Brian and Caff's long way around to Canada: Koh Lanta, the Romanta.

Catherine's version of events:

So we were having a lovely day by the sea again and were wondering about whether to do a boat trip or tour of some sort as we had gotten a bit lazy that week.

Brian told me that he had a surprise trip booked for that evening. I hate surprises so I had him pestered all day and was convinced we would be doing something very Brian-ish like night fishing or camping in a bat cave or something mad. Then he said to wear something nice so I thought maybe he had booked a dinner cruise for us or something.

A taxi picked us up at 4.30pm and it had an advert for Koh Lanta Speedboats on the side of it so I was then wondering why he made me dress up to get soaked on a speedboat with no change of clothes or anything.

Brian had a backpack with him and after about 30 minutes, we passed Kantiang Bay and drove into the National Park where he opened the backpack a bit and showed me our two sleeping bags and said we would be camping there. I was very worried at this stage as I was already being eaten alive by moskeeters in the comfort of our nice, clean hotel so I was imagining the infestations that lay ahead of me in the forest!

But then we pulled into this lovely cliff top restaurant in the middle of nowhere where Brian had booked a table and we watched the sun set and had the most amazing meal. It was the most romantic place I've ever seen.

We had lovely evening and we were just talking all normally and enjoying ourselves. He kept looking at his watch as if he had to be somewhere and I was slagging him. The Liverpool match was on and I thought he was probably getting antsy about missing it. Then a while later he got all romantic on me and got out of his seat and bent down on one knee...

I didn't see any of this as I was hiding my face in my hands so, in effect, I missed the whole proposal but it was very lovely. I was delighted. The ring was too big for my finger though, he must have thought he was proposing to Princess Fiona. I do have big hands for a girl and he must have been banking on my holiday fat-hand syndrome where they swell to caveman size and I've to drag them along the ground behind me. I didn't mind though. To be fair, it was a whirlwind romance and he'd never have had the opportunity to get my ring size, what with me living with him for 6 years with jewellery and rings lying around everywhere, etc. :)

I know you're probably thinking, "13 years, were you not suspicious?", but honestly, I'd no idea he was planning to do it at this time. Especially since we're both unemployed and heading to Canada on a shoestring. And in fairness, he had plenty of opportunities over the years...for example that Christmas a few years back when mam gave Brian my Granny's ring in front of the family while I was upstairs. Talk about putting him under pressure. It was a bit of a boring Christmas though, she was just trying to liven it up with an ad hoc engagement! :)

Brian's version of events:

Leading up to it:
I was wondering about how I would propose and thought of some of the precedents set by the lads:

- Wheels proposing in Paris at the Eiffel Tower
- Tooley two days after he met Julie
- Heendog proposing at the Westbury
- Johnny on Christmas morning
- Pea Murphy proposing in a nightclub (still not sure if Claire even heard the proposal ;))
- Gav putting the ring into a pizza box (probably the most romantic, especially since it was a margarita).

I had always wanted to put the ring into a bottle, then put the bottle into the sea just off the coast and wait at the beach until the tide brings the bottle in. That's the most romantic way of proposing in my opinion. I'd gone so far as to develop the plan further with Gav on Christmas eve last year (after a feed of Guinness).

The plan was for Gav to scuba dive off the coast of thailand with the ring in the bottle and wait till I was on the beach with Caff and then float the ring in towards us. Almost perfect. I went home to mammy whelan that night and told her of the arrangements and she said, "I wouldn't expect anything less from you two bloody eejits, two morans" lol, I thought the funny bit would have been when Gav had to come out of the water to give his congratulations.

The ring:
This was a tough one. I didn't have Caff's ring finger size (I probably should have kept the ring Joan gave me to give to Caff one christmas morning). I had to measure her finger, but how?

When she was asleep one night in Dubai, I wrapped my ear phone cable around her finger and pinched it, then marked it with a pen which then gave me the size! Easy, hey? Not really.

I went shopping in the Dubai mall and looked for the ring. I was considering either getting a token one or the real thing. I saw a really nice ring in a shop window so went in to find a little small Jeweller lad with long finger nails, like something you would put into a USB drive. There were also two nice girls working there. They asked me for the ring size so I pulled out my ear phones and wrapped them around their ring-sizer stick thing. They looked at me as if I had just eaten a sarnie in daylight during Ramadan. I told the guy that that was my girlfriend's ring size. He looked at me gravely and said, "is she very fat sir". I was a bit shocked and said, "not at all"! He then proceeded to use his kind female colleagues as human mannequins. One girl was bigger than the other so he said to me, pointing at one of them, " sir, is your girlfriend as fat as her?" I was mortified and said, "she's not fat", then he called the bigger girl over and said, "sir, maybe she is as fat as this girl?". Haha, talk about awkward. I got out of there as quick as I could. Token ring it was, so!

I went to Swarovski and picked out a lovely token ring. Of course I had to take out my earphones again but thankfully there was no weight bullying. Although I did have to do a pi calculation based on the length of the cable. Don't ask, I obviously got my sums wrong, I had forgot to bring my log tables with me. Anyhow, I got the ring and just had to wait for the right time.

The night before:
I had rang big Brian the night before to get his blessing. I told him that I loved his daughter more than I loved roast potatoes and ketchup. He understood the love for the roasties and so he gave his kind blessing and I told him I may have exaggerated and that Caff and roast spuds may be neck and neck :) I remember the first time ever meeting him in Caff's house when she had told me he was a bouncer. He's not a bit scary though, he is tae. Her whole family are.

The solution:
I organised a beautiful restaurant built into the cliffs in the west of the island called Noon Sunset http://www.noonlanta.com. My plan was to have dinner and watch the sunset and then scruff my knee up. I couldn't wait and was actually a bit nervous!

The morning:
Caff had been reading all the Harry Potter books for the first time while we were away and she was on book number 6. It was 9am and she was at the end of the book and apparently some fecker called Dumbledore keeled over at the end.

Caff bawling over Dumbledore:

She was sobbing away on the bed that morning so I'm thinking, why doesn't she read the happier books with bigger fonts? I'm more of an Anne and Barry fan myself. Barry's like myself, he loves lorries (Eddie Stobarts), jam and happy endings. He must have grown up in Phuket. :)

I told Caff that I had something planned for that evening and that we needed to be back from the beach by 4 as we were being picked up at our hotel. I packed sleeping bags (and the ring) to put her off the scent. The taxi came and I told Caff we were going camping in the national park, which is beside Noon!

She looked a bit nervous! But we got there in the end and it was unbelievable! Worth the 13 year wait! The sun set and we had lovely dinner, a nice aul soppy chat (ah here, leave it out) and I proposed to the absolute shock of poor Catherine! It was perfect.