Love conquers distance between Porur and London

“Getting a desired job at an early age, that too in another country, was itself a dream come true moment for me. Little did I know that London would turn into my second home in the next 10 years,” Satish Parthasarathy takes a deep breath before he starts unravelling his love story – from Porur to London.

All set to tie the knot (for the second time in Hindu tradition) with his longtime Brit girlfriend Sarah, Satish gets triple dhamaka for this Valentine’s Day: He would be celebrating V-Day, a lavish wedding here in Chennai on 10 February and, not to forget, Sarah’s birthday that falls on 15 February.

While most of us must have watched the movie 2 States, where a boy and girl from different States fall in love and get married after going through huge family chaos, here is a real-life ‘2 States’ story. But here, it is about two nations.

In 2011, Satish joined the UK Bank via an IT firm and both Satish and Sarah were assigned with same IT team to work together. However, in 2012 due to some reasons, Sarah was allocated with different group project. This was when both of them started chatting through Facebook. However, initially, these chats were short ones, mostly exchanging festival wishes.

After a few years, Satish came back to Chennai. But that’s when both of them realised what they had was something special. Sarah made a surprise visit to Chennai. “I was shell shocked to see her here. That is when I started to feel the special bond between us. On her way back, she made sure to click pictures with me, and to share the photos, we exchanged phone numbers,” laughs Satish.

The 2015 Chennai floods made a huge impact on both their lives. “When Chennai was flooded and there was no power or internet, Sarah couldn’t reach out to me. Not realising how something like this would affect her, she was overwhelmed with deep concern and worry. She tried every channel like WhatsApp, Messenger, Gmail, Facetime to reach me, but in vain,” Satish says.

After 5 days when Chennai was getting back to normalcy, Satish was amazed by the amount of love poured by Sarah over text messages and number of missed calls. He says, “One message read: ‘Satish, are you alright? I’m worried’ and ‘my eyes are wet’ and I replied ‘I’m fine Sarah, and my family is safe. I am amazed by the amount of care you have on me’.”

She later expressed her love to him but he was reluctant at first. He replied saying he liked her but they can’t be together as his family is orthodox and will not even accept inter-caste marriages. Also she was a year older than him. this won’t happen in India. Sarah’s heart was broken. She, however, din’t lose hope and persisted, stating age, distance, money are just numbers in front of love. She was even ready to give up her job and move to Chennai.

Satish was once again sent on an assignment to Halifax and this is when their love blossomed. Slowly, Sarah and Satish started falling for each other. Sarah, who also fell in love with Tamil culture, started learning about our traditions and values.

While Sarah’s family was happy and supported their love, it was a big ‘no’ from Satish’s side. He, in fact, travelled from London to Chennai several times in two years to convince his parents. However, after continuous opposition, the pair decided to get official permission from UK and Indian embassies and get married.

With mixed emotions, Satish held Sarah’s hand on 14 December 2018 in London for a grand wedding. “When I shared my wedding pictures, my mother went into depression. However, all my relatives and friends supported us strongly and insisted that we get married again as per Hindu traditions. Now, my family has also accepted Sarah and we are all set to get married for the second time on 10 February,” Satish gives a big thumbs up.