In 2015, Naina Rishiraj’s uncle died of a heart attack at the age of 60. He worked all his life after retiring with the dream of traveling the world. But, despite being “fit as evening”, Ms Rishiraj said, he died suddenly and never got to live that dream.
It was an awakening for Ms. Rishiraj, then a 22-year-old freelance journalist. She wanted to be a journalist since she was 9 years old and put a lot of pressure on herself.
“I was like, ‘Why am I not on the BBC at 10 o’clock?’,” said Ms Rishiraj, who grew up in London. Eventually, she said she realized, “‘I’m 22. I need to slow down. Life is precious.'”
In 2016, she decided to take a break from her career and backpack to Southeast Asia and Australia for three months. That October, she settled in Sydney.
Mrs. Rishiraj first met Ryan Anthony Hawkins at Bounce Sydney Hostel in March 2017. They were assigned to the same bunk bed in room 203: he was on the bottom bunk and she was on the top.
Mr. Hawkins also traveled throughout Southeast Asia in 2015. When he returned to his hometown, Regina, Canada, he realized that completing a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology at the University of Regina was not his path to fulfillment.
He recognized a certain trajectory that was common around him: “Everybody goes to uni or goes into business, they get married in their friend group or their high school sweethearts,” he said, adding that he knew “it was really me. Not.” After spending two months in Thailand, Cambodia and Laos, he decided to travel further and take advantage of his early 20s.
He spent 2016 bartending and saving money, and, in January 2017, moved to Sydney, where he worked in a deli. “For a backpacker who just needed to pay for his room and beer, it was a great gig,” Mr. Hawkins said. “I started at 6, I was done at 2 and I was on the beach at 2:30.”
In March 2017, Mr. Hawkins and Ms. Rishiraj ended up together on the bounce by chance: the hostel they were previously staying at was fully booked during a week in which both Justin Bieber and Adele were performing in town.
It is normal for people from the same hostel room to spend time with each other, they said. Ms. Rishiraj and Mr. Hawkins, along with some of their other six roommates, ate together, explored the city, relaxed on the beach and played board games.
On St. Patrick’s Day, they hang out on the roof of the hostel and try to play drinking games. But “we completely ignored the game,” Mr. Hawkins said. “We were just chatting.”
They talked about where they were from, their future plans and other cities they wanted to explore. “On paper, Naina and I are very different people,” Mr. Hawkins said. She is from a big global city; He is from a small town in central Canada. But they were drawn to travel rather than diverge from the path that had been laid out for them.
A few days later, they met at Guilian’s Belgian Chocolate Cafe, the Dessert Lounge. He “saved all his beer money for that week,” she said, to pay for a large hot chocolate they shared on a rainy evening.
They then went for a stroll and sat on a bench at the Sydney Opera House. As they looked out over the Sydney Harbor Bridge, they lamented how they might never see each other again. She had booked a flight to Melbourne before meeting Mr Hawkins and planned to be there in a few days.
“You always run into people, you make new friends and that’s what happens when you backpack,” Ms Rishiraj said.
Mr. Hawkins told her that night, “If we had been in the same town together for a long time, I would have asked you to be my girlfriend,” she recalled. “And I started crying.”
The day before her flight to Melbourne, Ms Rishiraj planned a night out. She kept a notebook with messages from people she met during her travels. Mr. Hawkins wrote in it: “What you and I have gained in a short time, I will keep forever … One day I hope we can stay in the same place for a long time.”
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They moved to Melbourne, thinking they would never see each other again. But they continued messaging and calling each other. On May 13, her birthday, she went to Sydney, he knocked on her door and surprised her.
“It was so absurd to me because, frankly, I didn’t know if he had gone to anyone else,” Ms Rishiraj said. They spent that weekend together. “We were like, OK, clearly this is something more.”
A few weeks later, Ms. Rishiraj was talking to a co-worker in the toy department of a department store where she worked, about Mr. Hawkins and her uncertainty about his future. And at the same time, his co-worker saw Mr. Hawkins approaching. He went out to surprise Ms. Rishiraj on her birthday.
Ms. Rishiraj said, “It was something out of a film. “I just ran into him, and he picked me up and turned me around.” Even his manager was excited.
In June 2017, he moved to Melbourne to be with her. He was living his best life on a budget: exploring new neighborhoods, frequenting night markets, going to speakeasy jazz bars and strolling St Kilda Beach. They found discounted tickets on Groupon, including tickets to the Cherry Blossom Festival. There, they scored a helicopter ride over the Yarra Valley for $27.
“We didn’t need much then,” Mr. Hawkins said.
Ms. Rishiraj added, “It was just a simpler time. “It really built our foundation as a couple. When we met each other we had nothing to offer each other except presence. It was not based on materialism. Communication and trust – we had to build it from scratch.
Her Australian visa will expire that October, and hers will expire in January 2018. They were trying to figure out the next steps, and she wasn’t ready to go back to the London grind.
He suggested that she move to Canada with him. After spending some time with her family in London, she got a visa to Canada.
They moved to Regina in March 2018 and Calgary in March 2019, where they live today. Mr. Hawkins, 31, is a realtor; Mrs. Rishiraj, 32, is a primary school teacher. Ms. Rishiraj graduated from Staffordshire University in England with a Bachelor’s Degree in Broadcast Journalism. She also received her undergraduate education from Ambrose University in Calgary.
In August 2022, the couple went to Athens for her cousin’s wedding. There, Mr. Hawkins was being “harassed by aunts,” he said, not yet proposing. All along, he had a ring with him.
After the wedding in Athens, the couple moved to Crete. He proposed after a sunset dinner on a rooftop overlooking the lighthouse.
In August 2024, the couple hosted a week of wedding events, including a reception dinner and a haldi, or turmeric ceremony, in their friend’s backyard in Calgary. The couple wore matching yellow and pink outfits: she in a saree, he in a kurta. Mrs. Rishiraj’s mother, Naresh Rishiraj, took out her red wedding dupatta and gave it to Ms. Placed on Rishiraj’s head – a Sikh tradition said to bless the bride.
The civil ceremony took place on August 19 at the Willow Lane Barn in Olds, Alberta. The couple’s close friend Ray Recto, who holds a one-day wedding officiant license from the Alberta government, officiated before 75 guests. They wore custom rings engraved with the coordinates of the Bounce Sydney hostel.
There was also a pre-wedding ceremony at the Meadow Muse Pavilion, an event venue in Fish Creek Provincial Park in Calgary. The event celebrated Ms. Rishiraj’s Indian and British roots with “high chai vibes,” he said, “where the vibrant flavors of Mumbai’s street food meet the cool charm of Bridgerton.” There was a London-style telephone booth, except white. and was decorated with pink and purple flowers.
And finally, there was a Hindu ceremony at Kenmore Ranch, followed by a reception at the Cornerstone Theater. Mr. Hawkins rode in a horse and carriage Bhangra Remix Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road.” He was welcomed by Ms. Rishiraj’s family, with whom he had to barter and pay cash to see his bride.
For his pledge, Mr Hawkins recalled a message he had written to Ms Rishiraj in Sydney before flying to Melbourne. “My dear wife, all my life is to live in one city.”
on this day
When August 19, 2024
where Willow Lane Barn in Olds, Alberta
Canadian celebration After the civil ceremony, a reception was held inside a barn decorated with fairy lights. A five-man band performed country music, including songs by Canadian singer Shania Twain. The couple wore cowboy hats as he picked it up and rolled it inside the rustic barn.
Three-tier wedding cake Their wedding cake had three flavors commemorating their origins: maple spice for Canada, piña colada for Australia, and almond tea for England and India.
Ride in style For their exit, Mr. Hawkins surprised Ms. Rishiraj with a vintage 1953 Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud. They traveled around the Rocky Mountains celebrating their new life.
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