A Death in Lagossette

(photos by Wilson Chery)

Late afternoon today, I slipped on my best black formal dress and my only heels.  From my house I could hear the crowd in the street waiting to leave, and wails rising above the voices as the hearse begins to move slowly down the road. Wilson pulled up in front of the house and beeped the moto horn to let me know he was ready to leave.  With a quick kiss to the kids, I grabbed tissues and my umbrella and hurried out the door.  I hopped on the back of the moto, adjusting my skirt to accommodate as modest a ride as possible.  I am not yet used to skirts on motercycles, and certainly not formal dresses, but I am trying to jump into cultural norms here in Haiti.  Riding a moto to a funeral when no other ride is available is one such occasion to dive in deep.

Wilson maneuvers out the gate, down the driveway and into the heart of Lagossette where a sea of mourners are starting the procession to the the funeral in a neighboring town.  Already the scene is surreal and foreign to me with SUV's, Land Rovers, open trucks, tap-taps, and even a repurposed school bus, spilling over with people going to honor the life of Tante Tata (Aunt Tata).  Nearly everyone, save the local school children in their navy bottoms with red and white checkered shirts, wear black or white and are dressed in their very best.  Men in formal suits, women with freshly styled hair, stockings, hats, jewelry, and handkerchieves in hand, or wiping cheeks, make their way to the waiting vehicles.  The sounds of raw sorrow permeate the scene and something deep and mournful lodges in my chest.  My community grieves.

The news came early on Monday when Magalie arrived late for work with tear-stained cheeks, that Gran Tata (Grandma Tata), her grandmother, had died.  Even those who had no direct relation to her referred to her at Tante (Aunt) Tata because she loved whether you were her own blood or not.  Milouse stood in my kitchen the next morning and paused with hands dripping over the dishpan to say, "she was much loved by many because she loved so many, so much".  And so started the week of mourning and remembrance for one "much loved" from Lagossette.

No expense was spared for the funeral of Gran Tata.  Her body was taken to the morgue, embalmed and placed in an elaborate casket.  Though the family had little to spend they scraped up all that was needed for the proper honor due their matriarch.  Throughout the week everyone in town prepared for today's funeral.  Money was earned or borrowed for funeral-appropriate clothes, tears flowed with remembrance, and last night the wake lasted for hours as the many who loved her paid tribute to her life and celebrated hard.  The music was like a dance party through the night, praising Bondye (God) for her life and comforting those afflicted with sorrow.

The ride to the church is short, but is full of one-way traffic, unlike most days on the rural country road.  Motos race and challenge one another for placement on the smooth outer edge of the road.  We wait for a tractor with 6 wagons loads of sugar cane following behind like a wobbly train.  It takes a wide corner ahead of us and the waiting motos line up to follow and then pass.  They avoid fresh puddles from this afternoon's rain, preserving the sharp dress pants and finely shoed feet and the we arrive at the site of interment.


The crowd is already surging into the church when we get there.  Wilson disappears into the crowd to find his family and  I find friends, Dan and Holly.  Dan and Holly have two Nannies who call Tante Tata "Mom" and they are here to support them as well as the many others we know who are affected by this loss.

The church is made of simple block construction with tin roof but is a larger church than many around.  Varnished boards make up benches for most of the sanctuary and on the platform a plain podium sits with the items typical of a Catholic church sanctuary, all in unadorned form.  Unhindered arched widows, with shutters aside, allow the clouded light into the now packed space.

We squeeze, side by side, onto a bench that had been brought in from the school to accommodate the crowded church.  Lagossette school kids stand in the isles as no more seating is available.  Even with a light breeze from the open door-way, sweat leaves my hairline and slides down my neck, and past my color bone.  My dress feels too clingy, too low, too constricting and I re-adjust uncomfortably.  My sticky palms belie my discomfort.  I do not know how to predict what will happen next and my unfamiliar surroundings draw my shoulder muscles up in tension.

Even before the service starts, the wailing has returned.  Above the din of voices, the calls of sorrow rise and fall in painful cadence.  Woman flail and fall against the bodies of those bearing their weight of grief.  People around us stand up to better see who laments next, and then sit again when satisfied with the information gleaned.

Next the band starts up, bass strings and drums leaning into the tune and the choir rises.  The music is rousing and joyful and stands in odd contrast to the wails and cries of the daughters grieving before their mother's closed casket.

The priest prays, exhorts, preaches.  He reads the passage of the Bible in Matthew 25 about who will enter the kingdom of God.  It talks about those who do and do not attend to Jesus when is hungry, thirsty, a stranger, in need of clothes, sick, or in prison and that when we take care of the needs of "the least of these" with these needs, we are taking care of Jesus.  Taking care of these is a mark of those who belong to God's eternal kingdom, and Tante Tata did those things for many, many people around her in her little village of Lagossette, and beyond.

There is eulogy and more singing, and the wailing continues to rise.  The sounds of sorrow now include men's cries, as well.

Sitting in that simple Catholic church I feel completely bewildered.  The is so much noise and commotion, so much loud proclamation of grief.  The priest's voice carries on through the sighs and cries as if he is preaching a Sunday morning sermon, without pause or distraction. My mind is wildly bent on trying to focus on the meaning of the Creole words methodically continuing over the loudspeaker, the rising and falling of the choir and their voices, and the cries of friends I know, who grieve so gravely, so freely, so fiercely.  My mouth feels stale and I must swallow back the ocean of empathy lest my cry join those climbing up and through the tin roof above.  One moment I feel as if I might giggle at the absurdity and then another wave of sorrow washes up and over my pounding heart.  My village grieves on for one who "loved well and loved many" and the weight is enormous.

The priest is now dispersing incense over the casket and saying final prayers, as the cries reach their final pitch.  Daughters and son, grandchildren, and others now sorrow in earnest, knowing the body of their beloved will soon be laid to rest in the cemetery outside the doors of the church. The spicy smoke of the incense wafts throughout the large room.  It constricts in my throat and catches the lump of sadness more decisively.  Water rims my eyes threatening to flood their lidded banks.  I look up at 2x4's and the constant wave of tin that makes up the roof in order to diffuse my own emotions and attempt to distance my mind from the pressing sorrow around me.  I do not wish to wail and sorrow as those who love Tante Tata.  I do not want to fall and be held and carried away in my grief, I do not want to lose control in the ocean of tears where waves of grief control.  I want to run from this deep place where my own rawness and nakedness threatens to become exposed.

Relief comes as the crowd begins to rise and disperse through the open doorways at the side and back of the sanctuary.  The mass of misery now shuffles past.  For those whose sorrow is too heavy, they move past, half conscious.  They are supported by the arms of loved ones girding up from around the middle and under limp arms.  They are wrapped in the love and support of those who tend to them in their moments of greatest weakness.  .  They are carried along when they are too frail to go on.  The lean on each other  when they cannot stand alone.  They are held with the strength of their community, and I realize that though my culture's way of grieving is not the same, the result is.

In both places there is a time and place for saying good-bye and for great sorrow.  There are expected behaviors and customs.  The house of God and the word of God are places and sources of great comfort and truth and the community is there to hold us in our times of need.

I have now made my way into the courtyard in front of the church.  The marching band is playing as the casket is carried into the graveyard and the guests mill around giving hugs and condolences.  In the vastness of this crowd, I find myself standing next to Milouse.  She has quiet tears in her eyes and I hug her close while she wipes her nose.  "She was much loved by many, because she loved many, so much."  I feel her sadness and it draws us close to one another in a shared experience of grief.

The funeral is ending.  On the ride home I am settled by the steadfastness of the mountains around, the rain in the distance, the palms slender upward reach, the coolness of the breeze against my bare arms -- I thank God for these little gifts.  I realize that I am becoming part of this foreign place and these people I can slowly claim as mine.  I am learning to call Haiti home, and the Lord willing, will continue to learn from her people.