Akshatha and Saurabh were blessed by a remarkable series of coincidences that put their journeys on a collision course.

Saurabh's GPS glitched on his drive home from work, and he ended up driving 700 miles to Tempe, where his car broke down. Akshatha walked out of her apartment, and saw a distraught Saurabh parked in front. Their eyes met, and the next words out of her mouth changed his world:

"Want to go to a Brian Greene lecture?"

Some of that is true. Saurabh does have a famously bad sense of direction, and Akshatha did really take him to a Brian Greene lecture the very first time they met. But their initial contact wasn't so serendipitous.

Like many young, single people, Saurabh and Akshatha had been trying to find love on the internet. If you've tried online dating, you know it can be... an adventure. Saurabh spent hours browsing hundreds of profiles. Akshatha went on enough first dates that she started collecting and analyzing data to understand why she wasn't finding good men. In January 2024, with Akshatha's PhD dissertation rapidly approaching, she decided that she would only go on One More Date before calling off the search.

A few phone calls later, despite everyone insisting that he fly, Saurabh drove to Tempe (his car is his personality). The first weekend they spent together was full of shared experiences. A road trip, a hike, strolling through the farmers market, shopping for a decent jacket (which Saurabh didn't have), a quiet breakfast and coffee at home and... emergency work meetings. It didn’t take long for them to realize that, woven into those everyday moments, was something unmistakably special.

Saurabh lived in the bay, and Akshatha in Tempe. When they weren't together, they spent hours on FaceTime telling each other about their days, their dreams and everything in between, making up for the years they spent apart. Despite the distance, they found a way to build a home around each other.

In April 2025, Saurabh brought Akshatha to the same hill they sat atop the night they first met, and asked the big question.

Three days later, Akshatha evened the score. She slipped a ring onto Saurabh’s finger, with promises now worn by both.

And thus ends the beginning of Akshatha and Saurabh's story.

Some more photos...