Footage taken inside the Barasoain Church in the city of Malolos, Bulacan province, shows Dianne Victoriano gliding down the flooded aisle, her white dress and long veil submerged in ankle-deep water. Guests surrounding her hitched up their own dresses. Some wore gum boots. Others paired flip flops with their rolled up trousers.
Despite the venue being flooded after heavy rain swamped Bulacan province, the bride could be seen beaming as she walked through the water clutching a bouquet of pink and white roses. As some commentators on social media put it: “for wetter, for worse.”
Victoriano’s wedding came as two back to back storms struck the Philippines in the last week, Typhoon Doksuri (locally named as Egay) and Khanun (locally named as Falcon). The storms displaced tens of thousands in the country, bringing gale-force winds, torrential rain and power cuts before making landfall in China.
Filipino officials say at least 52 people have died in the storms, including 27 from a capsized boat. More than 50 others are missing. Earlier this week, officials placed Bulacan under “a state of calamity” because of the heavy rains and flooding.
Mac Lazaro, one of Victoriano’s wedding photographers, said Wednesday that the day was “crazy” but the couple “really loved each other.” The area surrounding the church was badly flooded, he said, which made getting to the venue difficult.
Once inside, he discovered that the church was full of cold water. But with no opportunity to change his footwear, he said there was only one option for continuing his task. “I went barefoot,” he said, adding that the rest of his team also took their shoes off to capture the couple’s special day.
In a Facebook post after the ceremony, Victoriano thanked guests for joining the couple “despite the storm and floods.” She also credited her wedding coordinator, Eilleen Bautista, for helping her to think positively and keep calm ahead of her vows.
The day before the wedding, Bautista reassured the anxious bride: “We will shine tomorrow, Ma’am! Bring it on!”
In a separate Facebook post Monday, Bautista shared her own account of the decision to go ahead with the ceremony despite the “difficult circumstances.”
“I had to be ready to make it happen — rain or shine!” she said. “After carefully planning with my team, we came up with a solid plan to ensure everyone’s safety and keep the wedding going as planned,” she explained. “Even though the church was flooded, we were determined to make this wedding a memorable one.”
Bautisa told her followers that she believed there was a lesson to be learned from Sunday’s dampened nuptials. “This wedding proved that even in the face of adversity, we can still come together and celebrate love in its purest form,” she said.
This is not the first time flooded weddings in the Philippines’ Bulacan province have gone viral.
In 2018, a bride tied the knot during monsoon season, striding through brown water to marry her groom amid heavy rains from Tropical Storm Yagi. “My gown got wet and heavy but I told myself it was as if I was walking on a red carpet,” bride Jobel Delos Angeles told Agence France-Presse at the time.
Regine Cabato and Jintak Han contributed to this report.
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