Match made in heaven
Journals become sweet reality
WHEN Bay newlyweds Shannon and Gabriel Ntshikose started writing letters five years ago to what they hoped would be their future spouses, neither of them knew then that they were writing to each other.
In their newly released book, My Ribs, Your Organs, the Ntshikoses detail how their Christian lifestyle and relationship with God has played a major role in leading them into each other’s arms.
Before they met, the two individually had kept private journals in which they wrote to each other as a “dear-future-husband/wife”, detailing their plans, feelings and desire to meet each other.
By the time they met in 2015, Shannon had been writing her journal for four years while Gabriel had been writing to his future wife for three years.
“We met for the first time in July 2015 and we got close as friends while Gabriel was the head of Twenty-Twenty Destiny, a Christian society oversight to seven ministries at Nelson Mandela University. and I was on the staff at Father’s House church. We came to realise that we had a lot of commonalities, to a point that I got brave and asked him what was going on,” said Shannon.
After exchanging their journals, the two realised they had been writing to each other all along.
Among other qualities, Gabriel specified in his journal that he was looking for a driven and passionate woman who would understand him and love God while Shannon wanted a patient and kind man. Those were some of the qualities that the Newton Park couple found in each other.
“Discovering that the person I had so vividly described [in my letters], had also been writing to me was an overwhelming experience,” said Gabriel.
The Ntshikoses launched My Ribs, Your Organs at the Nelson Mandela University Art Gallery in Bird Street last week.
Despite different racial and cultural backgrounds – Shannon is Indian and Gabriel a mix of Xhosa and Sotho – the couple say this was not an issue for either family.
The couple believe their faith and patience carried them through the process of waiting for the right partner.
“You don’t have to violate your core values to get someone and keep them,” Shannon said.
The pair, who are not only authors but also conference speakers and entrepreneurs who run a quantity surveying and project management company, said the book was a love story dedicated to both Christians and non-Christians.
“I especially want to give hope to females. My hope is that they read the book and be inspired to wait for a Godly partner,” Shannon said.
Gabriel said he mainly hoped the book would remind men of “the reality that God has not forgotten us, especially as men are under so much pressure to do many things to attain a certain standard of [so-called] masculinity.”
ý My Ribs, Your Organs retails for R160 and can be purchased by sending the couple an e-mail at shannon.Ntshikose@gmail.com.