A Filipino couple didn’t let a typhoon deter them from celebrating their wedding day.
Despite knee-high water flooding their church, Filipino couple Jade Rick Verdillo and Jamaica Aguilar decided to go ahead with their scheduled wedding. The couple exchanged their vows on Tuesday in front of friends and family inside the historic Barasoain Church in Malolos in Bulacan province, according to reports.
The church had flooded after relentless rains, intensified by Typhoon Wipha, swept across the region as part of a deluge that submerged large swathes of the Philippines.
The couple had anticipated the risk but refused to let it derail their plans.
“We just mustered enough courage,” Mr Verdillo told the Associated Press.
“We decided today because it is a sacrifice in itself. But there will [be] more sacrifices if we don’t push through today.”
Ms Aguilar glided down the aisle in a flowing white gown, her train trailing across the water, as Mr Verdillo stood waiting at the altar, solemn and proud in his traditional Barong Tagalog – a traditional Filipino formal garment worn by men.
They have been together for ten years.
The pictures from the wedding showed guests with rolled-up trousers wading through knee-deep water.
Inside the flooded Barasoain Church, pews stood partially submerged as friends and family sat with water lapping at their ankles.
The groom said: “I feel that challenges won’t be over. It’s just a test. This is just one of the struggles that we’ve overcome.”
The photos also captured the bride’s train floating on the water, a child offering flowers barefoot, and guests smiling through the flood.
Despite the storm, family and friends waded through floodwaters inside the church to attend the ceremony.
“You will see love prevailed because even against weather, storm, rains, floods, the wedding continued,” said Jiggo Santos, a wedding guest.
“It’s an extraordinary wedding.”
On 30 July 2023, another Filipino couple, Dianne Victoriano and Paulo Padilla, were also married in the flood-hit Barasoain Church, wading through ankle-deep water to exchange vows.
Meanwhile, in the Philippines, more than 80,000 people remain in emergency shelters following weekend floods and landslides that killed at least three people.
