Watch: Double proposal caught on camera at Disneyland's Sleeping Beauty Castle
Jenny Tuell has seen so many marriage proposals at Disneyland that she isn’t too moved by them anymore.
But despite her cynicism, she knew she had to whip out her camera phone when she saw a man kneel down to propose to his partner on September 24 in front of the Sleeping Beauty Castle.
What stood out to her, she said, is the fact that they were proposing to each other. The couple, Javier López and Samuel Bishop Macias, both planned to ask each other to make the lifelong commitment.
“I saw Javier get down on one knee … I started recording and then Sam got down and you can kind of hear on my TikTok video, me in the background.”
“No,” she exclaimed in the video. “Oh my God!”
The crowd clapped as the couple embraced and cried, then Tuell panned to the castle.
“It was really special that I was able to capture that moment,” she said. “I have a pretty good quality phone camera and I love taking videos and pictures … I panned to the castle because I was like ‘I'm going to send this to them and I want to make it as cinematic as possible.’”
Other people were filming too, Tuell said, adding that she and another young woman went to congratulate the couple on their double proposal.
The couple hugged the young women and Tuell sent them the footage via AirDrop. She asked for permission to upload it to TikTok. She posted the video that same day with Taylor Swift’s “Love Story” playing in the background.
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The tear-jerking moment has since blown up and has been hearted nearly 6 million times.
“I wanted to share it because it was just such a special moment,” Tuell said. “Throughout the rest of the day, I was just so happy and smiling and couldn't stop thinking about it and rewatching the video.”
On Sept. 25, Macias shared a TikTok of his own with clips of the proposals, calling his husband-to-be his best friend.
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'I was genuinely so happy for them'
Tuell said within a day, she’d connected with the couple on social media. Their friend saw the video and tagged them. The couple thanked her for the kind act.
People propose all the time at Disneyland, said Tuell, who is from Chatsworth, a suburb of Los Angeles.
She goes to the park often and has seen at least three or four proposals in front of the castle. Last year, she saw two proposals within five minutes of each other, she said.
She has even seen people make baby announcements there.
When she’s at the park solo, she often finds herself talking to Disneyland cast members.
“I always joke that I would never want to be proposed to in front of the castle,” she said about her chats with the cast members. “Which is so ironic considering this proposal was so moving and I was genuinely so happy for them, especially coming from my normal cynicism about it.”
That López and Macias had chosen each other and wanted to make their engagement official in the same magical place made the moment too special not to share, Tuell said.
She said it was refreshing to see such genuine love between the pair.
“I'm really happy for them and it gave me a little bit of hope of seeing how much they love each other,” she said.