COVID Love Story: Can A Malawian Bachelor And A Dutch Bachelorette Make It?
They met and fell in love while working for a nonprofit in his country. He came to visit her in the Netherlands. Because of the pandemic, his hometown visited lasted 7 months. Would love conquer all?
On March 15, Patrick Phiri was ready to take his global romance to the next level.
Patrick, 32, lives in Malawi. His girlfriend, Fiona ten Have, is Dutch. And he was on his way to see her after nearly three months apart.
He was relieved as he waited for his plane to take off from Lilongwe Airport. It'd taken months to prepare his visa application.
And he was nervous about meeting her parents. Fiona, 27, was nervous, too.
"I really wanted my parents to like him," she remembers, "to spend some time together so they could get to know him."
That they did. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Patrick ended up staying for seven and a half months, with no job and no routine – a test of any relationship.
First Date
Fiona and Patrick met on July 1,
