Janice and I originally met in the summer of 1999 through ICQ, an instant message program like MSN Messenger or AOL IM. I was online because ICQ was Wpage's designated interoffice communication tool. Janice randomly found me by searching for someone who spoke Spanish and English (she was taking a Spanish class at Hong Kong University at the time). I had both languages listed in my profile. We chatted for only a few months. She chided me for loving Christmas but not being a Christian, at which point I made myself invisible to her. For two years after that, I received the occasional impersonal forwarded e-mail, all of which I promptly deleted.

In September 2001, I flew to Hong Kong from Hanoi, the last stop on my 2-week Asian vacation. I met David Frey for dinner the day I arrived, and that same night he flew to Bangkok for an unexpected business trip. Abandoned and friendless in a strange city, I looked up Janice. Before I left the US, I had exported my address book from Outlook to my web site. I didn't know if Janice was still in that address book, but I went to a coffee shop with free Internet access to view my contacts. She was in the list, so I sent her an e-mail telling her I was in town. She didn't remember who I was (she apparently chatted with 50 other people in a vain attempt to practice her Spanish), but she agreed to meet me at Hong Kong University after we spoke on the phone. She had just returned from a solo, 3-month backpacking tour of France and Spain and was still feeling adventurous. She may not have remembered me, but I could clearly picture the photos she had sent me while we were chatting. As it turned out, the photos I remembered were of a HK pop singer.

We spent only one day together. As I left, I extended a generic offer to visit me in the US. When the Jewell family decided to gather in Key West for Christmas, I extended Janice a more specific invitation. She had intended to travel to Taiwan on her Christmas break but decided to accept the invitation and visit the US for the first time. That's when our friendship blossomed into something more. After that Christmas, Janice would visit me 6 more times. The visits that really made an impression on me were the summer of 2002 (when she put up with my two strange roommates and did her best to stay up with me to watch World Cup matches at 3 in the morning) and April 2004 (when she came for just 4 days to attend Dad's 80th birthday celebration). In turn, I visited Hong Kong 5 more times.

In July 2004, Janice resigned from the high school she was teaching at and returned to the US for the 8th time in 4 years, this time carrying three pieces of luggage and holding an open return ticket.You know the rest of the story: cohabitation, return visit to HK in January, flying back together on Valentine's Day, July 2 proposal, July 22 marriage.