The Wedding Banquet

today, the long-awaited wedding of the daughter of a college classmate of mine was held at the Santuario de San Jose Church at Greenhills, San Juan. it was long-awaited (by me!) because it's been a long time since i last saw my classmate, Dolly, the mother of the bride.... and because Noel, a dear friend and classmate of mine, was one of the major sponsors. he has come home from New York to attend the wedding!!! actually, the bride and the groom are both from the U.S. and Dolly's whole family are also from there.

the wedding was fabulous.... after the early afternoon rites at the church, the guests proceeded to the exclusive Wack-Wack Golf and Country Club for cocktails before the reception. it seemed that the bride and groom's families spared no expense in planning this affair.... this being the first wedding in both families.... and it didn't help either that the groom's father is the Police Captain Superintendent in Southern Philippines (Region 12) - the highest ranking police officer in that region. in fact, one of the major sponsors was the highest ranking police official in the country!!!

i don't mean to criticize (sorry Dolly!) but there was one hitch during the reception. this occured in our table.... which happened to be one of the major sponsors' table.

for starters, jon and i found ourselves sitting with Noel in the sponsors' table because there were not enough seats at the table reserved for BAI and UP friends of the bride's family. in most wedding receptions with buffet style food service, those sitting in the major sponsors' table are usually served food by the waiters. in fact, the major sponsors usually don't get up to have their pictures taken with the bride and groom.... it's the bride and groom who go to the sponsors' table and have pictures taken with them. consequently, those in the sponsors' tables are not included in the list of guests who have to line up for the buffet.

in our case, we were served the soup..... followed after some time by the appetizers. after the appetizers, nothing else was served in our table! everybody around us, including those who got food from the buffet tables, have finished their desserts while we were still waiting for our main course. we were left in a quandary whether to stand up and go to the buffet table and get our food or wait for it to be served. after a long time and no food came our way, i guess most of us lost our appetite.... some did stand up and get desserts from the buffet tables and shared them with the rest!

as far as i'm concerned, this brouhaha, which I’m sure was not intentional, is nothing…. after all, i’m supposed to be on a diet. however, i pity those fine ladies from Southern Philippines (the ninangs) and the two gentlemen (the ninongs) in our table who were all major sponsors who didn’t get to totally enjoy the wedding banquet!!!

(P.S. I was so hungry when we got home that I had to break my diet and ate menudo from our ref plus bread before retiring for the night!!! Hehehehehehe.)