It was Claudia Flores Iriarte's first day working at a hostel in Lima, Peru, October 31, 2008. Then Sean McCallum walked in and their lives changed forever.
It was Claudia Flores Iriarte's first day working at the Point Hostel in Lima, Peru. Claudia was 22, just graduated from college and this was her first job. It was October 31, 2008.
Sean first spotted Claudia at the reception desk when he checked in. He says he thought she was beautiful, but didn't know who she was and doubted he'd ever see her again. Claudia, meanwhile, was deep in work mode and paid Sean no attention. "I don't even know if I was aware there was going to be a Halloween party that night," says Sean."It's just assumed that before you go out for the night, you're going to be hanging out at the hostel bar, and there were a ton of people and they were handing out masks."
Sean insists Claudia was staring at him too. But he admits he was captivated by her, and that he recognized her from the front desk, so he possibly was staring."We got to talking, and had lots of fun," says Sean."It was so loud in there. I asked Claudia her name a couple of times, and I could not hear what she said."
It was 2008. Neither Sean or Claudia had smartphones. Instead, they crowded around the single desktop computer in the hostel and looked one another up on the then-fledgling social media platform. He figured he'd stay at the Point Hostel again, but when he pulled up, he discovered it was full and Claudia wasn't working that day.
"I remember sitting at the bar, and it was an out-of-body experience," says Sean."I can only describe it as like this electric current running between us." "It's almost not even the words that were spoken or what was said, it was just the feeling," says Sean of their evening together. He made just a few exceptions, telling his boss, because he had to account for his annual leave, his close friend and his brother, although he made him promise not to tell their parents.
Even a text from Sean's brother -- apologizing for failing to keep Sean's secret -- and a subsequent bemused call from his parents couldn't dampen the mood. He wanted to ask for Claudia's mother's blessing before he proposed, so he scribbled down what he wanted to say to her on paper, and read it to her one day, in Spanish, while Claudia was out of the room.
"For him it was very special and very cool and very touching that everybody came, but I was freaking out -- I was going to meet his mom, dad, sister, his friends, all at once," says Claudia, laughing. "That was super memorable for everyone," says Sean, who says the"Hora Loca" is the main thing their loved ones talk about when they reminisce about the wedding today.Claudia and Sean, pictured here in Canada in summer 2022, are still together fourteen years later.Sean and Claudia relocated to Toronto together in 2010. They still live in Canada today, with their two children.
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