“All great Philadelphia love stories involve stoops,” laughed Angela Giampolo.
Even though she and fiancée Kristina Furia met through a chance encounter on a Philly stoop, their engagement had a much more picturesque backdrop.
Giampolo proposed to Furia while they vacationed in Tanzania, Africa, last month.
They met in 2010 through mutual friends and had their first date at R2L, where what was supposed to be one cocktail turned into the two talking for close to seven hours.
“She was so funny and so willing to have valuable conversation right away. It was simultaneously really refreshing and totally unusual,” Furia, a Philadelphia native, said. “She also happened to have shown up on a scooter wearing this ridiculously perfect pants suit and a pair of high heels.”
The couple dated for six months, parted ways for about three years and reconnected in 2013.
Giampolo, who was born in Massachusetts and grew up in Canada, said both appreciate the importance of evolving individually and as a couple, and rely on one another for input and advice during that process.
“Every day we make approximately 35,000 decisions. Those decisions impact the direction of your life and if you aren’t constantly talking and checking in with your partner, it’s so easy to grow apart,” she said. “I can’t imagine us growing apart; if anything [we’ve gotten] more and more in sync with one another while maintaining our individuality and personal growth.”
Giampolo works as an attorney at her firm Giampolo Law Group, and Furia is a psychotherapist and founding executive director of Emerge Wellness. Both also contribute monthly columns to PGN.
Despite their busy careers, both said they prioritize time with each other.
“We spend more time in a day together as a couple than most people because we control our schedules and we spend the majority of that time laughing — and laughing mainly at each other!” Giampolo said.
She added that Furia’s “goofiness” is one of her favorite qualities. Furia also commended Giampolo’s sense of humor.
“She’s funny as all hell pretty much all of the time,” Furia said, adding that she values Giampolo’s authentic generosity as well as her individuality.
“She doesn’t exist in the world like anyone else I’ve ever known; she’s absolutely unusual in the best way.”
For her part, Giampolo is impressed by Furia’s compassion and empathy, and strives to emulate her openness.
“She’s confident yet is able to admit when she doesn’t know something and reaches out for help. I have a hard time asking people for help so that’s something I’m constantly learning about from her,” she said. “She’s emotionally open and honest and more than willing to expression her feelings, which is also something I am trying to learn from her.”
That openness had led the couple to discuss marrying, but Furia was “totally caught off guard” by the actual proposal.
Giampolo began brainstorming how to propose about eight months ago. When the couple booked the trip to Tanzania, where Giampolo lived for several years, she said she knew that would be the place.
“It’s literally my happy place and Kristina’s happy place is anywhere near water,” she said.
When they arrived at their hotel, Kendwa Rocks, Giampolo covertly contacted the hotel owner, who happened to be gay. He looped other staff in, who helped her plan a Dec. 28 dinner on a private island.
“The guys who helped me made it magical,” she said.
They cut branches off trees with machetes to spell “Will you marry me?” in the sand and built a canopy of palm trees strung with seashells. As their boat approached the island, Giampolo said Furia started squinting to read the message.
“I told her to read me what the sticks said and then she smirked, then smiled and then laughed out loud and just said, ‘No! Really?!’” Giampolo recalled. “I took the box with the ring in it out of my bag and just handed her the box; I forgot to take it out and actually put it on her finger! She took the box and got out of the boat. I realized as I got out of the boat she hadn’t said yes yet so I called out, ‘Is that a yes?’”
It was, and the couple settled down to a dinner of freshly caught Kingfish. They watched the sun set on the island but had to hurry back as the tide ebbed quickly; they were able to catch several constellations and shooting stars on the boat ride back.
“I had this unexpected wave of peacefulness and a feeling that everything was right in the world,” Furia said about the evening. “We were standing on this little island on the other side of the world, in a country where being gay is illegal yet Angela had collaborated with five Tanzanians to help make the proposal happen in the most beautiful way on the most beautiful beach I could imagine. Everything felt really connected and like it made sense.”
The couple is planning a destination wedding in Belize.