Their romance started online on Facebook.
They had been dating for four years and three months before the COVID-19 gave the bride the heartache of losing her would-be husband to the disease.
Thirty-two-year-old seafarer Ralph Waldo G. Landicho and 26-year-old Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) Raquel F. Panganiban were looking to get married before their dreams shattered. Ralph went back to the Philippines on June 4, while Raquel, who’s working in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, came home on June 12.
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And as soon as Ralph landed in the Philippines, he wasted no time in making sure their wedding would go as planned and was excited “to work on the wedding preparations as soon as he got off the ship,” said Raquel.
She said. “ We’ve been living together in my parents’ house,” before Ralph suddenly started experiencing body aches and his breathing got worse and his coughing was getting more severe. His oxygen level dropped and he was put on the high-flow oxygen machine.
Before Ralph passed away, until his last breath he told Raquel, “Bebe, I want to go home.”
He was cremated on August 3.
