Kimi van der Byl & Robert Keith
08 November 2008
The Proposal
Rob packed a picnic lunch and hid the ring in his camera bag. On the guise of him taking a timed photograph of the two of us, he got the ring out of the camera bag and asked me as the timer went off. The reflection from the dunes was so bright, I didn't even see the ring before my eyes well up with tears, I embraced Rob and sobbed an immediate 'Yes'!
The story of how Rob and I met
Robert and I had mutual friends. One evening (3 March 2001 to be precise) I arrived at a club (Studio 47) with some of our friends while Robert was already in the line with other friends. Because the queue was long and it was very cold and windy, my friends who already knew Robert, spotted him in the queue and asked him if we could jump in the queue with them. Because it was so cold, we were packed like sardines waiting to get in. It served us right for jumping the queue because another door opened at the rear of the venue and those at the end got in before us (we were in the middle and got in last). But this gave Rob and I plenty of time to get to know each other. We were very good friends for months although our friends teased us about liking each other in more than a friendly way, which we adamantly denied. Once Robert was late coming to play a game of pool with me. When he arrived, he said that a girl had called him and kept him up on the phone at home. I could not understand why I was so jealous and then realized that our friends were right, I loved Rob and probably had ever since I saw him in that queue! Fortunately, Robert had very similar feelings and asked me to his Hockey formal on 8 September (our first real date). Two months later (8 November 2001), confessions of love were finally made. That is why we chose 8 November to get married, it will be exactly 7 years since the first spoken 'I love you'.
The photo is of my fiancé, Robert Keith, and me at The Bay Hotel. We went there for our 6th Anniversary (of dating) on 8 September 2007 and were utterly spoilt by the Bay Hotel staff. I booked the room and did not tell Robert about it, all he knew was that we were having a drink in the cocktail bar. When I told the employee at the front desk about the surprise, he suggested that he plays along and I must come to him with Rob to ask if I can see one of the rooms for a possible future stay (I think that his name was Mark). Mark also put rose petals all over the room and gave us champagne and cake. Mark played along fantastically and Robert was so surprised! We even had tickets to a club that evening but opted to give it a miss and stay at the hotel instead.
Because of these fond memories, we chose to get married at The Bay Hotel
Our ceremony
Our wedding ceremony is going to be at St Dominic's Chapel in Wynberg. This is the chapel at my old school, Springfield Convent, where I was a scholar from pre-school up to matric.