The Funeral
I attended my first African funeral today. It was quite heart-breaking. The deceased, Lorna, is the sister-in-law of Dina, a co-worker at TICH. We drove waaaaay out of town, to the escarpment leading to the rift valley. The escarpment is the ring of mountains circling Kisumu and Lake Victoria, acting as our protector. The ride was bumpy in the back of the TICH vehicle. There were eight of us representing the institute.
Lorna was 32 years old and died from AIDS. She contracted it from her late husband who died five years ago. Her husband is Dina's brother. The disease is hitting ages 18-30 the most; the age when young people are normally making money. But those suffering from AIDS are too ill to work, then they die, so the economy is wrecked and their children are left for relatives (usually the grandmother) to care for.
Just as we do in the South, the Luo have an open-casket service. There was a piece of glass encasing Lorna's body in the handmade coffin. The sheltering tent was blue tarps strung between trees in the middle of the home compound. Chairs and church benches were lined up underneath with the casket at the front. A choir in full regalia sang and beat a drum as all us visitors passed the casket for one last (first) look and to deposit an offering in a plastic bowl sitting on the casket. Several young men carried the casket, followed by the singing choir and congregation, between the houses and into the backyard. Beneath a stand of trees, with the mountains looking on, the grave had been dug and two huge piles of black dirt were mounded on either side.
Several other young men jumped into the grave to receive the coffin. They struggled, the entire group, with the weight of it. It bobbed and slid, often off-kilter, and my heart went out to those young men working so hard to carefully lay the coffin in the hole, on the dirt. The minister asked the family members to throw a handful of soil into the grave. What a heavy, hollow sound the dirt made on the top of the casket. Then, as the choir sang and drummed, men grabbed shovels and spades and swung them furiously, pushing and pulling the soil into the hole. One man, tall, skinny and probably mid-20s, began sobbing out loud and couldn't be comforted. It was truly a sad, sad sight, watching that dirt go onto that casket in the back yard with the escarpment mountains rising nearby and the man's sobs heard above the falling dirt. And every little while, the choir would begin a new song and a different man would step up and relieve one of the tired, sweaty guys of his shovel or spade. Amazing to watch their earnestness at piling every last speck of soil onto the grave, so that it mounded up.
When the crowd moved back to the center of the compound, a man came up to Ugutu and Liz, our co-workers from TICH, and said our presence was requested in Dina's father's house. So we went in and they had set the table with chicken and stew beef and piles of steamed rice and rice pilau and cole slaw. At each place setting was a warm bottle of Coke or Fanta Orange. They insisted we sit and eat. Ugutu had already warned us about the Luo, that they treat visitors as extremely special guest, and to refuse their food would be considered rude. We washed our hands and dug in, eating with gusto and our hands. Dina was truly grateful and moved to see all of us there. She said, 'I didn't expect to see so many of you come to say Pole.' Pole means sorry. And we are.
Lorna was 32 years old and died from AIDS. She contracted it from her late husband who died five years ago. Her husband is Dina's brother. The disease is hitting ages 18-30 the most; the age when young people are normally making money. But those suffering from AIDS are too ill to work, then they die, so the economy is wrecked and their children are left for relatives (usually the grandmother) to care for.
Just as we do in the South, the Luo have an open-casket service. There was a piece of glass encasing Lorna's body in the handmade coffin. The sheltering tent was blue tarps strung between trees in the middle of the home compound. Chairs and church benches were lined up underneath with the casket at the front. A choir in full regalia sang and beat a drum as all us visitors passed the casket for one last (first) look and to deposit an offering in a plastic bowl sitting on the casket. Several young men carried the casket, followed by the singing choir and congregation, between the houses and into the backyard. Beneath a stand of trees, with the mountains looking on, the grave had been dug and two huge piles of black dirt were mounded on either side.
Several other young men jumped into the grave to receive the coffin. They struggled, the entire group, with the weight of it. It bobbed and slid, often off-kilter, and my heart went out to those young men working so hard to carefully lay the coffin in the hole, on the dirt. The minister asked the family members to throw a handful of soil into the grave. What a heavy, hollow sound the dirt made on the top of the casket. Then, as the choir sang and drummed, men grabbed shovels and spades and swung them furiously, pushing and pulling the soil into the hole. One man, tall, skinny and probably mid-20s, began sobbing out loud and couldn't be comforted. It was truly a sad, sad sight, watching that dirt go onto that casket in the back yard with the escarpment mountains rising nearby and the man's sobs heard above the falling dirt. And every little while, the choir would begin a new song and a different man would step up and relieve one of the tired, sweaty guys of his shovel or spade. Amazing to watch their earnestness at piling every last speck of soil onto the grave, so that it mounded up.
When the crowd moved back to the center of the compound, a man came up to Ugutu and Liz, our co-workers from TICH, and said our presence was requested in Dina's father's house. So we went in and they had set the table with chicken and stew beef and piles of steamed rice and rice pilau and cole slaw. At each place setting was a warm bottle of Coke or Fanta Orange. They insisted we sit and eat. Ugutu had already warned us about the Luo, that they treat visitors as extremely special guest, and to refuse their food would be considered rude. We washed our hands and dug in, eating with gusto and our hands. Dina was truly grateful and moved to see all of us there. She said, 'I didn't expect to see so many of you come to say Pole.' Pole means sorry. And we are.
posted by Cindi at 11:32 PM
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