, but was politely asked to leave. A firey red-head, it was agreed between her and mother superior that it was not for her. Shortly after, her sister invited her to come stay with her in Honolulu. A bit deflected, my grandmother accepted. On a flight from San Francisco to Honolulu she was seated next to a man who was actually born and raised in Honolulu. He was immediately drawn by her and they spent most of the flight talking. When they landed, he invited her on a tour of the island. A native, he had a Buick convertible and offered to show her around. She rebuffed, and politely declined his offer. He insisted, asking where she was staying, that he'd pick her up. Again, she deflected. "Where are you staying?" he asked. "Somewhere on Royal Hawaiian Avenue."
The next day there was a knock on her sister's front door. A man had knocked on every door on the street asking for a redhead named Jane. They were married in 1948.
At the time, flight arrivals into Honolulu was a marked occasion. A newspaper clipping from the time showed their two names on a manifest. In alphabetical they appeared next to one another, "Charlton and Clark."
37
This is old and new news; The Times covered our 2006 wedding at remote Grytviken, South Georgia; we were traveling on The World Discoverer, owned by Society Expeditions.
This is the New News: My husband Peter sold his sailing company in California and moved to Florida in 2010 after he started working for Silversea Cruises which bought the Discoverer after Society Expeditions went out of business. Now named the Silver Explorer, Peter works on the ship where we met.
I have bragging rights for being in South Georgia and Antarctica first. He has bragging rights of over a 100 polar voyages. On rare occasions I get to tag along. We were both back in Grytviken and Antarctica this year.
The Explorer has also been responsible for other love stories. One of Peter's bosses from Australia met his London based girlfriend on board, but of course, no dating occurred untill long after the end of the voyage.
Another boss, while working on the Explorer, proposed at Neko Harbour on the Antarctica peninsula. We went to their wedding in Holland. Their baby announcement read:Made in Antarctica.
Sweet.
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@Lesley Damisch
Wow, Grytviken, googlable, I love the fact that there is a museum there, "South Georgia Museum".
1
As a former flight attendant, I enjoyed reading these inflight romance stories. While I was unsuccessful finding love in the air, I did meet my now husband on vacation. We were each chartering catamarans with our friends in the British Virgin Islands, back in 2015, when I was 29 and he was 33. It was the shoulder season so the harbors were rather quiet and largely filled with retired couples. After seeing a boat of youngish girls pass by, he allegedly whipped out a pair of binoculars and promptly turned the boat around in hot pursuit. After a never-ending night in Spanish Town, we started dating long distance and married 18 months later. Today we have two children. We still sail.
29
On the flight from Kennedy to Shannon I had the pleasure of sitting next to woman going on holidays to Ireland for the first time,Row 33 Transamerica flight I was going home from a vacation in Brooklyn
We got to chat ,talk and giggle the hole flight
I remember thinking Something different here, once we landed we Swapped-telephone numbers and I promised to come visit Doolan where she was staying a particularly gorgeous place, we spent a few weekends together there listening to live music and she would sing eventually vacations ended and we had to go home to our lives and work but we kept in contact by phone and letters for seven or eight months until I decided to go visit again in Long Island well needless to say it worked out surprisingly well, we’re still together
That flight was in 1982.
45
These snippets of successful romances are sweet and funny. Love how the voices of the people come through, sharing the awkward first impressions or the surprising connections [yesterday's eyeliner...not my good sweats] [tube socks up to his knees, sandals and a fedora].
Thanks for making me chuckle first thing this morning.
36
In 2004, I was a recent American graduate napping in a 5-bed shared room in a Prague hostel. I awakened to find my future wife, a Norwegian, sitting on the last available bed in the hostel.
22
Boyfriend and I met at Reading Station, it was Christmas Eve 2007 and he asked me to watch his various bags of Christmas shopping while he went to buy a Mars Bar at the station shop. (This being the UK there are always various announcements about not leaving your bags unattended in case of a terrorist attack/theft)
When he got back, he sat down and held out his hand "thanks for that, my name's Tim" . I smiled politely and made small talk until the train came then got on the train. He took time gathering up his bags and then came and found me on the train and sat next to me. Unfortunately, he was only going for two stops but we later found each other on Facebook and have dated ever since.
19
In the 1970s when I lived in South Africa my younger sister and I boarded a plane from Joburg to Rome. We were seated together when coming down the aisle I saw the most beautiful girl in the world walking towards my direction. She and her brother were seated in the aisle and window section near me, and I have no idea how what happened next occurred but in several minutes I had convinced her to have her brother switch seats with me and we sat together fro the entire flight, watching Woody Allen's Play it Again Sam, and then waking up in Rome. She was 17 and I was 21. I was stopping in Rome and she was transferring flights for the US. We wrote letters for the next year and were to meet each other in South Africa the next summer.
Letters were crossed and I never saw her again. Until one day, 20 years later, I opened up the NYTIMES and saw a small story in the Advertising column that she had been made President of a well known ad agency. I called her up, arranged a meeting, and yes, we fell into love. And while there is much, much more to this story, we remain close friends to this very day. All because of the NYTIMES.
81
Maybe it was bashert; my maternal grandparents met on a train in 1916. In White River Junction, VT, in the fall of 1960, I picked up the Montrealer, the train which ran down the Connecticut River Valley to New York. I was on my way home to New Jersey from Dartmouth for the long Thanksgiving weekend. At the Springfield, MA station a group of three Smithies boarded my car, and struggled to get their suitcases up onto the luggage rack; I helped. One of them became my wife in 1964 after her graduation, and we've been married 54 years.
38
Thank you for this piece. It is a nice break from current events! We just went to see Come from Away. One of the plot lines is the couple who met Sept 11 on the plane which was diverted to Gander, Newfoundland. So, for me, These stories are timely, too!
18
In 1976 I flew to Australia to visit my fiancé and finalize plans for the future. On the first leg of the trip, to Tokyo, a woman moved to a seat next to me, claiming she wanted to look out the window. I ended up marrying her, not the Australian, and we have been together 40 years. I do have regrets about the hurt that I caused, but feel that it worked out best for me. Have always felt that traveling is a great way to meet people, share experiences with them, and make attachments
14
Robert, as long as it worked out for you. the Australian should consider herself lucky.
14
It was the Monday before Thanksgiving in 1988 when I realized I had no plans for the Holiday. I tried calling my Father who was living some hundreds of miles away I left him a message. I called my Grandmother who with immediate excitement promised to thaw a turkey. My father then called with equal excitement suggesting we fly to Baja California to go sports fishing. Having promised my Grandma I told my Dad “I had to work”. Over the phone I purchased an insanely expensive ticked that could pick up at the airport. At checkin I was told go to the gate. They sat me down started boarding the plane. Only then did I realize was on standby. Only later did I learn a very pretty blond had been watching me from short distance. when the plane was fully boarded I showed all around me my temper. Am employ was bounced from the last row of the plane and now I was sitting next to that blond. The flight lasted an hour and I pointed her out to my Grandfather “that is the woman I am going to marry” we were coincidentally booked on the same flight coming home. This year we celebrate our 28th anniversary.
7