(Wedding) The Final Dance

Believe it or not, the idea to perform a choreographed waltz for our wedding dance was from me. I'm not a natural dancer, but I can follow steps if I practice hard enough. So I thought, why not go all out? You only get married once, they always say. Love agreed to it with much enthusiasm, as she was a dancer back in high school. 

So here's our final (yes, not first) dance:

I was thinking of doing something like "Thinking Out Loud," but as we only had three months to practice, limited acrobatic ability and a whole wedding to plan, we opted for a slow love song but a really iconic one.  As for the source of our choreography, I'd like to keep that one close to the chest.

Love and I fought a lot during rehearsals, especially during our first few practices. I kept complaining that she's leading me to where she likes me to go (I'm sure it's the other way around in ballroom), which causes resistance when I try to lead her. But after a few sessions, we completed the dance and Love started trusting my dancing prowess haha...

We scheduled the dance at the end of our reception program (hence, final). It was performed at the Country Garden gazebo, outside the reception hall. Doing it the traditional way would require the guests to leave their seats and go outside, watch the dance, then return to their seats for the rest of the program. This way, after the dance, the guests can opt to mingle outside or go home.

Very nice lighting from The Country Garden

We used the gazebo as our photo booth but it was suggested that we do the dance there also. We needed to trade the live band for an external sound system to do this (we didn't need the live band as we had a lot of performers lined up). It all turned out great, the program ran smoothly, and the lights and styling of the garden and gazebo were magnificent.

We performed the dance as well as we could've hoped. It was really fun. Another first with Love.  

(Weekend Getaway) Batangas—Summer 2015

It was a laid back summer for Love and myself this year. No beach trips to Boracay or other summer destinations, just a couple of good ol’ weekend getaways to Batangas for our company outing held at Chateau Royale and a long overdue get together with my college friends at Cintai Cossito.

Chateau Royale Sports and Country Club

Just a few kilometres away from Tagaytay, Chateau Royale is a great place for corporate team buildings as they offer a wide variety of activities:

• A footballl (soccer) field
• A large pool where some of my colleagues played some kind of water polo
• Badminton courts
• Billiards area
• Multiple activity areas with a videoke machines
• Rooms for overnighters and day trips
• And the reason why I may come back, a really high rock climbing wall

The start of my Ninja Warrior campaign

Here are some nice shots of the resort courtesy my colleague Angelo Calipe:

For some reason, Love and I didn't take any pictures of ourselves during the trip. Very uncharacteristic.

Cintai Cossito’s Garden

Cintai Cossito’s Garden is located just a few minutes away from the Star Tollway-Lipa exit. The resort itself is a really large garden where a lot of couples hold their prenup pictorials. Some of the resort’s offerings include a wide variety of activities for corporate events, a multi-purpose area for wedding receptions, a game area, a restaurant, a bar, two large pools and room service massages. The personnel are competent and accommodating to guests and the rooms/villas are spacey and Bali inspired.

Just when I thought we had already explored all that Batangas could offer, we discovered two destinations for a nice chill weekend just a few hours away from Manila.