A SINGLETON’S family holiday became a ‘Mamma Mia story’ when she hooked up with the Greek waiter who poured shots in her mouth – moving there two months later.
Beth Winstone jetted off to Zakynthos, Greece, with her mum and grandma in August 2023 and visited the restaurant her family had gone to every year.
Beth Winstone met Gabriel Alia in Greece while he worked as a waiter at his uncle’s restaurant[/caption]
Beth said many of her friends have compared her story to Mamma Mia[/caption]
The 23-year-old admits she was not looking to find love after coming out of a ‘bad’ relationship just months earlier but met Gabriel Alia while he worked as a waiter at his uncle’s restaurant.
Beth said Gabriel, 25, took her out for a drink on the third night of her holiday, and she fell in love instantly, meeting with him every day for the remainder of the trip.
But when Beth returned to the UK, she said she got a flight back to Greece only two weeks later to see Gabriel as she didn’t want to be apart.
The Greek waiter ‘asked Beth to be his girlfriend’, and the two have been inseparable since, with Beth claiming she has found true love and that Greek men are ‘different’ to British men.
The content creator said Gabriel bought her drinks and danced with her, helping her to ‘get out of her shell‘ after her breakup.
Beth, from Birmingham, West Midlands, said: “In August 2023 my grandad died and my gran had already booked to go to Zante and I booked at the last minute, a month before we were meant to go.
“We went back to [a] restaurant [that the family liked to visit] and that’s when we met. I was previously in a relationship, it ended and it mentally destroyed me, it was really bad.
“I had absolutely no expectations in my head, I didn’t want to speak to anyone ever again and then that happened.
“When we were in the restaurant, I was just sat there oblivious because I wasn’t looking for anything. He kept trying to speak to me and asked if I ever smiled because apparently I had a moody face.
“It just went from there, he took me out on the third night of the holiday for a drink. After that, we’d see each other every day of the holiday, in the night after he finished work.
“When I got back home, two weeks later I flew back out on my own for five days, because he was still working.
“I came home and two days later at 2am in the morning I bought tickets for a flight from Manchester to Zante at 6am. I surprised him, he didn’t know I was going.
“The first time I went back after two weeks he asked me to be his girlfriend, but I was still a bit unsure because of the long distance. But I said yes, obviously.
“It’s the way he was with me, he’d made me laugh and stuff and take me out, not what most men do nowadays, he wanted to get to know me and meet my family and stuff, they loved him. It was meant to be.
“Greek men are different from English men, let me tell you that. I definitely had a Mamma Mia story, that’s what all my friends said.
“The relationship is getting better and better, we haven’t been apart a day since we met. He is the love of my life.”
In the hit Mamma Mia film, starring Meryl Streep and Amanda Seyfried, strong-willed Donna Sheridan (played by Streep) goes on holiday to Greece and has a summer of romances – resulting in the birth of daughter Sophie (played by Seyfried).
After going back and forth between Zakynthos and Birmingham, the couple now live together in the UK with Gabriel working for Beth’s dad at his scaffolding business
Beth said: “I went back to Greece in October with my mum and nan, I quit my job as a waitress and then moved there for a whole week.
“Once summer season finished in Greece he flew back to England with me to meet my dad.
“We moved back to Greece in November, we got a house in Zante, and then after Christmas we decided to move back to the UK because it was really hard for me to find a job there in the winter.
“We tried both and we decided we like it here more.
“I moved over there just after two months of meeting him but I knew it was something, and it was.
“I absolutely didn’t expect to be with a Greek man at all, I was just going on holiday with my mum and gran and my cousin, it all just happened so fast.”
Many people have loved hearing about their story online[/caption]
Beth explains she had been visiting Zante with family since 2012 and had met Gabriel before when she was younger, but had not recognised him.
Beth posted her and Gabriel’s story on social media, in a video that has gathered more than 500,000 views.
One commenter said: “Greek men are built different, you’ll be together forever.”
Another said: “Marry him & move back to Greece.”
A third said: “I witnessed a true love story.”
What is Mamma Mia about?
MAMMA Mia! is a musical romantic comedy film released in 2008, directed by Phyllida Lloyd and based on the hit 1999 stage musical of the same name.
The story is set on a beautiful, fictional Greek island, though it was filmed on location in Skopelos, Greece.
The film features the iconic music of ABBA, with songs written by Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, who were also involved in the film’s production.
The film stars Meryl Streep as Donna Sheridan, a spirited single mother, and Amanda Seyfried as her daughter Sophie, who secretly invites three of Donna’s former lovers—played by Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, and Stellan Skarsgård—to her wedding, hoping to discover which one is her real father.
