The beauty of the Middle East is that most of the world is really accessible to you. When deciding where we want to travel, we literally open the map and start dreaming up possibilities.
And that’s how we thought of Cape Town. Although not particularly close to Doha, its much closer than from Canada. It also fit exactly what we were looking for: moderate weather, incredible natural beauty, a rich and incredible history and culturally vibrant.
Ashley proposed to Chanel in her favourite place to be, the beach. So it was inevitable that we found the most beautiful, serene beach to capture their love in South Africa's fall season. Ali and I only met Ashley and Chanel that afternoon, but we could tell that their calm demeanour, fun-loving nature and love for one another is truly special. They get married later this year in Cape Town's beautiful vineyard landscape in an intimate gathering of loved ones.
All the 'first time' moments in our lives felt like they happened yesterday. The first time we met. Bought our first car. Travelled together. We luckily remember these moments so vividly and clearly. The heavy black coat I was wearing when I sat to pose on our new Nissan from the dealership in the midst of winter. How we wandered around the streets of Beijing without a GPS, but the old-school way - printed directions and three memorized sentences in Mandarin, 'where is the washroom?', 'how much?', and 'excuse me'.
I can’t even begin to describe how incredible, inspiring and supremely talented this new mother is. Its been only four young months into motherhood, but she has fully embraced it (despite her own protests that she doesn’t know what she is doing). She’s constantly thinking about Hayat, worried and eager to make life for her better each moment. But that’s not what makes me so proud.
