“It’s true when they say, couples that travel together stay together”

In 2018, shortly after we got married, I decided to surprise my wife with a holiday to Maldives, a place where she had always dreamt of visiting. The trip was booked for summer 2019, for a week’s stay at the luxurious Shangri La resorts on the island of Villingily.

(Read below to find out exactly what happened whilst we were there).

A surprise of a lifetime

Well, I actually have some really big and exciting news to share with you all. So, in August when we went on our holiday of a lifetime to the beautiful island nation of Maldives, to our surprise we found out that we were pregnant!

Dreaming of becoming a daddy

I’ve been dreaming of becoming a dad for so long, I couldn’t actually believe my ears when we found out the good news on our return to Spain. We had joked whilst on holiday that perhaps my wife was pregnant, but never had we in our wildest dreams thought that was actually true.

This holiday couldn’t have been more perfect or more special for us. We’ve wanted to hear this news for so long and to find out this way made our memories of Maldives all the more special.

Maldives trip, 2019 I Image from the Khawaja Family

Looking back, it actually all makes sense now, all this time we were thinking that perhaps my wife had contracted food poisoning from something she had eaten the week before. This whole time she was, in fact, pregnant and it explained why she wasn’t able to eat anything during the whole 32-hour journey to Maldives.

Even during our stay at the resort, my wife was unable to withstand any kind of strong food smell. She had completely lost her appetite during our stay in Maldeves, which meant I too couldn’t eat because the smell of food would make her throw up. But it was all worth it!

Lasting memories

Our stay at the Shangri La hotel in Maldives couldn’t have been better, we would sit outside on the deck of our water villa overlooking the beautiful golden sand beach and turquoise blue sea in the evenings, talking and making plans about our future, reminiscing about the past and wondering what surprises lied ahead of us.

Even though we had no idea at that time that Mukaddas was pregnant, regardless our favorite pastime was always thinking of baby names and deciding whether we wanted a boy or girl first.

Zeshan & Mukaddas in Maldives, 2019 I Image from the Khawaja Family

I always wanted to have a daughter as a first child, but only time will tell the gender of the baby soon, but whatever it is, we’ll love her or him with all our hearts.

Our time on the island was filled with so many precious moments, I’m certain this trip will definitely rank as one of the best and most memorable holidays of our lifetime.