Manila wedding

Deryk was my co-lead in our corporate social responsibility (CSR) organization at work until he pursued other opportunities.We still get to see each other every so often along with the other people we worked woth very closely as part of the core organizing team of our CSR initiative. As such, when we were invited to his wedding which was held last weekend, a lot of us made sure to go.

The church ceremony was held at San Agustin Church in Intramuros at 1PM. It was, for the most part, beautiful. The wedding vows allowed us to learn about the love story of Deryk and his wife Gle and the amazing journey they took together over the years. However, the challenge of having a wedding in San Agustin church is that so many people get married here that the ceremonies tend to feel rushed. I remember a friend of mine getting married here and she initially wanted me to be the lector but she was told by San Agustin that they don't allow other people to act as the lector because they really have to move things along. We definitely felt that during the wedding as the lector seemed to be in rapid fire mode. Nevertheless, it was still a beautiful celebration and Deryk ang Gle both looked very happy.

The Manila Hotel served as the venue for their wedding reception dinner which was held at 7pm. Since there was a lot of time between the church ceremony and the reception, a few of us - Zaza, Denise, Leianne, and Kristel - decided to hang out in Robinson's Ermita. We had a late lunch in Jack's Loft and then we started to go around the mall. We checked out Japan Home and a few folks bought some items there. I still can't believe that practically everything in the store costs less than P100! They even have a frying pan priced at P88. Wow! This is a perfect place to get Christmas gifts and I think I will visit this place as we get closer to the Yuletide season. :) As we were walking along the mall, we passed by the Robinson's department store and I saw many foldable fans. Zaza mentioned she wanted to buy a new fan so when I pointed the selection of fans to her, we ended up going into the department store where practically everyone else purchased something (except me LOL). At that time, it was already past 5PM so we decided to head to Manila Hotel so that we would have time to get cleaned up. As we waited for the reception to start, we spent more time sharing stories while chilling at the beautiful hotel lobby.

We were among the first few people who entered the ballroom at 7PM and as we stepped in, we were all in awe. The ballroom looked stunningly beautiful! It had sort of a fairytale-woodland-in-winter feel. Strands of crystal were elegantly draped from the the ceiling, the presidential table was decorated with a plethora of candles that gave the venue a more romantic feel especially whenever the lights were turned down, and the table arrangements and centerpieces were exquisite. All five of us were so wowed by the ballroom that we just kept going around and taking pictures. (The photos just don't do the reception area justice.)

The attention to detail was also remarkable. I noticed that the tables had four different types of decorations: there were two kinds of tall arrangements made of tastefully decorated twigs and branches...

and there were two kinds of snow globe-looking centerpieces.

I noticed that the shorter "snow globes" were featured on the tables closer to the center of the room and the taller ones were on tables that were further away. I realized that the room was set up in this way because if all tables featured the tall centerpieces, then people who were further away would have their line of sight blocked. Smart!

The reception served as a bit of a reunion for a lot of us from our CSR organization since it had been months since we last got to see each other. Aside from the 4 people I spent the afternoon with, I got to spend the rest of the evening with Melody, Enrique, and Lou and his wife Leda. We were all seated at the same table and I would like to think we were very good wedding guests as we were all very actively engaged, often being some of the first to applaud each important moment and frequently starting the clinking of glasses so that Deryk and Gle would kiss. By the end of the evening, it took a while for us to make our way to Deryk and Gle to with them well and have our photo taken again with them since so many people were in line to say goodbye. We even joked that it was like we were in a meet-and-greet with some very famous celebrities. :) This was definitely a very memorable wedding and I'm happy that I got to witness Deryk tie the knot while spending the day with great friends.