The scheme was to make Hazel believe that this is just going to be one of the adventures I prepared for her. After dinner, I led her to the Sky Coaster where we saw the beautiful city lights of Cebu. Before going down, I told her that we'll be taking another surprise ride but she'll have to be blindfolded.

I went to tie my hanky around her head and led her to the other side of the building where my crew (my brother Brian Sahagun and good friend Jover Alforque, both excellent photographers) and the Sky Adventure staff were waiting to serenade her with a birthday song.

Hazel all the while thought that I was gonna propose. However, when I started removing her blindfold and the audience began singing happy birthday, she felt a bit embarrassed for assuming so since the first thing she saw was the cake with the "Happy Birthday Chef Hazel" side facing her.

I felt very excited at that moment. To my mind, it was the longest happy birthday song being sang but I never wanted it to stop because I do not know how to make my "Will You Marry Me" pitch.

Then I just blurted out, "So what are you going to say?" Hazel said "What?", apparently still a bit surprised.

Then she said, "Oh, thank you everybody."

Someone in the crowd said "What else?" And I go, "Yeah, what else are you going to say?"

That's when I slowly showed her what the other side of the cake says. Then I handed it to a Sky Adventure staff and knelt and said my piece. If I remember it correctly, I asked her if she knows how much I love her and that I love her so much and just wanna spend the rest of my life with her and... "Will You Marry Me?"

And as they say... the rest is history.

We'll be married in civil rites sometime this March in Manila (no definite date yet). We'll have our church wedding next year, March 5 in Nuestra Senora De Gracia in Makati.

Thank you Chedz Cakes for being a special part of this wonderful and memorable segment of our love life. I could not have done it without the cake that was perfectly made, right down to the minutest specification.

- Jef