Their story began at 205 Madison Avenue in Youngstown, Ohio (better known as Cafaro House). Living on opposite sides of the same floor, they didn't see much of each other at the start. In fact, Akanksha's first memory of Ankur is as the guy who somehow managed to set the entire building's fire alarm off in the middle of the night by unsuccessfully trying to make Easy Mac. However, he managed to redeem himself over the coming months, and after a summer trip to Akanksha's hometown of San Ramon and a couple of parties where Akanksha (loudly) exclaimed her interest in Ankur, he worked up the courage to ask her out. Somehow deciding on Cafaro House's basement laundry room as the most romantic location, Ankur and Akanksha officially began dating on September 18, 2015 and the rest is history.

Almost 7 years later, as Ankur was finishing up his first year of residency and Akanksha was in her last year of medical school, the two planned a long-awaited trip to Italy. It was the perfect opportunity for Ankur to plan a romantic proposal. He tried to keep the whole thing a secret, though his insistence on a specific restaurant on a specific date where she had to have her hair and nails done may have tipped her off. Nonetheless, with the assistance of Mario, their wonderful boat captain in the coastal Italian city of Positano, Ankur proposed on April 25th. They had a wonderful time the rest of their trip - gelato, pizza, and pasta tasting their way through the rest of Italy. When they returned home, they met all their friends and family for a celebration in Ohio, and the wedding planning process began.