THE JOSHUTARD STORY
THE JOSHUTARD STORY
The Joshutard wedding has been many years in the making, starting with a chance encounter between 7-year-old Joe and Han in the Lakeside Primary School cafeteria in 1999, and a shared Dairylea Lunchable. From there, we became a noted playground power couple.
Our relationship has always been characterised by the kind of healthy competition in which close friends bring the best out of one another. Although Joe maintains he was robbed in the Lego-building contest during his first stay over Hannah’s place.
He made up for his diva behaviour by introducing Han to TGI Friday’s mozzarella sticks on their first ‘proper date’.
Han returned the favour by using her scientific and technical expertise to bring the most out of our many visits to Techniquest. She alone had the patience to figure out how to open the ‘magic gate’ exhibit (and no, we’re not giving you the answer here – you’ll just have to figure it out for yourself).
These were creative years, with many a theatrical production staged for our parents, who have maintained a close friendship of their own – including a boozy book club that has run, unbroken, for over a decade.
An epic end-of-Year 6 water fight marked the conclusion of the first chapter of our journey, with a twist of circumstance sending us to different high schools. Though we still found time over the years for a few joint sessions on Star Wars: Rogue Squadron, with Joe at the controls and Han serving as navigator.
Despite going our separate ways, we stayed in touch – with Joe briefly joining Han’s youth club and meeting her new teenage buddies, including a parkour expert known as ‘Ninja Man’, and others whose nicknames don’t belong on a family-friendly website.
After university years in separate cities, fate brought us both to London, and eventually landed Joe on Han’s sofa – though he eventually scored a room with a future groomsman in Peckham.
When our schedules realigned, they decided we might as well revive our childhood romance as grownups. This turned out to be much the same, but with even more dressing up (or in the case of the naked tiger run around London Zoo, dressing down).
Now happily co-habiting with two semi-feral cats, and enjoying respective careers as robot-arm operator and professional communist, we are looking forward to bringing things full circle and getting hitched in Techniquest – with all the friends, family (and comrades) who have joined us along the way!
See you on 10 June!
Joe and Han