Upon the invitation of Rupert Ouano, through our friend Linda Logarta who happens to be his cousin, we then accepted his invite to visit his residence, a mansion perched on top of La Canada hills in Flint Ridge, CA.
Overlooking the Freeway and the surrounding mountains, Rupert and Grace Ouano’s beautiful three-level manse has seven bedrooms: a big master’s bedroom with antiques as décor; a China room with all things inside brought all the way from China including the Opium bed, cabinets and Ming blue vases; Japanese room serving as guest room and known as the Blue room; two living rooms, one formal dining, a large kitchen (actually they don’t cook there as they always dine out), a gym, and a very impressive Chapel with more than 50 saints picked from their trips here and abroad.
From the third level, we came down to see the cellar loaded with sparkling wines, and at the back of the manse were the swimming pool and spa with sauna. After which, we were led to the garage, and lo and behold Rupert’s favorite, the Rolls Royce, was parked! Next to the RR was his Bentley, our service car no less, driven by Eddieboy Limbaco, nephew of Linda. You know, Rupert has a fetish for expensive cars, that aside from his RR and B, he also has a Mercedes Benz, BMW, Lexus, Jaguar and etc. He dabbles in writing, too, but spends much of his time attending to his business—managing all their facilities for the old and sick. One of the facilities is in San Francisco, CA.
So simple-looking and unpretentious, Rupert told this writer that he had humble beginnings in Mandaue, especially during his younger days. He was humble enough to accept and matter-of-factly reveal that when he was still a boy, his mother used to feed him “lugaw and alugbati” for breakfast. He smiled when he told us this story.
A self-made man and now standing tall, Rupert has been working so hard to attain his goal. With a loving, devoted and hard-working wife, albeit childless, Rupert and Grace, with the blessing from God, made their dreams come true! Alleluia!!!