Jab We Met: 'She's my lucky charm'

We had invited you, our readers to share your love story this Valentine's Day.

Velan Kannan from Mumbai tells us how he met his future wife on a popular social networking site in 2008.

When I returned from Dubai, I was very lonely.

To pass my time, I used to log in to Orkut and add new friends.

That is how I met my life partner Josephine.

In November 2008, I was searching for someone on Orkut when I landed on Josephine's profile.

I sent her a request and she responded in the next few days.

For over a month we chatted over orkut and I kept forcing her to give me her number so that we could talk.

Finally on December 31 2008, she gave me her number and we had a normal conversation.

After speaking for a few days over the phone, we decided to meet.

We met in the second week of January 2009. It was a Saturday and she was having a half day at work.

We decided to meet outside her office.

We went to the nearby garden, sat down for some time and said our respective good byes. I dropped her at Vikhroli.

Since I stayed alone, I used to call her anytime. I was also becoming very possessive about her. As days passed she didn't like my behaviour and attitude

In the second week of February, before Valentine's Day, we stopped talking.

As time passed I got busy with work and forgot about her.

After two years in December 2010 when I was going through my old emails, I found her e-mail id.

I thought of sending her a casual mail for which I wasn't expecting any reply.

To my surprise, she replied saying she was fine.

In her e-mail, she had also sent her mobile number. Due to my busy schedule, I could not call her.

I came to know that she had visited her native place in Christmas vacation.

We eventually met again, after a gap of two years.

Jab We Met stories!

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Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com

When we met, my eyes had swelled up, it was completely red.

We met in a garden and starting talking about our past.

Our offices were also nearby so we used to meet often. But being a catholic, in the month of February, during lent season, there were other alliances coming for her.

She told me that she did not want to stay in touch with me. I was shattered and wondered whether it will work out.

One month passed by and after Easter we started meeting again. That's when I proposed marriage to her.

She also started liking my company.

Then finally she said, "Tell your parents to come to my home and speak with my parents"

I was a bit surprised and shocked and wondered how I would tell my parents.

We were supposed to meet on Sunday at their home but I could not tell my parents. I somehow mustered the courage and called my sister and told her everything.

She said she would inform mom about it.

I was a bit scared thinking what their answer will be. But they were very eager to meet her.

On the third week of April 2011 our parents met.

And in the 4th week of April her parents came to our home and things were finalised. We were engaged on May 15, 2011 and got married on July 6, 2011.

She is my lucky charm, she has turned my life from nowhere to where I am today.

After few months of marriage I got a job in an MNC for a good position.

Financially we became better.

She has been with me in all my odds. I am very lucky to have such a wonderful human being in my life as my wife.

Through this, I would like to tell my baby that I am very lucky to have you as my wife.

Thank you for making my life so beautiful and meaningful.

Happy Valentine Joe!

Jab We Met stories!

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Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com

Ashok Babu may be happily married, but he still misses his childhood sweetheart.

I don't know whether it is good to tell about my love story, as both of us are married to our respective partners and living a different life.

But I still feel I must share my story with Rediff as this part of life I can't share with any known person.

We were friends from childhood. She used to live in our neighbourhood.

We were very close to our respective families. Both of our families liked each other too.

Those were the days when I had completed my academics and was seriously searching for a job.

I was trying hard to settle in life and at the same time I used to have a lot of time to spare.

All my other friends were busy with their respective trials to settle in life.

So I used to spend much of my time in her house. Initially we had nothing in our minds and both of us were just friends.

But suddenly our friendship turned to love, as I felt interested in her day by day.

Her looks, dressing, maturity in thoughts, simplicity in behaviour, her family and bonding with my family nudged me to take our relationship to the next level.

In my opinion, a known devil (she was the sweetest devil) is always better than an unknown one.

At the same time I could not propose to her as I had no income and was also not sure of her opinion.

If it was a No, there was a danger of losing her friendship too. So I kept mum and enjoyed her friendship.

One day her father somehow paved the way for me to get a very good job in an MNC where he was already working. That was a turning point for my professional career.

I will be thankful to him through my life.

Her father and I were colleagues in office and since we lived in the same neighbourhood we'd sometimes share the same vehicle to go to office too.

One day during a casual chat with her father in office, I was forced to talk about my love.

Though he was very close to me I trembled with fear. I shared my feeling towards his daughter and intention to marry her with his and my parents' permission.

I had informed him that I'd never expressed my feeling to his daughter.

I told him that if he did not like the proposal, I would not talk about it to his daughter because I did not want to miss the friendship between us and our families.

To my fear his answer was 'No'. He said that he had found some good alliances for his daughter and all of them were well settled abroad.

I felt very bad for proposing my love, without knowing his intention towards his daughter's marriage.

I pleaded him to forget about my proposal and not to discuss it with anyone.

Illustration: Rajesh Karkera

Jab We Met stories!

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Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com

From that day onwards I stopped going to her house, and reduced our conversations keeping myself busy in other things.

At the same time I understood that her father had disclosed about my issue with her mother and had asked her to keep an eye on us.

Surprisingly, he never spoke about this with their daughter.

A few days later, she realised that I was avoiding her and confronted me about it.

I kept mum and started ignoring her queries and calls regarding the said issue. She kept on trying to find the reason for me sliding away from her suddenly.

Finally she succeeded and I disclosed my feelings towards her. I also told her that I had first discussed this with her father.

She was shocked as she did not have the same feelings towards me.

We stopped talking to each other. Meanwhile her father continued bringing her proposals from abroad. She had to meet all types of boys every weekend.

Her father being my office colleague and also a friend used to share the details of these alliances every week for which I use to feel very bad.

One day I got a call from her saying that she was finding it difficult to lose my friendship and in this gap she was also gaining some feelings towards me.

But she feared that her parents will never agree, not only because my salary was poor, but also because we belonged to different castes.

She was not in a position to go against her parents.

Though my family was convinced to have her as their daughter-in-law and also property-wise we were well to do than them. However, professionally, I was just a beginner.

We started talking again for hours discussing about our future.

We'd somehow skip away from our families to stay close to each other, roam out, watch movies and go for picnics along with other friends. We used to talk for long hours secretly in the night.

Those were the most memorable days of my life. As days passed happily, none of us knew of the consequences ahead.

One weekend as usual a guy from abroad came to her house, liked her and her father fixed the guy for her.

I came to know about this and asked her to put her feelings for me in front of her parents thinking they might change their mind.

But she was not ready to go against her parents because they would not allow inter-caste marriages.

We discussed for long and I failed to convince her.

I felt I should leave the city before she got married in front of my eyes and urged my boss to transfer me from the city just to force myself to avoid her.

We both felt bad for each other and said our good byes to each other.

She got settled abroad and moved on. I am married to a girl who was arranged by my parents later.

I have a sweet little baby girl. I have shared everything about my love with my wife. She is very co-operative and has helped me move on.

Still deep inside I strongly miss her.

I always feel that had she put her thoughts in front of her parents may be our lives would have been different.

Jab We Met stories!

Follow this link for our Valentine's Day coverage

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Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com

Anita Bhatt from Jammu shares the incidents that led her fall in love with someone she disliked in her first meeting:

I still remember December 10, 2010 when I met Aneet for first time.

The meeting was arranged by our parents (as ours is an arranged marriage).

We talked about 15 minutes only. We realised that we were not interested in each other at all because he was in love within someone else and so was I.

Aneet's parents were not interested in the girl of his choice as she did not belong to our caste (which I came to know about after 1 year of our marriage).

Aneet's family emotionally forced him for this marriage as his mom had met with a very serious accident four years back.

In my case, my parents were happy whatever I had chosen for myself. But to my bad or good luck (whatever say), the guy I was in love had some serious problem in his family, which he never told me.

He'd always say, "I love you but I can't make you mine forever as I have some very serious problem in my family".

After that I got so much disturbed that I was not interested in marriage at all and denied all the marriage proposals that came my way. So my parents decided not to force me for marriage.

During mid 2010, my dad had some neurological problem and his health condition got very critical. After treatment from a very best doctor in Jammu, my dad got out of danger and recovered from the problem.

In November, 2010 my mom received Aneet's proposal from one of my cousin aunt.

My mom discussed the proposal with my dad and they decided to go ahead with it.

When they discussed with me, I refused but my dad started blackmailing me emotionally about his health and all.

So after month long discussions and arguments, I agreed to meet Aneet.

One week after we met, I received a call from an unknown number, which was of course from Aneet. I was shocked and surprised as I hated talking to him.

But we ended up talking for about 1 hour, as Aneet started asking me so many questions.

He called me again on January 1, 2012 to wish New Year but I never called him from my end, as I still was not comfortable with this relation.

On March 7, 2011, we got engaged and our family had decided that marriage will happen in November 2012.

During our courtship days also, I'd never call him as I was still connected to my past.

But Aneet had moved on as he was emotionally stronger than me. In fact, I'd sometimes not pick his phone.

One day he got very angry and forced me to tell the truth about my behaviour.

After 2-3 hours of arguments, I finally told him the truth about my past.

After that day he tried to make me comfortable with this relationship while talking over the phone but I never responded positively.

Our courtship days were not so beautiful and memorable like others.

Jab We Met stories!

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Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com

On November 23, 2011, we got married with great pomp and show.

Few days later after marriage, Aneet took my hand in his and said "Don't think I am your husband, we can be like friends", which was quite impressive.

On December 11, 2011 Aneet left for Pune to join his office back after holidays.

I was still in Jammu for next three months to complete my resignation formalities.

On March 14, 2012, I came to Pune.

When I reached home Aneet hugged me and said "I missed you." But I was still not comfortable.

In the initial stage, it was very hard to be with each other as we were still strangers.

As days passed by we got to know each other very well.

During these months, he made me comfortable in every respect.

To our surprise, we learnt that we had a lot in common between us, even our favourite dishes were the same.

From friends, we became good friends and from good friends, we became best friends.

We started sharing our thoughts and views, and actually started liking each other.

Now we do everything that makes both of us happy.

We have started caring about each other's happiness.

Aneet would always say "I love you and you are Aneet's Anita".

I also feel the same way but never shared this to him.

Now, on this Valentine's Day, I would like to express my love, my desire and would like to thank Aneet for making me feel the warmth of love once again.

Thanks for coming into my life.
Hope, you like my story.

Jab We Met stories!

Follow this link for our Valentine's Day coverage

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Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com

We also heard from this reader who called his an 'unfortunate, but true love story'

I joined B Pharmacy after I finished my class 12.

On the second day of my classes, just a few benches ahead I saw a very simple girl among all the other dashing girls.

She had long hair up to the waist, beautiful eyes and a very soft voice. I lost everything to her.

You can say it was love at first sight. She was so simple that despite my numerous attempts at impressing her, she did not look at me.

I made her the queen of my heart.

I collected information about her from her friends and always tired to become the hero of her life.

But since I was a very rough guy with a beard and moustache, none of the girls took me as a good boy.

One day I found her alone in the classroom studying. I went to her to propose my love.

I just sat beside her and I told her "Will you marry me?"

She blasted me and left me alone. She went to the garden and continued studying.

I again went to her and told her " Jab We Met stories!

Follow this link for our Valentine's Day coverage

Want to send a gift? Choose your gift on Rediff Shopping!

Dear readers, do you have an interesting love story that you want to share? Tell us where you first met your partner and how the two of you fell in love. Write in to us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject line: 'Jab We Met'). You can also include a photograph of you and your partner and we'll publish the best entries right here on rediff.com