Just moments before the reunion dinner party went to air on Sunday night Married At First Sight‘s Clint Rice and Jacqui Burfoot got engaged – for real this time.
Clint and Jacqui were appearing as guests at the So Dramatic! viewing party in Sydney’s CBD, when Clint, 43, took the opportunity to get down on one knee in front of 150 spectators.
“I cannot believe it. I didn’t think I’d get engaged before I was 30, but now it’s happened when I’m about to turn 30 in less than 48 hours! I am so excited,” Jacqui told Woman’s Day at the event, gazing down at her $30,000 five carat diamond ring designed by Simon Curwood.
“It’s [the ring] so heavy!”
Clint said he had been planning the big proposal for three weeks and chose the event, which was a ticketed event for MAFS fans, as it seemed “nice to be able to share it with other people that support the show.”
Earlier this week, he called Jacqui’s father to get his seal of approval.
“ I like the tradition of just getting the blessing of the parents-in-law first, and so I had a chat with him and told him what I had planned for Sunday night. And he’s like, ‘we absolutely give our blessing’,” said Clint.
Jacqui added her parents would be happy as they weren’t thrilled about her going on the show in the first place.
“They did not approve of me going on the show, both our parents hate it actually. They told us it was going to ruin our lives and people we’re going to laugh at us. But now we’ve found each other, it’s made it all worth it,” she said.
“We’re so happy, we got what we wanted. We went on the show for love and we found it.”
Clint added that as hard as the experiment was, he’d “go through it all again to meet Jacqui.”
Just days before their engagement, Woman’s Day sat down with the pair at Clint’s home in Tasmania, where they told us all about how their relationship truely began.
AN ACTUAL MATCH
The pair reveal that they first began texting during the experiment after Clint and his wife Lauren Hall called time on their marriage. And while Jacqui’s husband Ryan Donnelly claims otherwise, their exchanges remained platonic until around “a week and a half” after they filmed their final vows.
Texts turned into lengthy calls and soon Jacqui was on a flight out to see Clint at his home in Tasmania. “I had gone back to work, but I was emotionally distressed. So I left my job and decided to come visit Clint instead,” says Jacqui.
“I definitely thought that he was marriage material, but we didn’t know if we were going to click. We didn’t speak much in the experiment and we’ve got a 14-year age gap, so it was nerve-wracking to see whether or not we would actually work. But as soon as I got down there, sparks flew and we knew straight away,” she adds.
“Literally on the car ride home [from the airport] we could just tell,” Clint, 43, says.
“And then we got home, had a drink and it was like, ‘wow, we actually are here together.’ You know when you have this feeling and energy with someone, you just know you’re on the same wavelength?”
On top of bonding through their “shared negative experience during production” and the fact that their initial partners had “quite similar traits,” Jacqui gushes it was a plus that they also had so much in common as well.
“We both have e-commerce in common, we’re both down to earth and love the outdoors and hiking. And we’re both insecure and clingy types as well,” she laughs.
“We’re both quite dependent on each other emotionally, which is really good because we align in that need for validation constantly.”
“I just have so much respect for Jacqui,” Clint echoes. “I was wanting someone that I could communicate with, who was empathetic and kind. And she’s all of that.”
TAKING ON THE WORLD
After their first date at Clint’s home, things have progressed quickly, with Jacqui moving into Clint’s palatial house just weeks later and Clint flying over to New Zealand to meet Jacqui’s family.
The acceleration of their romance was one of the main talking points on Sunday night’s dinner party however Jacqui’s not fazed with the naysayers.
“Obviously I was quite desperate for going on Married At First Sight,” she says. “I was really looking for a life partner, so it’s actually no surprise that I’d move in with someone [so quickly]. And I’ve still got my stuff in Sydney, I haven’t fully moved down, but I’ve been living here for the last seven months. Everything just seems to tick,”
she adds.
And things don’t seem to be slowing down either.
“We’ve definitely got marriage and babies on the horizon,” says Jacqui. “We also want to focus on growing our businesses. I’m getting into golf as well, Clint’s a pro-golfer so he’s showing me the ropes.”
Interestingly, Jacqui adds that they’re keen to “build a media presence together,” which shouldn’t be hard given Jacqui has already made “nearly $10,000” on personalised celebrity video message service Cameo! “I’d love to do something like Dancing With The Stars too, where there’s no drama,” she says.
“I probably couldn’t do I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! as I’d just cry the whole time. But it would be great to go on TV [again] so people can get to know us as a couple and we can maybe rewrite over our false personas,” she adds.
“I’ve always seen myself as a bit like Sophie Monk, personality wise. I am funny and I don’t take myself too seriously and I can laugh at myself, so I don’t think it’s fair that I’ve been given the reputation that I’m crazy.
“I would love to correct that misconception. I don’t need to go to a psychological [sic] ward.”
READY TO MOVE ON
While they’re both thankful they found each other through MAFS, the couple wouldn’t go as far as crediting the MAFS production or the experts for starting their love story, saying they believe their compatibility was overlooked for drama and ratings.
“I think casting need to actually match the right people and give them a real chance to make it,” Clint says.
“To see that there’s one matched couple still together [Rhi and Jeff] out of all the couples is really embarrassing.”
Jacqui adds sternly: “I didn’t like Ryan. I never thought that we’d be able to make it work outside. I thought that right from the day I met him on my wedding day.”
When we point out that some may be confused with that statement given she mentioned at the reunion dinner party that she tried to make things work with Ryan, Jacqui hints there was more at play happening behind the scenes. “I didn’t feel safe to voice my concerns,” she says, before adding that she can’t comment about any producer interference as it “touches on stuff that will affect our legal case.”
At the time of print, Jacqui had reportedly obtained an interim restraining order to prevent Ryan from posting about her online.
And yet, with the final reunion set to air on Monday night, the couple are now ready to leave the drama behind and live in their love bubble in Tasmania with Clint’s two dogs Eski and Nassa.
“We’re just excited to distance ourselves from the drama and move on with our lives and live happily ever after,” says Jacqui.
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