A FUNERAL

I went to a funeral this morning. It was not someone I knew particularly well - the mother of my wife's childhood friend - but I know the daughter well, and went for her sake.

I haven't been to many funerals in my life. Three of my grandparents, the obvious candidates, died before I was born, and the fourth when I was five; and I grew up without aunts and uncles. My father died when I was young, but I was only two. And a good schoolfriend died in a car crash when I was about eighteen; but I was at school in France at the time, and so wasn't around.

So my first ever funeral was that of my elder brother, who sadly died of a brain tumour in 2002 when he was 45 and I was 42. Since then, I have been to that of my father-in-law, my stepfather, and a couple of local people. Not many, really; though I suspect that will gradually change from now on.

When we lived in Tanzania, there were funerals all the time. It was a real problem, and not just because many of them were of relatively young people felled by Aids. The problem is caused by the expense, since the body must be transfered to the home village, which might be 2,000km away from Dar es Salaam, and the deceased's relatives must pay to get people home and to feed everybody who turns up. I have read that in South Africa, it is now possible to buy funeral insurance to cover the cost, which is a welcome development.

Despite, or perhaps because of, their greater experience of death, I think that Africans handle it much better. A European funeral - as, indeed, it was this morning - is sober and dignified, with much of it held in silence. An African funeral, on the other hand, is colourful and vibrant, with a lot of wailing and laughing and general chaos. Perhaps that is how it used to be in Europe, before we were taught to hide our feelings. If so, I think it would be a good idea if we went back to it. Death is a part of life, after all.

Walter Blotscher