Our story
How it all began
It started with a Hinge message and a promise of carbonara. Tony spotted Larissa's cooking prompt and slid in with exactly the right line: "I know how to make a great carbonara, I'd love to show you." She said yes immediately. She loves food. She had no choice.
There was a brief detour. Each of them went on one other date, convinced the other wasn't interested. But a week later they found their way right back to each other, and that was pretty much that. By December, Tony casually referred to Larissa as his girlfriend mid-conversation. When she stopped him, "Am I your girlfriend? You never asked!" he looked at her like she was crazy: "What is this, the 1900s? Of course you are." They laughed for a long time. They still do.
About the carbonara: it was delicious. It was also, as it turns out, the only thing Tony ever cooked. Larissa became the household chef, and somewhere along the way, she became a seriously good one. She makes gamjatang and gori gomtang from scratch. She makes her own kimchi. Tony likes to point out that his Brazilian fiancée's kimchi is better than some Koreans he knows, and he's not wrong. He also likes to say that in her past life, Larissa owned a Korean restaurant. She doesn't disagree.
The food thing goes both ways. When they first got together, Tony was dragging Larissa to every Brazilian steakhouse in the area, trying all of them one churrasco at a time. He eventually convinced her to get a full grill and taught himself how to cook picanha. He is, at heart, a Brazilian. This was confirmed in July 2025, when he visited Brazil for the first time and fit right in with Larissa's family like he'd always been there. Larissa, for her part, had already passed her own test long before that: she fell in love with Korean food, with Tony's family, and with the warmth they welcomed her with from the start.
They are both the oldest siblings in their families, which means they are both, in their own words, completely right about everything. Two firstborns, each stubborn in their own wonderful way, somehow building a life that is patient and loving and deeply intentional. They take care of each other. That part comes naturally.
Their road trips are loud, chaotic karaoke sessions, lots of K-pop and occasional very strong opinions about the playlist. Tony's music taste drives Larissa a little crazy. She loves him anyway.
A few milestones