Yahoo Lifestyle Man Stages Fake Fall on Ice Rink During Proposal to Girlfriend as a Nod to 'Sliding' in Her DMs (Exclusive)
Before he got down on one knee to propose, Gurneet Arora staged an accident on the ice that "genuinely scared" his girlfriend of three and a half years
Gurneet Arora proposed to girlfriend Ananya Batra on Jan. 5 at Gore Meadows Ice Rink in Ontario, Canada
The proposal took almost an entire year to plan and involved a staged fall as a nod to Arora's first message to Batra, which was a GIF of a falling Toronto Maple Leafs player along with a message that read: "I fell trying to slide into your dms, a little help?"
"Do you remember the very first message I ever sent you? Will you help me out one more time and marry me?" Arora asked Batra when she rushed to help pick him up
A man took falling in love literally for his proposal.
Gurneet Arora, 26, spent almost a full year planning his proposal to his girlfriend, Ananya Batra, 23. Their engagement on Jan. 5 at Gore Meadows Ice Rink in Ontario, Canada, involved a staged accident as a nod to how the soon-to-be groom slid into his fiancée’s DMs four years ago.
"I was so happy and shocked," Batra tells PEOPLE.
The clueless bride-to-be thought she was ice skating with their friends and family, and dog Leo, to celebrate her boyfriend's birthday, which was the previous day. She had even designed the invitations. In actuality, everyone else was in on Arora's plot to propose.
"Gurneet thought it would be a perfect opportunity to propose because he knew I would have my nails done and wouldn’t expect a thing about him renting out the ice rink and having our friends there!" Batra says.
In another effort to reduce suspicion and secretly capture the proposal, Arora's brother, Pavit of Arora Photography, told her he needed to take ice skating and hockey pictures of everyone there because he was applying to be a photographer for the Toronto Maple Leafs, and had to build his portfolio.
"Gurneet was playing me the whole time!" Batra says. "I was fully convinced that nothing is out of the ordinary!"
Around 8:15 p.m., Arora and his buddies pretended to race across the rink. That's when Arora suddenly slipped, slamming his entire body onto the ice.
"We were watching them from the corner as they raced, and all of a sudden he falls really hard, and I got scared that he’s hurt," Gurneet says. "I skate over to him to see if he’s hurt, and then everyone around him starts moving back."
She continues: "He’s down so I couldn’t see him holding the ring. When I tapped him on the shoulder, he looks up with his cute smile, and he proposes!"
The couple's loved ones began cheering as their favorite song, "One Life" by Ed Sheeran, began playing. The sweet song includes the lyrics "Will you marry me?/Just say yes." A blue fog machine also enhanced the special moment.
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"During the fall, I was genuinely scared 'cause he fell really hard and looked like he was really hurt," Batra recalls. "Once I picked him up and he was down on one knee and proposing everything around me just paused, I didn’t hear any of the outside noise and it was just me and him being in the moment, and I fell in love with him even more … I was just so incredibly happy that nothing else mattered."
When Batra went to pick up Arora after he fell, she asked him what happened. In response, he pulled out the diamond engagement ring and said, "I fell in love with you. Do you remember the very first message I ever sent you? Will you help me out one more time and marry me?"
The fake fall was significant to the couple, who met through a mutual friend four years ago and began dating in July 2021, because it was representative of their first interaction together.
In early 2021, Arora was told that Batra was a huge Toronto Maple Leafs fan, so he sent her a GIF of the ice hockey team's former player Matt Martin falling on the ice, along with a "corny" message that read: "I fell trying to slide into your dms, a little help?"
"From there we kept talking, got to know each other, watched Leafs games over Discord (it was the pandemic), and eventually started dating a couple months later!" Batra says. "To this day we try to watch as many Leafs games together as we can!"
Read the original article on People
