OUR STORY

Rachel: We met my sophomore year through the Intercultural Resource Center (IRC), a place that became a home and refuge to so many of our friends during college. Tosh had a gap year and started a year behind me. I was helping with the scholarship program Tosh was in, and we stumbled upon an old YouTube video of Tosh singing “La Vie En Rose,” talking about the concept of love and how most people must be led by hormones and have it all wrong (lol). I said out loud to my friends (who are now in our wedding party!), I think I’m gonna be best friends with that person. As you can see, I’m a person of my word.

Things fell into place during my last year in college, and it just made sense. I looked back at all my photos throughout college and found Tosh in almost all of them, our friendship evident in all my large life moments. Our relationship became more over meals, poetry, music, and long talks about the world and our place in it.

Satoshi: During my first week of college, after having freshly moved to the States, I walked promptly up to Rachel and another friend at my first-ever IRC event. Even before getting to know Rachel, something inside me knew that she would understand my confusion that at this event BBQ, for some inconceivable reason, meant hotdogs and burgers instead of my preferred assortment of coal-grilled pork belly, chicken, and fish served with rice, side dishes, and sauce.

This was the beginning of a friendship that spanned questions of belonging to place—church, university, and community—, explorations of Asian-American identity, and a thorough dive into the poetry of word and meal. That friendship was close to my heart far before it blossomed into any sort of romance.