Early January, having celebrated NYE in Ibiza (my home at the time) with the Singaporean crew, the island suddenly felt eerily quiet, once they had jetted off. Wouldn’t it be amazing to spend the winter in warmer climes? I thought to myself dreamily. A couple of days later a bolt of sunshine danced into my inbox, Subject: SEYCHELLES. An e-mail from my old boss and dear friend who I had worked with in Asia several years before. He was always offering me projects in far-flung places from Kenya to Madagascar.
‘Darling, I would absolutely LOVE it if you could do this three-month project for me. I need you to start next week. You’d really be helping me out!’
As if by magic, within a week, I found myself living beachside at the aptly named Bliss Hotel, on Mahé island. I fell effortlessly into my new routine; an early morning swim in The Indian Ocean, a quick bikini to business suit outfit change, followed by days spent bombing around the island, meeting The President and all the Seychellois dignitaries.
A month later, my Spanish colleague Electra and I had the luxury of a getaway weekend to the Robinson Crusoe island of La Digue. I’d started chatting to a tall handsome German on a dating app who was on holiday there with his sister. We unsuccessfully attempted a Rendez-Vous on the first night. Stranded up a mountain on the other side of the island with only a bicycle for transport, it was a logistical fail – Living in Ibiza I was all too familiar with the occupational hazards of island dating!
The following day at the beach I spied a beautiful golden boy; square-jawed, blue-eyed perfection.
“He can’t stop looking at you,” said Electra
“He looks very young,” I laughed.
As I played on a swing between two palm trees, he glided over to say hi; shy and seemingly unaware of his jaw-dropping looks, François was a 22-year-old Corsican in The Seychelles for a family holiday, with a penchant for wild boar hunting.
