For me, meeting Phil was definitely unexpected in my life. I had been living in Munich for over 2 years and life wasn't great. I missed the comfort of living in my own country, every little thing, especially dating, took extra effort; but moving back to the USA didn't seem like the right move either.
It was the first day of Oktoberfest at the Hacker Pschorr beer garden. We were well into the festivities of drinking and singing when Thatz arrived with his out-of-town friend's Phil & Chris. Phil seemed nice and fun. He jumped right into our group, befriending everyone at our table. At some point in the evening, I decided I wanted to attempt getting entrance into one of the tents. I asked if anyone wanted to join me and Phil immediately stood up. It was fun. We snuck our way into the tent of Schottenhamel and soon ended up at the carnival for bumper cars, shooting games and rides.
After walking me home, Phil boldly asked me if I was single and that he wanted to take me on a date. I loved it. It was so curteous and confident. The next morning, however, I was sober and practical and I knew that I could not go on a date with a tourist. Instead, we met up with a group of friends.
It is funny how life is. As practical as I tried to be, there was "something" about this guy. I felt so comfortable around him and I just couldn't shake that I wanted to spend more time with him. He was on his way to Prague the next morning and I thought it would be wonderful to join him, so I called in sick to work and headed out for an adventure. Maybe it was serendipity, maybe it was the no expectations and freedom to just be ourselves. Whatever it was it was an awesome trip and I was excited!
We never stopped talking to each other. He flew back to Minnesota and told me he would call when he landed and he did. We spent hours on skype, he wrote me love letters, sent me mixed tapes and within months he move to Germany. Yes, there have been bumps and fights and "what have we gotten ourselves into" moments; but every step of the way has been more than worth it. We have travelled and moved, met friends, run races, challenged each other and shared great adventures together already. I am so thrilled to have met my soulmate and I cannot wait to marry him!
Our Story
It was the first day of Oktoberfest 2011. Some people arrive at 6am to wait for a table. Chris, Thatz and I showed up right at noon and met up with some of his coworkers. The first person we were introduced to was Gerriann, and that's where this little adventure of ours really begins. I immediately asked Thatz if he was interested in her because it's not my style to come as a visitor and interfere with my friends lady-prospects on their home turf. He said I had the all clear and at that moment my trip, and my life, changed. We had a great time hanging out during Oktoberfest that day. Later on in the night we ran off to explore the Wiesn together. They have carnival games and rides and we tried to hit up as many as we could.
I had such a good time I asked her out on a date for Monday. She relented eventually but then torpedoed that idea in favor of a 'group date'. We wound up doing a happy hour with a few other people and this time I asked her if she wanted to go to Prague with me in the morning as I was going to stop there on my way to Berlin. She said "absolutely" and we went to Prague on Tuesday! On Wednesday she had to return to Munich and I had to be on my way to Berlin so we said our goodbyes not knowing when we were going to see each other again, if ever. She sent me an email on the ride home saying that we needed to meet up again soon. I invited her to Berlin but she wasn't able to make it so she suggested I come down to Munich for the last 3 days of my trip. It took me all of about 5 minutes to book a flight back to Munich. I bailed on the marathon (partly because I sprained my ankle at Oktoberfest) and went back to hang out with Gerri.
When I returned home to Minneapolis, we continued to talk via Skype for ludacris amounts of time every day. About 3 or 4 weeks later she suggested that if we were really going to give this relationship a fair shake that we should probably be in the same city. It took me less than 24 hours to decide that I was moving to Munich. I sold all my stuff and was on a plane a couple months later.
Some of my friends questioned my judgement, and I suppose I would have done the same thing if it was them coming to me with some insane idea like moving 6,000 miles for a girl you just met. But I knew right away that she was "the one". I was always pretty skeptical and thought that idea of "the one" was a lot of BS. Until I met Gerri. There couldn't be a better match for me if I had one custom ordered. I'm super excited to marry the woman of my dreams.
