Ber-month weddings

After Ben and Laila's wedding last November, I attended 3 more weddings to round out the year. First to tie the knot were Alvin and Doray. I was a bit late for the ceremony in Mary the Queen Parish right next to Xavier School. The reception was held at The Marriott in Resorts World. Food was served at the table and it took a while for everyone to be served all courses, but Alvin and Doray had the right idea: during dinner service, we played a game where people would have to identify the movie from which each of ten songs being performed by the band was taken. This meant that people were all paying attention to the band and talking amongst themselves and writing songs down on pieces of paper. This obviously kept everyone entertained. By the time the band was done with all ten songs, we were midway through dinner already.

The next wedding I attended was that of Chachie and JM. The ceremony was at the Archbishop's Palace (I've been there once before to watch a performance of the Philippine Madrigals) and we moved to the Light of Love Events Place for the reception. I also sang two songs. The first song I performed was Kahit maputi na ang buhok ko by Rey Valera. It's a beautiful song which was specifically requested by the couple and it's the first time I ever sang that song in front of an audience. It's also the first time I did a bit of an ad lib talk during the instrumental part to keep people entertained and eliminate dead air, much to the amusement of my friends there hehe. I then sang Cruisin' with JM's sister. We didn't practice at all but Chachie wanted us to sing together so we just went with it and it seemed to turn out okay (I guess we both knew the song pretty well anyway, so it was more a matter of matching each other and harmonizing).

Finally, my "uncle" Jim wed Mira a couple of Fridays ago. I use the term "uncle" loosely here because he's my mom's cousin so he's a generation ahead but I'm several years older than him. :) They got married at the National Shrine of the Sacred Heart in Makati. I've been there once about a decade ago for Amy and Duncan's wedding, but somehow I still remembered how to get there. We ended up being very early for the wedding because my mom was a 'ninang' so we had to make sure we got there before the start of the cerermony. As it turned out, the time indicated on the invitation was 30 minutes early so we had time to get settled. I was also asked to be part of the offertory. The reception was held at the the clubhouse of McKinley Hill. Thankfully, I was very familiar with the area because I managed to avoid the rough and tough Friday traffic during Christmas and we arrived at the clubhouse about an hour before most other people. At the end of the wedding, we took home some of the flowers that we ended up using for Tatay's death anniversary a few days later.

Most of the weddings I've attended before these last three have been suit-and-tie events so I'm quite pleased that in two of these, I got to wear a barong. I miss wearing a barong during weddings actually. It's so much easier and comfortable to wear than a suit. I did notice though that the sleeves of my barong are just a smidge short now. I don't know if it's because they shrunk a bit from washing or because I have gotten wider. Whatever the reason, I need to start losing weight ASAP and maybe I should also get a new barong for the next wedding I attend.