Askim

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Anyone that knows me will tell you I tear up and cry at the most subtle of things. Especially love. Today, only a couple hours into meeting these two, I was tearing up at their city hall wedding. Love is such a beautiful thing and finding your person is just magic to me. These are some of my favorite shots of today when I met with Duygu and Zach (and their closest family members) to walk around Central Park and Downtown, as I photographed their wedding day glow- plus some courthouse photos!

Read below for the story on how Zach proposed- it’s a good one.

Zach can’t ever surprise me. I ALWAYS find out but the proposal was the only time I did not see it coming. I went home to Turkey last September to visit my family. Zach was to meet us in Bodrum (coastal town) for a summer vacation with us, then go to Ankara (my hometown) for a few days with everyone in the family and to talk to my parents about marrying me. He went out with my parents and brother one evening to talk about us and how he wants to marry me.

They all came back, and before telling me anything about how it went, Zach made me go on a jog with him to my Grandmother’s place (it’s a nice running path to her home). We left and he gave me a quick summary of their conversation, then we started running.

We got to my Grandmother’s place and went up to drink some water. When we walked in, Zach gave me his phone and told me to rush to the balcony and take a photo of the sunset. I went out to snap a few shots and when I turned around he was on the balcony with me holding 3 cards. He wrote all his feelings down before getting there and he read them to me. At this point, I could see my brother recording us, and my parents on the parallel balcony of my Grandmother’s. Zach then went down on one knee and asked me in Turkish to marry him. It was probably the biggest surprise of my life. I’m shocked I did not find the ring in his bags by accident 🙂

It was so emotional and so special to have my family with us. I did not think he would do it in Turkey. My grandmother who has difficulty walking and usually misses out on big things was also able to sit down and watch us and later declare: “This was like watching a movie!”.