I was recently honoured to be able to photograph Val and Sammy Sampson on the occasion of their 50th Wedding Anniversary. What a wonderful achievement for this lovely couple.
I asked the couple to share a few words of their story with me.
Val and Sammy were living in Gwelo, then Rhodesia when they met in 1966. Sam was in the Royal Rhodesian Air Force and Val was a nurse. On a social date with another air force guy at their sports club, Val saw Sammy entertaining a crowd with his jokes. He later came across and introduced himself to Val and that was it, fireworks! They married on 29.06.1968 in Salisbury and have been blessed with a beautiful family. They later opened a pet shop and built a fish hatchery where Sam bred tropical fish, suppling not only V & S Pets, but also other pet shops throughout the country. He became a judge at the fish club there too. Sadly water rationing prevented them from continuing with the breeding so they then moved to Kariba with their cabin cruiser boat where they caught mainly Tiger fish and Val learnt to pickle it for the table. It was on Lake Kariba with its wild beauty that they learnt to really appreciate nature. With 2 of their children being schooled in S.A. they decided to move to Johannesburg end of 1984.
Some wise words from the couple "Being close does not always prove that agreements are met, but an open relationship and a good sense of humour go a long way to ones happiness and appreciation of one another"
52 years later and they are still together. Time spent with each other right now is very precious as one cannot predict the future.
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| The lovely couple holding a canvas of an image from their wedding day. |
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| King and Queen |
