Rowie Verbakel (25) from Gemert could never have imagined that an evacuation drill at work would become one of the most romantic moments in her life. She was therefore quite surprised when a number of firefighters suddenly entered the doctor’s office during the exercise. It turned out to have all been staged by her friend Reinoud (27), who got down on one knee outside.
“We came back from vacation last week and she expected me to do it there,” says Reinoud. “But I wanted to do it bigger. When I do it, I do it well,” he laughs.
The firefighter from Gemert has been together with his girlfriend Rowie for almost ten years. Together they had been talking about getting married for a while, but a proposal had not yet come about. And that had to be done in an original way for Reinoud. He forged a plan and hoped that the general practice in Aarle-Rixtel, where Rowie works, would participate.
“I thought I could never do this, but her colleague was immediately enthusiastic,” says Reinoud. The idea was that there would be an evacuation drill, in which Rowie had to take on the role of the victim. “She knew that exercise would come, because it is every year. But she did not know that the fire brigade would come to evacuate her,” explains Reinoud.
“I was completely shaking. Of joy.”
While Rowie did what she was asked to do on Tuesday and was waiting in a room upstairs, Reinoud was preparing for the supreme moment outside. Two colleagues from the fire department then went up the stairs with oxygen masks and took Rowie down.
At that moment the penny dropped for her. “Despite those masks, I recognized them. I thought: now it’s going to happen,” says Rowie. Outside, Reinoud, completely in uniform, got on his knees in front of her. “I was completely shaking. Of joy. Really nice, I didn’t expect him to be able to surprise me like that,” she says. And of course Rowie said a resounding ‘yes’.
