“So, how comfortable are you guys with the cameras?”, I asked Lynn and Sung. “Oh, not at all,” the both of them said in unison. “We’re probably gonna be one of your worst couples.” I think I might have blurted out a nervous laughter when I heard that. =) Sung was pretty clear to me at the start that they were going to challenge me that day.
Lynn and Sung, if you’re reading this, I just want to tell you, that you were NOT difficult at all. So, no, you don’t get the “Most Difficult People To Shoot” prize!
It’s really about being comfortable with each other, even if you’re really uncomfortable with the camera. The crazy-camera-totting me may be following your every step, but that’s easily forgotten once you get into the groove of things. A little bit of awkwardness at the start is very typical for everyone. But with my stay-back, laid-back, shoot-from-afar style, people tend to just ignore me after the first 20 minutes or so, and instead, focus on each other. THAT’S when I start shooting.
I’m a fan of the cupid. There’s a cupid in every relationship — be it a co-worker, a family member, a waitress, a book, or even a cab driver. The cupid in Lynn and Sung’s story was Sung’s sister, who was determined to set them up.
Lynn called it the “set up,” while Sung called it the “con job.”
It all started one evening while planning for her Halloween party, when Lynn decided to ignore Sung’s sister’s phone call, knowing that she was going to bug her about introducing Sung to Lynn at the party. By missing this call, Lynn never heard the end of it for the entire week after that. Out of guilt, Lynn decided to finally let her set up a meeting with Sung over dinner and a movie, having been promised that it was going to be “totally casual, its soo not going to be a date!”.
Of course, once the non-date evening started, Sung’s sister felt conveniently tired, and proceeded to excuse herself to go home early, leaving Lynn and Sung to spend the rest of the night alone.
“But we were ok with that anyway, because we liked each other even from the start,” Lynn said shyly with a smile as Sung rubbed her arms and held her close to keep her warm as the temperature dropped with the setting sun.
Years later, Lynn was telling this story to a friend, when Sung exclaimed, “What Halloween party??” The “con job,” as they now call it, is that his sister never invited him to the Halloween party. The guilt trip that Lynn got for the entire week after the missed call was just a con job to get Lynn to agree to a date with Sung!
And, my friends, they lived happily ever after. The end.
Sung is known for his lack of cooperation in front of the camera. Every photo of him (seriously, almost EVERY photo I found of him on facebook) has him covering his eyes with two fingers, just like the black bar that goes across someone's eyes in a censored image without model release. So to reward him for being so cooperative during our session, I told him he could strike his famous pose 10% of the time. And this is what we got. This is, after all, what makes Sung unique!
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One fateful night, Robert was standing outside Hangge Uppe on Elm and Rush in downtown Chicago, about to call it a night, until a cab pulled up in front of him.
Then he saw her.
Robert described that moment to me: “…and then, Noly walked out of the cab, dressed all in black, and alofasu’n I started gett’n the pitter-pat…….right here….” he said as he patted his palm on his chest. “…she took my breath away.”
“He reached out, grabbed my hand, and pulled me into Hangge Uppe,” Noly said, with her oh-so-cute Spanish accent.
Needless to say, they hit it off, and “technically” had their first date that night! “And then I snuck a kiss at the end of the night,” Noly gave me a little wink as he told me that.
“And ever since, we’ve been together.”
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Do you believe in fate? When you look at who’s sitting next to you in this journey called life, do you sometimes think that fate must have something to with it? That something or someone must’ve brought you together, because you are so like-minded, and fit so perfectly for each other, that there’s no way this was an accident? I believe Stasia and Carrie are two of those people.
Stasia is a Hematology/ Stem Cell Transplant nurse at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.
Carrie is a Field Officer for Amnesty International.
Carrie completed the Chicago Half Marathan benefiting the AIDS Foundation.
Stasia completed the Chicago Triathlon benefiting for Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.
Stasia was a Villanova University graduate ’07, and was a member of Delta Gamma, an international fraternity built upon the motto “Do Good.”
Carrie was a Villanova University graduate ’03 and returned for her Masters ’07. Also a member of Delta Gamma.
And then they met.
They became friends.
Then they hung out more and became more than friends.
They got engaged while skiing in New York in January 2010.
There is something very beautiful when two people with the same kind and giving spirit, who spend every day of their lives helping other people, find each other and decide to spend the rest of their lives together. Stasia and Carrie are incredibly in love, and it shows in these images. Congrats girls!
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