A story of true love

the romantic version

​

Ten years. Ilias and I met 10 years ago, on May 27th of 2004, on Thanasis’ 19th birthday. I was a little girl, I just had started my undergrand studies. He was done with undergrad and he was ready to leave Greece and start his adventure in USA. Ilias liked me since the moment that I entered the party. He confessed to me many many years later.

We didn’t see each other for two years and we met again while he was in Greece for Christmas break from UCLA. Our friend Thanasis – who had introduced us and who will be our best man – brought Ilias to a dinner party. I have to admit I don’t remember anything else apart from Ilias that night. We didn’t talk much but both of us realized that something special was going on. We started talking over the phone and over MSN. I was impressed by his personality and how he had succeeded in many areas in such a young age. And he was so modest and focused. After months we realized that we are spending too much time on texting and calling each other. And we decided to do something about it.

It wasn’t easy. Not easy at all! Years of long distance relationship while we had only a telephone and our love to keep us going on. But we realized that life is better when we are together. You know, this wired feeling of butterflies in your stomach. We keep seeing each other in person every 6 months. We had to travel back and forth over one ocean and two continents just to see each other. We have friends that confessed many years later that they didn’t believe that we would last They just thought that we are too young to handle the difficulty of our relationship. But we did.

Ilias has been holding my hand through the years and has been teaching me so many things. I remember our long discussions about debugging and computer architecture. Still, every time that I want to discuss something exciting about coding or technology he is my to-go person. It’s so nice to share your passion with someone who understands. There are times that we are laughing by ourselves with a geek joke (see "*" at the end) that nobody else understands. This is really so much fun!

He! He! He taught me how life can be so sunny when I look at the sky through his eyes. He showed me how beautiful I am. You know, this is not selfish. It’s so important to be the center of your partner’s life. He makes me laugh and laugh and laugh. Did I mention laugh? Next to him I learned how to be a better person, to deal with difficulties, to grow, to learn and to love. Because it is so nice to love and be loved. So nice and unique!

Little secrets for Ilias:

- He has been writing code since 5 years old (I wasn't even born back then!)

- His favorite Greek dish is Pastitsio and Tiropita. He gets so happy when I cook them for him.

- He wants his wardrobe very organized with all hangers facing the wall and all clothes facing the same direction.

- He is a licensed bartender and he actually prepares very good fruit punches.

- He loves spending time in the shower. His “quick” version of the shower is an hour or so.

* Two strings walk into a bar and sit down. The bartender asks, "What would you like to order?". The first string says, "I think I'll have a beer quag fulk boorg jdk^CjfdLk jk3s d#f67howe%^U r89nvy owmc63^Dz x.xvcu". Then the second string replies "Please excuse my friend... He isn't null-terminated." :)