Jaden and I met on a dating app. Three days after we first chatted, he asked me out to watch a movie, The Amazing Spider Man. It was our first date. We went for ramen at Cineleisure before walking and talking all the way to Shaw Lido. I have kept every movie ticket I had since I was young, but I also kept this one in case our relationship blossomed into something more.

After noticing the ticket was fading, I taped it onto a piece of paper hoping to preserve it. But after a few weeks, I noticed the ink had faded even more. It broke my heart the second I realised what happened. The movie was a big deal for both of us because it was our first date ever with someone. It was us stepping out of our comfort zone to meet a stranger. In fact, I was so scared that I almost backed out 20 minutes before our meeting.

The tickets are not ‘broken’ or in need of a repair, but rather represent the fading memories of a first date. I wanted to preserve them without physical alterations and sullying what the owners hold dear. After all, the fading of details is evidence of time passing and this phenomenon of ageing is a beautiful process too. It reflects, in many ways, the endurance of their relationship.

My repair allows the owners to have the pleasure of looking at the tickets in their various states. Even as the faded physical tickets are encased in a plastic slab, an augmented reality filter allows them to “see” their original state, as if they were holding them for the first time that evening. I hope it will help them realise how far they have come along together.

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