After the long night of dancing and drumming, we woke up the next morning in anticipation of the viewing and burial. School began as usual at 8 AM, with a prayer, the anthem, the pledge and students marching to class with the beating of the drums. Around 10 AM, the drums beat again, signaling another assembly. The students ran to the front of the school and seemed to know exactly what to do (which was good because we had no idea what was going on). They formed two long lines, and the drumbeat started and they began singing and marching in place, waiting for other classes to join. When all were assembled, a beautiful bouquet of flowers was brought out and carried by one of the older girls, and they all began moving out of the schoolyard and down the road toward the home of the family.
We turned right off the main road and went into the village, weaving a serpentine path through the mud and daub houses, bamboo kitchen stalls and past clothes lines of colorfully patterned fabrics drying in the sun. We passed the center area, where the Chiefs were meeting around a large tree with members of the family, including the father, as well as community members. When we reached the home of the family, the students gathered in an open area outside the home's fence, and continued their songs. The teachers were led inside and we stood under the new palm leaf roof directly in front if the home. Local women were wailing inconsolably in front of the home. People were filing through the door of the home which was only covered by a hanging white sheet. The teachers began filing in, and we joined them to view the body. There were about four women in the house. They tossed white talcum powder on Renee's shoulder which later we learned meant that this was an unexpected death. The sight of the girl instantly brought a surge of emotion and tears, thinking of the complete loss and devastation I would feel if I lost my own child. We filed out of the house and stood in the hot sun while others also went in. They had the entire student body from both the primary and junior high schools pass through the home, many of the children coming out crying. Some stayed in front of the home while others went out and continued singing and began dancing and drumming with a fervor. We soon joined them, as the heat from the hot sun beating down in a crowded space was becoming overbearing. In the area outside the home, there were groups of women dancing and singing together, as well as the swelling group of children moving to the music and singing in one voice. Some were wailing as they sang. It was such a sight of beauty and sadness, and also celebration.
After about an hour of taking all of this in, we rejoined under the palm roof and soon the closed coffin emerged, carried by several men. The cries and singing reached a fever pitch, and all merged in one hot mass to follow the coffin through the village and into the church.
The church service began and Renee stayed with the teachers while the rest of our group went back to eat lunch at Vinolia's and process all we had seen and heard. The whole experience was so surreal, like nothing we had ever imagined. There was so much beauty in how the community came together to support the family and grieve as one. I believe it was Emmanuel that had said that if something happens in their community it affects the whole community, not just that one family or one person.
At the church service, people filed in singing, and it began with a Catholic service. Then the priest launched into a lecture about the importance of helping others because you never know what difference it could make, that it could mean the difference between someone's life or death. There was a central tone that people should have done more to prevent this child's death. After that came songs and offering. Many children went up, dropped coins in a basket then circled the casket which was flanked by two women dancing around it, then walked back to sit down.
After lunch the rest of us joined the church service. There is a tradition which they performed where they called up the class the child had belonged to (class 4), and began reading the attendance role. When they got to Theresa's name, they called it three times, each time the students calling back "absent". With that,they announced that her name was being struck from the school roster and crossed out.
Burial ( part 4) to be continued....
