For the sake of myself and anyone else involved in this tale, all names have been changed for their privacy
First and foremostly, I was drunk. To be fair, it was a party, and thanks to my new roommate’s influence, my drink of choice had become tequila. This party took place about two-thirds into my exchange in New Zealand and was unlike the usual parties held at the Orchard Park Hall on campus. Orchard Park, or OP, was already unlike the other campus residences: picture a cluster-living style of housing but in little cottages holding 4 or 6 people. We had much more relaxed rules as we were all mostly in our twenties or early thirties, so the staff trusted us to be more responsible. But even with the lax rules, this party broke all of them.
The party was held in the rec room and was celebrating the departure of the Senior Resident Advisor (RA) Chris, who had graduated and was returning back to Samoa. This meant that all the RAs attended and were fully taking part in the rule breaking. The main event was watching Chris and his younger brother play Fear Pong—if you haven’t heard of it, it’s like Beer Pong meets Truth or Dare, and I highly recommend it. The highlight of this was Chris’ brother stripping fully nude and doing a lap around the residence hall. I saw a LOT that night. Let’s just say it was well known that islanders know how to party.
Now that we have the atmosphere of the party established, the story really begins. I arrived already intoxicated, having pre-drank with my friends. So we, as a group, stumbled into the rec room to find the party in full swing. I found a place in the circle surrounding the previously mentioned Fear Pong and scanned the crowd smiling at people I knew and noticing a few that I didn’t. It should also be noted that there were restrictions on having non-OP residents partying at OP later than 10 p.m., so it was unusual to see a large number of people I didn’t know. During the clusterf*ck that was this party, I noticed one quiet guy leaning against a table. He was cute and was fairly my type: tall with glasses and kind of nerdy/cute. Anyway, I basically found an excuse to stumble to that side of the room to talk to other people I knew and ended up introducing myself to him and a few of his friends. His name was Cam and he was also on exchange from Myanmar getting his masters. Now, if you’re like me, you have no idea where Myanmar is and have never heard of it. Well, it is in South East Asia surrounded by Bangladesh, China, Laos, and Thailand. It is formally known as Burma. The more you know! We talked until my friend Sam came over. Sam was a super nice girl, but sometimes she could be a little overly chatty; I will admit that when I’m drunk my patience really goes down. I ended up bailing from the conversation, using the excuse that one of my overly intoxicated friends needed me, leaving Sam to talk his ear off. That was it—our entire first interaction. The rest of the night was spent socializing with friends, taking more shots, and dealing with classic drunk drama.
Cut to about three days later when I got a friend request on Facebook. Honestly, it took me a second to remember who he was. (I don’t have the best drunk memory.) Then, as the kids say, he “slid into my DMs.” He asked for the classic coffee date. I will save you from the fairly boring details of the few dates we went on (coffee, dinner, drinks, etc.).
He was sweet, but like any romance occurring abroad, we had an expiration date. A week before classes were ending, I hit the road for a solo trip in a shitty rental car, and upon my return, we went for a brunch date. At the end of it, he walked me back to mine and we made plans to meet later that night at his to watch a movie. Yeah, that didn’t happen. I messaged him to let him know I wouldn’t be able to make it (I know, I’m not classy) and since I was leaving the country soon, things wouldn’t work out. I felt bad, but it was the right call. I didn’t want him to get too attached… Well, maybe he already was.
We met the next morning because he wanted to see me one more time and said he had something to give me. We met up, and he had a tote bag with him. After chatting a bit, he passed me the bag. Inside were a few different things. The first was a traditional Myanmar decoration, the second was a note he had written me, and the final thing was what you’ve been waiting for. Drumroll, please… He wrote me a song! It wasn’t completely out of character, he was an incredibly talented guitarist, but I was completely shook. He had typed up the lyrics and recorded a copy of it on a USB stick. He was bummed out that he hadn’t been able to perform it for me as he had planned, but I was thankful that he didn’t. I have a weird thing where I get super uncomfortable when someone performs something for me, one-on-one or in a small group, and it would have been really hard to not react awkwardly to a serenade. We said our final goodbyes and I headed back to res.
I was in a mild state of shock. My roommates saw this and asked how it went, I immediately said, “he wrote me a f*cking song.”
To his credit, the song isn’t terrible. It is named after me, which is incredibly sweet, and I did message him thanking him and letting him know that it was the most romantic thing that someone has done for me (which it was).
Going abroad, a lot of crazy things happen, but I think having a song written in your honour is pretty rare and, honestly, makes for a great story. It is something I will never forget—especially because my best friend plans to play it at my future wedding, and I am not going to lie, I played it for my friends at my “welcome home” party, followed by a dramatic reading of the lyrics by one of my friends.
Not many people can say that this has happened to them, especially after only going on about four dates with the guy. Fingers crossed that Cam will one day become famous and I can sell the signed music and song for a bunch of money. Either way, it was wild and I’m still pretty shook.