Love knows no bounds — or language barriers.
A couple living 5,000 miles apart fell for each other through Google Translate, which they used to communicate as they didn’t speak the same language.
Now, they’re married.
In 2018, Madina and Matthew Harbidge caught each other’s eye when Madina was visiting Australia from Kazakhstan. While friends translated for the pair at first, eventually, they turned to the online translation service for a long-term solution.
“When I saw him, he smiled, and I remember his eyes: He looked at me with open eyes and it was a different view for me. I was like, ‘OK, hello,’ ” Madina, 33, told Kennedy News. “And of course, he was looking awesome. I liked this man.”
“She’s a beautiful lady and obviously very intelligent as well, so we got to talk about a lot of different things before the translators got sick of translating,” Matthew added. “I had no idea it would work out to where we are now.”
But when Madina returned to her home country, the pair, who are now married, attempted to learn each other’s languages and also began speaking English via video calls.
“Sometimes Russian and English handle context very differently, so I had to learn how to write so it translated correctly to Russian, and Madina had to do the same thing,” Matthew said. “Otherwise, [Google Translate] was excellent for doing that and we transitioned from writing in each other’s languages to phone calls and video calls together.”
After making numerous trips to see each other and dating virtually — exchanging 145,559 total Facebook messages and 48 days of calls — nothing could keep the lovebirds apart forever. Finally, in August 2020, Matthew proposed via video call, and the pair got hitched in June 2022.
But at first, the couple wasn’t so sure their relationship would work out.
After Madina returned to Australia a second time and the two spent more time together, she told Matthew she liked him — but was met with rejection.
Madina said: “One time I messaged him saying, ‘Do you know that I like you, maybe we could try something?’ and he answered ‘no’ and I was very upset,” Madina said.
“I really wanted to make it work, but I thought, ‘This is going to be really bloody hard if we try to do this,’ that’s why I said no to Madina [when she initiated a relationship], and then she was grumpy at me and didn’t speak to me for two days,” Matthew added, noting that watching his friends who had gone through the Australian visa process made him realize just how difficult it would be to maintain this relationship.
“At the time, I was like, ‘That’s very hard work’ and not something to be like, ‘OK yeah, let’s give it a shot,’ ” he admitted.
But not talking for days made Matthew miss Madina and he realized that maybe they should give it a whirl.
“It was the longest that we hadn’t talked to each other, and basically, when that happened, I was like, ‘no, that’s it,’ and it affected me a large amount, and I said, ‘I absolutely want to spend the rest of my life with this lady,’ ” he said.
When the pair saw each other in person again in October 2018 in Amsterdam, Matthew arrived with a bouquet of flowers and an important question.
“He had a lot of roses, one bouquet of red roses and wooden tulips, and he asked, ‘Do you want to be my partner?’ ” Madina recalled. “And to be honest, I didn’t really understand what he meant because in Kazakhstan we don’t use ‘partner’ a lot, maybe boyfriend and girlfriend but not partner. I was like, ‘What do you mean?’ “
“After the second time, he asked, of course, I said yes,” she added.
As sparks flew in Amsterdam, Madina finally “understood him as the person [she] really loved,” she said.
“He had a clear soul, was very friendly, open, caring and respecting to everyone, and he was very different,” she gushed, saying he made her feel “at home” and comfortable. “I’d never met anyone like him.”
They talked daily, scheduled a date every weekend and saw each other in person every three to four months. But when COVID-19 struck, they weren’t sure how they were going to make it, since they were apart for a year and a half.
“Of course, we were trying out hardest to make things work, but we didn’t know when COVID was going to end,” Matthew said. “We kept saying, ‘It will just be a few months,’ but that became a lot of months, and it became a year, and still there was no end in sight.”
“The structures that we sort of built-in — saying ‘good morning’ and ‘good night’ to each other and spending as much time as we could together — it really helps, but it was bloody hard. It was a tough time,” he added.
Yet, he bought a ring to show just how committed he is to Madina, proposing to her over a video call 5,000 miles away.
“We had no idea when we were going to see each other again,” he said, deciding to pop the question on a beach. “I got out the ring, turned the camera around and said, ‘Will you marry me?’ and she was very, very happy.”
Eventually, the couple was reunited when Madina’s Australian visa was approved — taking only eight months as opposed to two years — finally ending the long-distance portion of their relationship in May 2021. But first, Madina had to quarantine before the two could officially see each other.
“Matt managed to stand outside my hotel when I was in quarantine [for two weeks] and he sent coffee, food and pictures to paint to my room,” she recalled, saying she spotted him from her window. “After I left quarantine, we saw each other, and I don’t know how long we stayed there crying, kissing and cuddling each other.”
This past June, the lovesick couple tied the knot at the nature reserve they visited on their second date.
“If it’s someone who you really love and know you’ll be with them forever, you need to work on the relationship,” Madina said. “Of course, it will be hard and you will think, ‘Oh, maybe it’s not a good idea,’ but if you know it’s your person, you need to do it.”
Now, they’re hoping their romantic story can inspire people who are hesitant about long-distance relationships to make the leap and take a chance on love, saying it’s really just temporary in comparison to spending the rest of your life with the one.
“It will be hard, but what’s two years of mild unhappiness and doing the hard work to have 50 to 100 years of happiness with your life partner,” Matthew said. “For me, it doesn’t even compare, right? The payoff is so worth all the hard stuff.”
