Bacolod City

A weekend in Bacolod for Graham and Rocelyn's Wedding 👰🏻

We arrived early on the Friday morning and headed straight to the mall so the boys could get barongs for their wedding outfits. A traditional Filipino wedding attire for the men, it's a long sleeved shirt with a pattern on the front, it's usually a sheer material meaning they have to wear a t-shirt under (intense in the heat). It was nice to see some friendly faces from Guernsey and meet all the Irish and Filipino family of the couple. Bailey risked a hair cut and beard trim, communication can be an issue here when you get asked "is that ok?" You reply "yes" and they continue to cut.

The wedding was at a nearby Catholic Church, a surprise when we arrived was seeing our names in the order of service stating we were making an offering of candles to the priest. Rosie looked absolutely stunning and service was beautiful, few years from Graham, apparently this means he has to do the washing up for 6 months. Our candle offering went without a hitch, very nerve wracking though as we were first down and the candles kept being blowing out by the fan. Afterwards we had photos in the church, they always take one nice one and a silly faces one 😜 it was lovely to see how many people had travelled to share the day with the couple.

The reception was held at L'Fisher Hotel where most of us were staying. It was a huge room and big wedding with lots of guests, we had a good table with all the guernsey guests. The bar staff were very attentive often double parking the boys which probably contributed to the outcome of the evening! It was lovely seeing everyone from all different cultures and backgrounds coming together and dancing together. The Filipinos love to singing and we were treated to lots of guests getting up to sing during the reception. I felt like a celebrity when some teenage girls kept asking me to get in photos with them, they love the blonde hair over here.

The next day one of Rosie's friends had organised a dog show as it was a public holiday due to it being the Philippine Independence Day. The show therefore was based around this theme, it was an amazing sight to observe some of the costumes were very dramatic (especially the dog that had been coloured pink!)Read more