The most common questions I get asked are how did you end up in California, or how did you meet your husband.

I was living in Sydney and the 2000 Olympics were approaching. To avoid the crowds on public transportation I decided to take a holiday for part of the Olympic celebration. A friend I met the previous year in Europe was also interested in getting away so we booked a 14 day Contiki tour of New Zealand. For those who don't know Contiki is a tour company that specialises in trips for 18 to 35 year olds. They have a huge presence in Europe and are very popular with Australians travelling abroad.

JD had planned for years to go to the Sydney Olympics. The more he planned his trip the more places were recommended to him, including New Zealand. As fate would have it, we booked on the same Contiki tour.

The evening before the tour began I left the hotel room and headed to the elevator to pre-register for the tour. At the same time JD left his room, which was right next door and he joined our conversation. He seemed nice enough...for an American...lol... Neither of us expected that night that we would end up married.

We got to know each other better during those two weeks and then he headed to Sydney for the Olympics. When I got home we got to hang out after work and on the weekends until he left on his tour of Australia.

I came to visit him in the US shortly after Christmas and by the time I left two weeks later we were both certain that we wanted to get married, even though I should have been geographically undesirable....