Simona Musu and Dean Scheepers could barely contain their excitement when they arrived at the Maldives’ Malé-Velana International Airport on February 22.
The couple, who are from South Africa and live in Amsterdam, had traveled to the island country for a special occasion: to exchange marital vows in an intimate beach ceremony, a precursor to their courthouse wedding planned for later this summer.
“We were on cloud nine,” Musu tells CNN Travel. “We felt so glamorous. We went straight from the airport, and there was someone standing with our names on a sign who took us to the seaplane and then to our resort.”
A week later, the couple returned to the airport. But this time, their mood was far more grim. Their flights back to the Netherlands the day prior, along with thousands of others all over the globe, had been canceled following the February 28 strikes by the US and Israel on Iran, putting the couple among tens of thousands of stranded travelers.
The following Monday, at least a hundred of them packed Malé, as the airport is commonly known, charging phones, tending to young children and sleeping in any available space. “No one looked like they just had a vacation on an island,” Scheepers says.
He and Musu were in a state of shock themselves, having just returned from their luxurious week at an all-inclusive, five-star property — the highlight of which was their wedding ceremony on the resort’s private white-sand beach, complete with Maldivian drummers and a walkway full of rose petals and vibrant pink blooms.
Instead of heading back to Amsterdam, where a group of family and friends was waiting to celebrate with them, Musu and Scheepers were facing a far less pleasant scenario: no place to stay, no options for upcoming flights and no idea when — or how — they would return home.
“The whole week we had at the resort was incredible,” Musu says. “The wedding day was just perfect, beautiful, everything went to plan. From there on, downhill. It’s been an absolute nightmare.”
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