With Passion

Newly engaged Beatrice Tan, 30, founder/creative director of Klarra, shares how she and her fiance, Dean Krstevski, 32, COO for a fintech company, work hard at their relationship.

- Steve Thio​​​​​​​

How did you both meet?

We met at an e-commerce/logistics seminar. I was sent there to learn more about operations for my business and Dean (who was based in Bangkok at that time) attended the seminar on behalf of his company. We were grouped together for one of the roundtable talks and it was probably then that we fi rst laid eyes on each other. After the session, everyone proceeded to the exhibition hall where we had to tap our cards to enter. Dean entered fi rst, but he turned back and smiled; that was when we started talking.

What were your first impressions of each other?

My fi rst impression of him: cute, serious and sincere. His impression of me? Ambitious, smart and not interested in him!

How did the relationship start?

We added each other on Facebook after the seminar. We wanted to meet up and go to the next workshop together since we had each attended the seminar on our own. He returned to Bangkok the next day.

We started chatting on Facebook Messenger after that. The next weekend, he flew to Singapore just to have lunch with me, which was a surprise. I didn’t think the lunch date was the actual reason he flew here; I assumed he had other reasons for the trip. But we hung out from the time he arrived here till he left for the airport to take his fl ight back to Bangkok. So that was how our relationship started.

When did you know he is the one?