OT 's Dr. Sumi Dunne on the love story that led her to Ireland

Dr Sumi Dunne

Last week, Operation Transformation revealed five brand new leaders - and one new expert! Laois based GP, Dr. Sumi Dunne, who took the place of Dr. Ciara Kelly for the show's 12th series, popped in to Ray to chat about her new role and the amazing love story that led her to Ireland in the first place - listen back in the video above.

Dr. Sumi was born and raised in London but moved to Portarlington in 1999 because she "met a man up a mountain" who told her that Portarlington would be a great place to live. The mountain was in Kathmandu and the man was, of course, the GP's "current husband" Matt Dunne.

"He did all the chasing," she insists. "I was just coming up to twenty-three at the time. I was in medical school and was travelling around India with two cousins. Independently, Matt was travelling and was in Kathmandu and our paths crossed.

Their first encounter occurred in a bar called the Yak and Yeti where "out of the dry mist" of the disco, a man with an accent and a beard appeared and said 'howya' - pure Irish charm.

"It was really funny because this was pre-text, pre-email, pre-any of that so he scribbled down my number and said, 'I'll ring ya'. How many people do you meet on holiday that back it up with an 'I'll ring ya'? So he did, ring me."

Soon after, Sumi returned to Southampton, where she graduated from the University of Southampton Medical School, and Matt returned to Laois to become an auctioneer until, eventually, the two decided to meet on Irish soil.

"He rang me. There was a few weeks of a lag phase, I was a student and Ryanair weren't doing flights at €9.99 at that time so there was a trade-off with going out with the girls or catching a flight to come and visit so it took a few weeks for the student finances to come in order but I came over to visit."

And the rest, as they say, is history.

When asked about how she landed her new gig on Operation Transformation, Dr. Sumi explained that she had built a slow and steady presence in the Irish media.

"I had done a few pieces for radio which is always really safe because no one sees what you look like when you're on radio," she laughed. "And I had written a few articles for the newspapers."

"I was made aware that Ciara was stepping back from the programme and then I had seen it in the newspapers, and I thought 'why not?'"

To hear Dr. Sumi speak about this year's leaders and her pet peeves - click on the video above.

For more info on the Operation Transformation leaders, head over to https://ot.rte.ie.

Watch Operation Transformation on RTÉ One every Wednesday at 9.35pm.