Obituaries in the news
By The Associated Press – Nov 4, 2008
Lennart Bergelin
STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) — Lennart Bergelin, who coached Bjorn Borg for 12 years and captained Sweden to its first Davis Cup title, died Tuesday. He was 83.
Peter Bengtsson, a spokesman for the Swedish Tennis Association, said Bergelin died from heart failure at a Stockholm hospital.
As a player, Bergelin won nine Swedish championship singles titles between 1945 and 1955, and the French Open doubles title in 1948. But he became more famous for his work with Borg from 1971-83, helping him win 11 Grand Slam tournaments.
Bergelin coached the Swedish Davis Cup team between 1971-76, and gave Borg his debut in the competition against New Zealand's Onny Parun in 1972. Borg was only 15, but won the match.
Bergelin was also the Swedish captain when Borg, Birger Andersson, Ove Bengtsson and Rolf Norberg won the country's first Davis Cup trophy in 1975.
___
George Grant
HELENA, Mont. (AP) — George Grant, a celebrated fly fisherman and conservationist who cherished the Big Hole River and successfully fought a dam there, died Sunday. He was 102.
Grant died in Butte, Wayrynen-Richards Funeral Home said.
He had an international reputation for fly tying, with a pattern called the Black Creeper perhaps his most famous. Grant's conservation work included fighting the proposed Raichle Dam on the main stem of the Big Hole, one of the state's top fishing streams, in the 1960s.
In addition to fighting the proposed dam, Grant worked to stop the practice of moving heavy equipment into the Big Hole for diversion of irrigation water, said Bruce Farling, Montana executive for the conservation group Trout Unlimited. Grant worked with the group even in failing health near the end of his life.
___
Byron Lee
KINGSTON, Jamaica (AP) — Byron Lee, a bandleader who helped introduce Jamaican music to an international audience and founded one of the island's first ska bands died Tuesday. He was 73.
Information Minister Olivia Grange says Byron Lee died of cancer at the University Hospital of the West Indies.
The musician founded Byron Lee and the Dragonaires band in 1956 at age 20 and recorded several ska and calypso songs, including "Tiny Winey." The band soon signed with the West Indies Recording Limited label owned by future Prime Minister Edward Seaga.
Lee bought the label in 1964. His Kingston studio would later attract musicians including The Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton.
Showing posts with label 2008. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2008. Show all posts
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Roadside Memorials
press to closeWinnipeg Free PressLocal NewsPublic grief
ROADSIDE MEMORIALS HONOUR LOVED ONES, SEEK JUSTICE
by Bruce Owen
Updated: August 24, 2008 at 08:17 AM CDT
The dead cannot cry out for justice; it is a duty of the living to do so for them'
-- Lois McMaster Bujold, U.S. science-fiction author, in Diplomatic Immunity, 2002
Every few days, Sveinn and Victoria Sveinson go to the intersection of Highway 59 and the north Perimeter Highway.
Sometimes they go together, sometimes alone.
It's as close as they'll ever be to their daughter now. Crystal Taman was killed Feb. 25, 2005, by an off-duty Winnipeg police officer, now no longer on the force, who rammed into the rear of her car as she waited for the traffic light.
Each time the Sveinsons go, it's for the same thing: to clean and adjust the roadside memorial they maintain for Crystal.
"We want people to not forget," Sveinn said of his and his wife's care of their daughter's roadside memorial at the intersection. "We don't want people to forget what it does to people's families."
How the Taman case was investigated and prosecuted is the focus of a public inquiry. But hers is not the only roadside memorial in Manitoba.
Over the past few years, more and more grieving families and friends are laying wreaths, erecting crosses or even small statues of the Virgin Mary in memory of people killed in crashes. These personalized memorials not only mark where a loved one last lived, they also signify how the nature of grief has changed in a society cynical about organized religion and unsure how to deal with death. In Taman's case, there is a message, but hers is like the others in their public display of loss. At one time, we quietly buried our dead in cemeteries or scattered their ashes in cherished places. Our grief was a private thing. Now, it's become a public event.
University of Manitoba religion professor Dr. Kenneth MacKendrick, who teaches a course about grief and photographs roadside memorials, said the rise of roadside memorials is common across Canada and the United States.
Research suggests erecting memorials for loved ones killed in crashes is a ritualistic response to grief in an era when few people go to church regularly and many are skeptical of organized religion, he said.
MacKendrick said also at play is a feeling we don't know how to handle death, especially sudden death. Our world confines death to back-page obituaries or hushed corridors of funeral homes and hospital intensive care units.
So when someone we care about dies, we're not so sure how to respond.
For a growing number of people, that confusion and grief pulls us back to the scene to find some type of solace.
The next step, the most natural one, is putting up a memorial where the person we loved took their last breath. We do it to remember them, but we also do it out of frustration.
"There's no way to scream in public," MacKendrick said of the decision to put up a public memorial, "so I'm going to do it this way."
University of Manitoba landscape architecture assistant professor Karen Wilson Baptist said the rise in roadside and other memorials can be traced partly to the 1997 death of Diana, Princess of Wales. The huge outpouring of public grief, the mountain of flowers outside her Kensington Palace home, were perhaps a signal to the rest of us it's OK to grieve publicly.
Wilson Baptist also photographs roadside memorials and is writing her dissertation on the role these memorials play in how we see the land around us.
She said the act of maintaining a memorial is a lot like maintaining a flower garden. It brings beauty and peace to a place where someone died unexpectedly and horrifically.
"It gives them a remnant of the person who died. They have access to them. It's also a place to let go of a painful memory."
More roadside memorials are appearing throughout the province. Even those that don't name a victim are far from anonymous. Besides remembrance, some are also there because of other, more pertinent, unanswered questions.
Going south on the Maryland Bridge, there is a memorial to Doug Prysiazniuk, the City of Winnipeg worker who died last year when he was working under the bridge. The crew was operating a lift truck with an articulating bucket when the bucket suddenly shot up and crushed him against the underside of the bridge. A family member goes each week to check on the memorial and pray.
His father John said the memorial is there to remind anyone who stops to look that his son died on the job for no reason. The results of an investigation into Prysiazniuk's death have not been released.
"People should ask how and why it happened," John said. "Nobody knows. At least, we haven't been told yet."
At Arlington and Cathedral sits perhaps the most elaborate roadside memorial in the province. It's dedicated to Rachelle Leost, a 39-year-old mother killed in May 2007 when she was struck by a stolen vehicle. Two men were arrested; one was charged with impaired driving causing death.
Leost's common-law husband, Perry Gaudry, said Rachel's memorial was set up as a reminder of a life stolen.
"We want this to be a reminder to people of what happened there," Gaudry said. "Someone who shouldn't have lost their life lost their life there because of someone else's action."
Leost's family drives past the site half a dozen times a day and tends it frequently. Someone -- the family does not know who -- added statues of the Virgin Mary. The memorial has never been vandalized, and snow removal crews have been careful not to bury or damage it.
For the Taman, Prysiazniuk and Leost families, their memorials make a statement more powerful than words -- this is the place where someone we loved died needlessly, even unjustly. At the same time, these memorials allow others to be silent mourners, to stop and grieve without intruding or being seen.
Acknowledging the memorials' importance, the City of Winnipeg set out some rules about them almost two years ago. Memorials must not pose a safety hazard to other drivers and pedestrians and should not fall into disrepair. Memorials are normally expected to be removed within six months, but that's more a suggestion than a rule.
Manitoba plans to partner with Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada on a program that will see a sign, including MADD's red ribbon and the name of the crash victim, erected where that person was killed by an impaired driver. Ontario, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island already take part in similar programs that aim to promote road safety and limit the number of personalized memorials.
MacKendrick said it's unlikely any political authority will clamp down on roadside memorials, although they could be considered a hazard, momentarily diverting a driver's attention.
Authorities in about 25 states have started to deal with the proliferation of memorials, also known as descansos (resting place) in Spanish. Texas, Massachusetts and California allow memorials only for people killed by impaired drivers. Others have banned them from interstate highways or limit the time they can be up or encourage families to use standardized crosses. Delaware has created a memorial park in hopes of discouraging roadside shrines.
Canadian officials are dealing with the same issues. Prince Albert, Sask., officials are struggling over setting a reasonable length of time to allow roadside memorials. Calgary is studying the issue. Alberta encourages people who want to erect a memorial to instead enrol in the Adopt-A-Highway program.
While cities, provinces, states and countries have policies aimed at controlling memorials, they do have one thing in common: no matter what the law says, people still set up the memorials.
Jacquelyn Quiram of Illinois now runs an Internet business (http://roadsidememorials.com/) that sells crosses to anyone grieving the loss of a friend or loved one in a car crash.
Quiram said she started the business after her friend was killed by a car in 2003. She has sold several hundred crosses since. A 90-centimetre cross, stained oak or painted white, sells for $125.
When her friend was killed, Quiram found herself returning to the scene of the crash and wanting to do something to commemorate her friend's life while at the same time sending a message about road safety.
"Death affects the community," she said. "People tend to want to go back. It's a step in the grieving process."
Quiram said the crosses are not road hazards, that drivers talking on cellphones are far more dangerous.
What her crosses and most other memorials do is remind people to be careful, that life is fragile and anything can happen from one moment to the next.
And that no one is completely safe. Ever.
bruce.owen@freepress.mb.ca
CITY OF WINNIPEG'S
POLICY ON
Roadside
memorials
Roadside memorials may be permitted
subject to meeting the requirements
of the streets and traffic
bylaws and the following standards.
Memorials are normally expected to
be removed within a reasonable time
frame, to a maximum of six months.
Memorials must not interfere with .
traffic-control devices or affect the
safe operation of the highway system.
Memorials must not interfere with sight
lines for traffic, nor create undue distractions
for motorists or impediments for
pedestrians.
. All memorials must be installed and
maintained at the applicant's expense.
. Memorial locations must be approved
by the streets maintenance division and
the traffic management branch. Once
an installation is approved, the applicant
should leave contact information
with the public works customer service
division.
. It is the responsibility of the installing
agency or individual, not the public
works department, to obtain the necessary
underground or utility clearance,
(such as Hydro, MTS, gas, etc.) before
installation. Costs to repair any damage
to underground installations, and costs
of any consequential damages, will be
the responsibility of the installing agency
or individual.
. Memorials must be installed as close
as practical to the far edge of the rightof-
way. Under no circumstances will
memorials be allowed in the median of
a divided highway or on traffic islands,
interchange loops or roundabouts.
Approval of memorials other than
crosses must be obtained from the
traffic management branch before
installation to ensure public safety in
the event of errant or off-road vehicle
collision. Crosses must meet the following
requirements:
. Crosses must be constructed of wood
or other lightweight materials which will
break away if struck by an errant vehicle.
. Crosses may be a maximum height of
one metre. Crosses constructed of wood
may be made of lumber no larger than
25 by 100 millimetres in dimension.
. Crosses may include a small plaque
or plate giving the name of the deceased
and the date of the collision. In addition,
plaques or plates shall bear a contact
name and number.
. Colour of crosses must be white or
wood tone only, no fluorescent colours
or red, yellow or orange and no reflective
materials.
. The city will take reasonable measures
not to damage or destroy memorials
during road maintenance operations.
The city assumes no responsibility or
liability for any damages.
. Where memorials require removal for
street construction or maintenance, the
department will try to contact those responsible
for memorial installation. If the
city must remove memorials, they will
be held for 14 days. Under no circumstances
will the city reinstall memorials.
The city could remove memorials .
that fall into disrepair, are damaged,
vandalized, disfigured or burned, or fail
to meet standards of memorial location
or construction.
. The installer is responsible for site
maintenance. The city is unable to
provide assurances regarding mowing,
brush clearing or other right-of-way
maintenance at memorial sites.
All locations are subject to review at .
the discretion of the director of public
works or his or her designate.
Highway 59
Roadside
memorials
Between Birds Hill and Grand Beach there are half a dozen roadside memorials
to people killed in car crashes or hit by a car. Most memorials are concentrated
around Scanterbury at Brokenhead First Nation and north to Grand
Beach where the highway is only two lanes.
1. Memorial at Hwy. 59 and Birds Hill
Road
Harris Mashinter, 19, was killed July 9, 2005,
when his car hit a metal light standard south
of the intersection of Hwy. 202, or Birds Hill
Road.
2. Memorial on Hwy. 59 two
kilometres south of Scanterbury
Jessica Nadine Straight, 25, was killed early
July 8, 2007, when a southbound car struck
her as she walked south on the highway.
3. Memorial on Hwy. 59
one kilometre south of Scanterbury
Kyle William Recksiedler, a 16-year-old
Grand Marais high school student, was
killed Aug. 31, 2003, when he pulled out to
pass slower northbound traffic and collided
almost immediately with a southbound Ford
Ranger. He was alone and wearing a seatbelt.
4. Memorial in east ditch of Hwy. 59
in Scanterbury
Brian Johnston, 52, of Scanterbury, was killed Oct. 23, 2005,
when he was hit by a northbound Honda CRV. Johnston was
wearing dark clothing as he walked in the northbound lane
and the driver did not see him.
5. Memorial on Hwy. 59 three
kilometres north of Scanterbury
Dallas Joan Pasaluko, 66, was killed Aug. 21, 2006, when she
lost control of her car and it crossed the highway, rolled and
landed on its roof in a water-filled ditch. Three people rescued
Pasaluko, but she died later.
6. Memorial on Hwy. 59 one
kilometre north of Stead turnoff.
Merrill Eugene Starr Oct. 19, 1993
7. Memorial on Hwy. 59 three kilometres south
of Grand Beach turnoff.
Unknown. There is no name on the white cross and wreath.
© 2008 Winnipeg Free Press. All Rights Reserved.
Powered by McClatchy Interactive
ROADSIDE MEMORIALS HONOUR LOVED ONES, SEEK JUSTICE
by Bruce Owen
Updated: August 24, 2008 at 08:17 AM CDT
The dead cannot cry out for justice; it is a duty of the living to do so for them'
-- Lois McMaster Bujold, U.S. science-fiction author, in Diplomatic Immunity, 2002
Every few days, Sveinn and Victoria Sveinson go to the intersection of Highway 59 and the north Perimeter Highway.
Sometimes they go together, sometimes alone.
It's as close as they'll ever be to their daughter now. Crystal Taman was killed Feb. 25, 2005, by an off-duty Winnipeg police officer, now no longer on the force, who rammed into the rear of her car as she waited for the traffic light.
Each time the Sveinsons go, it's for the same thing: to clean and adjust the roadside memorial they maintain for Crystal.
"We want people to not forget," Sveinn said of his and his wife's care of their daughter's roadside memorial at the intersection. "We don't want people to forget what it does to people's families."
How the Taman case was investigated and prosecuted is the focus of a public inquiry. But hers is not the only roadside memorial in Manitoba.
Over the past few years, more and more grieving families and friends are laying wreaths, erecting crosses or even small statues of the Virgin Mary in memory of people killed in crashes. These personalized memorials not only mark where a loved one last lived, they also signify how the nature of grief has changed in a society cynical about organized religion and unsure how to deal with death. In Taman's case, there is a message, but hers is like the others in their public display of loss. At one time, we quietly buried our dead in cemeteries or scattered their ashes in cherished places. Our grief was a private thing. Now, it's become a public event.
University of Manitoba religion professor Dr. Kenneth MacKendrick, who teaches a course about grief and photographs roadside memorials, said the rise of roadside memorials is common across Canada and the United States.
Research suggests erecting memorials for loved ones killed in crashes is a ritualistic response to grief in an era when few people go to church regularly and many are skeptical of organized religion, he said.
MacKendrick said also at play is a feeling we don't know how to handle death, especially sudden death. Our world confines death to back-page obituaries or hushed corridors of funeral homes and hospital intensive care units.
So when someone we care about dies, we're not so sure how to respond.
For a growing number of people, that confusion and grief pulls us back to the scene to find some type of solace.
The next step, the most natural one, is putting up a memorial where the person we loved took their last breath. We do it to remember them, but we also do it out of frustration.
"There's no way to scream in public," MacKendrick said of the decision to put up a public memorial, "so I'm going to do it this way."
University of Manitoba landscape architecture assistant professor Karen Wilson Baptist said the rise in roadside and other memorials can be traced partly to the 1997 death of Diana, Princess of Wales. The huge outpouring of public grief, the mountain of flowers outside her Kensington Palace home, were perhaps a signal to the rest of us it's OK to grieve publicly.
Wilson Baptist also photographs roadside memorials and is writing her dissertation on the role these memorials play in how we see the land around us.
She said the act of maintaining a memorial is a lot like maintaining a flower garden. It brings beauty and peace to a place where someone died unexpectedly and horrifically.
"It gives them a remnant of the person who died. They have access to them. It's also a place to let go of a painful memory."
More roadside memorials are appearing throughout the province. Even those that don't name a victim are far from anonymous. Besides remembrance, some are also there because of other, more pertinent, unanswered questions.
Going south on the Maryland Bridge, there is a memorial to Doug Prysiazniuk, the City of Winnipeg worker who died last year when he was working under the bridge. The crew was operating a lift truck with an articulating bucket when the bucket suddenly shot up and crushed him against the underside of the bridge. A family member goes each week to check on the memorial and pray.
His father John said the memorial is there to remind anyone who stops to look that his son died on the job for no reason. The results of an investigation into Prysiazniuk's death have not been released.
"People should ask how and why it happened," John said. "Nobody knows. At least, we haven't been told yet."
At Arlington and Cathedral sits perhaps the most elaborate roadside memorial in the province. It's dedicated to Rachelle Leost, a 39-year-old mother killed in May 2007 when she was struck by a stolen vehicle. Two men were arrested; one was charged with impaired driving causing death.
Leost's common-law husband, Perry Gaudry, said Rachel's memorial was set up as a reminder of a life stolen.
"We want this to be a reminder to people of what happened there," Gaudry said. "Someone who shouldn't have lost their life lost their life there because of someone else's action."
Leost's family drives past the site half a dozen times a day and tends it frequently. Someone -- the family does not know who -- added statues of the Virgin Mary. The memorial has never been vandalized, and snow removal crews have been careful not to bury or damage it.
For the Taman, Prysiazniuk and Leost families, their memorials make a statement more powerful than words -- this is the place where someone we loved died needlessly, even unjustly. At the same time, these memorials allow others to be silent mourners, to stop and grieve without intruding or being seen.
Acknowledging the memorials' importance, the City of Winnipeg set out some rules about them almost two years ago. Memorials must not pose a safety hazard to other drivers and pedestrians and should not fall into disrepair. Memorials are normally expected to be removed within six months, but that's more a suggestion than a rule.
Manitoba plans to partner with Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada on a program that will see a sign, including MADD's red ribbon and the name of the crash victim, erected where that person was killed by an impaired driver. Ontario, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island already take part in similar programs that aim to promote road safety and limit the number of personalized memorials.
MacKendrick said it's unlikely any political authority will clamp down on roadside memorials, although they could be considered a hazard, momentarily diverting a driver's attention.
Authorities in about 25 states have started to deal with the proliferation of memorials, also known as descansos (resting place) in Spanish. Texas, Massachusetts and California allow memorials only for people killed by impaired drivers. Others have banned them from interstate highways or limit the time they can be up or encourage families to use standardized crosses. Delaware has created a memorial park in hopes of discouraging roadside shrines.
Canadian officials are dealing with the same issues. Prince Albert, Sask., officials are struggling over setting a reasonable length of time to allow roadside memorials. Calgary is studying the issue. Alberta encourages people who want to erect a memorial to instead enrol in the Adopt-A-Highway program.
While cities, provinces, states and countries have policies aimed at controlling memorials, they do have one thing in common: no matter what the law says, people still set up the memorials.
Jacquelyn Quiram of Illinois now runs an Internet business (http://roadsidememorials.com/) that sells crosses to anyone grieving the loss of a friend or loved one in a car crash.
Quiram said she started the business after her friend was killed by a car in 2003. She has sold several hundred crosses since. A 90-centimetre cross, stained oak or painted white, sells for $125.
When her friend was killed, Quiram found herself returning to the scene of the crash and wanting to do something to commemorate her friend's life while at the same time sending a message about road safety.
"Death affects the community," she said. "People tend to want to go back. It's a step in the grieving process."
Quiram said the crosses are not road hazards, that drivers talking on cellphones are far more dangerous.
What her crosses and most other memorials do is remind people to be careful, that life is fragile and anything can happen from one moment to the next.
And that no one is completely safe. Ever.
bruce.owen@freepress.mb.ca
CITY OF WINNIPEG'S
POLICY ON
Roadside
memorials
Roadside memorials may be permitted
subject to meeting the requirements
of the streets and traffic
bylaws and the following standards.
Memorials are normally expected to
be removed within a reasonable time
frame, to a maximum of six months.
Memorials must not interfere with .
traffic-control devices or affect the
safe operation of the highway system.
Memorials must not interfere with sight
lines for traffic, nor create undue distractions
for motorists or impediments for
pedestrians.
. All memorials must be installed and
maintained at the applicant's expense.
. Memorial locations must be approved
by the streets maintenance division and
the traffic management branch. Once
an installation is approved, the applicant
should leave contact information
with the public works customer service
division.
. It is the responsibility of the installing
agency or individual, not the public
works department, to obtain the necessary
underground or utility clearance,
(such as Hydro, MTS, gas, etc.) before
installation. Costs to repair any damage
to underground installations, and costs
of any consequential damages, will be
the responsibility of the installing agency
or individual.
. Memorials must be installed as close
as practical to the far edge of the rightof-
way. Under no circumstances will
memorials be allowed in the median of
a divided highway or on traffic islands,
interchange loops or roundabouts.
Approval of memorials other than
crosses must be obtained from the
traffic management branch before
installation to ensure public safety in
the event of errant or off-road vehicle
collision. Crosses must meet the following
requirements:
. Crosses must be constructed of wood
or other lightweight materials which will
break away if struck by an errant vehicle.
. Crosses may be a maximum height of
one metre. Crosses constructed of wood
may be made of lumber no larger than
25 by 100 millimetres in dimension.
. Crosses may include a small plaque
or plate giving the name of the deceased
and the date of the collision. In addition,
plaques or plates shall bear a contact
name and number.
. Colour of crosses must be white or
wood tone only, no fluorescent colours
or red, yellow or orange and no reflective
materials.
. The city will take reasonable measures
not to damage or destroy memorials
during road maintenance operations.
The city assumes no responsibility or
liability for any damages.
. Where memorials require removal for
street construction or maintenance, the
department will try to contact those responsible
for memorial installation. If the
city must remove memorials, they will
be held for 14 days. Under no circumstances
will the city reinstall memorials.
The city could remove memorials .
that fall into disrepair, are damaged,
vandalized, disfigured or burned, or fail
to meet standards of memorial location
or construction.
. The installer is responsible for site
maintenance. The city is unable to
provide assurances regarding mowing,
brush clearing or other right-of-way
maintenance at memorial sites.
All locations are subject to review at .
the discretion of the director of public
works or his or her designate.
Highway 59
Roadside
memorials
Between Birds Hill and Grand Beach there are half a dozen roadside memorials
to people killed in car crashes or hit by a car. Most memorials are concentrated
around Scanterbury at Brokenhead First Nation and north to Grand
Beach where the highway is only two lanes.
1. Memorial at Hwy. 59 and Birds Hill
Road
Harris Mashinter, 19, was killed July 9, 2005,
when his car hit a metal light standard south
of the intersection of Hwy. 202, or Birds Hill
Road.
2. Memorial on Hwy. 59 two
kilometres south of Scanterbury
Jessica Nadine Straight, 25, was killed early
July 8, 2007, when a southbound car struck
her as she walked south on the highway.
3. Memorial on Hwy. 59
one kilometre south of Scanterbury
Kyle William Recksiedler, a 16-year-old
Grand Marais high school student, was
killed Aug. 31, 2003, when he pulled out to
pass slower northbound traffic and collided
almost immediately with a southbound Ford
Ranger. He was alone and wearing a seatbelt.
4. Memorial in east ditch of Hwy. 59
in Scanterbury
Brian Johnston, 52, of Scanterbury, was killed Oct. 23, 2005,
when he was hit by a northbound Honda CRV. Johnston was
wearing dark clothing as he walked in the northbound lane
and the driver did not see him.
5. Memorial on Hwy. 59 three
kilometres north of Scanterbury
Dallas Joan Pasaluko, 66, was killed Aug. 21, 2006, when she
lost control of her car and it crossed the highway, rolled and
landed on its roof in a water-filled ditch. Three people rescued
Pasaluko, but she died later.
6. Memorial on Hwy. 59 one
kilometre north of Stead turnoff.
Merrill Eugene Starr Oct. 19, 1993
7. Memorial on Hwy. 59 three kilometres south
of Grand Beach turnoff.
Unknown. There is no name on the white cross and wreath.
© 2008 Winnipeg Free Press. All Rights Reserved.
Powered by McClatchy Interactive
Ebenezer Funeral Parlour, Ghana
The hectic experience he had to endure to give his father a befitting burial some 14 years ago was one of the reasons that pushed Mr Joseph Lloyd Vivid Kwadjo, Managing Director of Ebenezer Funeral Parlour to start a business that deals with the dead.
This in addition to an encouragement from a friend who owned a similar business in South Africa informed his decision to go into the funeral home business. So, in 1995, he started putting structures in place for the now popular Ebenezer Funeral Parlour whose operations as the first funeral parlour in Ghana, began in 2002.
to Mr Kwadjo at the funeral home located on the Accra-Kasoa road, he said, “I was working in South Africa when my father passed on in 1994 and I had to come down for the funeral. And mine! It was no easy task. From ensuring that the body was well preserved, acquiring death certificates to hiring of canopies, chairs and what have you was very very hectic,” Mr Kwadjo told Showbiz.
Back in South Africa, Mr Kwadjo said his friend took him to his funeral home and showed him around telling him how good the business was if only one had the courage to go into it.
So what goes on at Ebenezer Funeral Parlour? “Like the hospital mortuaries, we preserve dead bodies. It is a very sensitive job and we have our rules which are strictly adhered to. For example, we do not allow people to see other people's bodies. Over here, corpses are put in body bags before they are put into the refrigerators,” he said.
Mr Kwadjo said they are very sensitive to the cultural needs of their customers for which reason they allow them to perform whatever rites they wish to — from libation to slaughtering of animals.
“We are very sensitive to customs and traditions. We employ both Western and Ghanaian cultures. Ghanaians dress the full body but in the Western world, they only dress the top part of the body”, he said.
Although Ebenezer Funeral Parlour has an in-house pathologist, they do not undertake autopsy because as a private mortuary, it hasn't been given the right to do so.
“The pathologist therefore gives advice on whether or not an autopsy should be done. And when it is necessary to do it, we have it done in the government hospitals.
“We, however, do embalming using machines. We also have chemicals for preserving complexions. For instance, if the deceased was a fair person, we use the appropriate chemicals to ensure that the body does not change colour when laid in state”, he added.
Not every corpse can find its way into the mortuary of Ebenezer Funeral Parlour. When bodies are brought in, they are carefully reviewed and accepted only when the funeral home authorities are convinced about the circumstances surrounding their death.
The Ebenezer Funeral Parlour has a workforce of 27 with three main departments — mortuary, administration and transport. “We are in business and whatever is attached to funerals, trust that we will deliver. We have caskets, shrouds, suits, pillows, mats, wreaths, hearses etc. We also have canopies for the grave and the device for lowering the coffin into the grave”, he said.
The Parlour charges GH¢4.50 a day for the first 14 days for preserving bodies. The amount increases to GH¢7.00 from 15 to 28 days while 29 days onwards attract a daily fee of GH¢8.00.
Touching on how much it will cost to engage the services of the funeral home, Mr Kwadjo said it depends on the requests and taste of the customer.
“For example preserving a body for a month will cost about GHC 160 and an extra GHC40 for embalming and handling. The price of a casket ranges from GHC400 and GHC2300. A shroud for a man (new suit) cost GHC600. Otherwise a second-hand suit which costs GHC60 will do. The undertaker who is usually the lady who washes, dresses the corpse as well as decorate the place the body will be laid charges GHC450.
If a customer wants elaborate decor, he/she incurs an extra cost of GHC400.
“Hiring a hearse from the home to places within Accra costs GHC450 for the Mercedes Benz and GHC420 for other vehicles. Using pallbearers cost GHC160. For food, drinks, hiring of chairs, canopies among others, we engage the services of appropriate service providers and charge the cost against our customers”, he added.
Contrary to what pertains at Ebenezer Funeral Home, Madam Gladys Naa -Ashong Hesse, 80, an undertaker from Osu who has been washing and dressing corpses since she was a school girl doesn't charge for her services. She accepts whatever her customers deem fit to give her after the job has been done.
“I do not charge my clients because of a promise I made to God sometime ago. I told God I would do something for Him in return if He delivered me from a certain situation. So my free services is what I use to thank God for His deliverance”, she said.
Asked if she knows of the going rate for undertakers, Madam Hesse answered in the negative. “I cannot tell what other people charge because they are often not willing to disclose and I do not press to know”, she added.
According to Madam Hesse, clients call her usually based on recommendation from other people. Others sometimes just walk in and request for her services. “Sometimes I get so many calls that I pass on some of the jobs to others. I remember once, I had to handle eight bodies on one particular day”, she said.
Touching on some of the challenges of an undertaker, Madam Hesse said “some of the problems are sometimes insults from the bereaved family. I often overlook that because bereaved persons express their emotions in a variety of ways and they get easily irritated.
Also there is the possibility of contracting diseases since I may not know what the person died of. Thus I wear gloves for all jobs and insist on no talking in the room during work”, she added.
Madam Hesse, who is a teacher by profession learnt undertaking from her mother, a seamstress who used to do it for only family members.
“I also did it just for family members when I started on my own in 1970. The first corpse I handled by myself was an aunt of mine. I now do it for the general public”, she said.
Story by Jayne Buckman-Owoo
This in addition to an encouragement from a friend who owned a similar business in South Africa informed his decision to go into the funeral home business. So, in 1995, he started putting structures in place for the now popular Ebenezer Funeral Parlour whose operations as the first funeral parlour in Ghana, began in 2002.
to Mr Kwadjo at the funeral home located on the Accra-Kasoa road, he said, “I was working in South Africa when my father passed on in 1994 and I had to come down for the funeral. And mine! It was no easy task. From ensuring that the body was well preserved, acquiring death certificates to hiring of canopies, chairs and what have you was very very hectic,” Mr Kwadjo told Showbiz.
Back in South Africa, Mr Kwadjo said his friend took him to his funeral home and showed him around telling him how good the business was if only one had the courage to go into it.
So what goes on at Ebenezer Funeral Parlour? “Like the hospital mortuaries, we preserve dead bodies. It is a very sensitive job and we have our rules which are strictly adhered to. For example, we do not allow people to see other people's bodies. Over here, corpses are put in body bags before they are put into the refrigerators,” he said.
Mr Kwadjo said they are very sensitive to the cultural needs of their customers for which reason they allow them to perform whatever rites they wish to — from libation to slaughtering of animals.
“We are very sensitive to customs and traditions. We employ both Western and Ghanaian cultures. Ghanaians dress the full body but in the Western world, they only dress the top part of the body”, he said.
Although Ebenezer Funeral Parlour has an in-house pathologist, they do not undertake autopsy because as a private mortuary, it hasn't been given the right to do so.
“The pathologist therefore gives advice on whether or not an autopsy should be done. And when it is necessary to do it, we have it done in the government hospitals.
“We, however, do embalming using machines. We also have chemicals for preserving complexions. For instance, if the deceased was a fair person, we use the appropriate chemicals to ensure that the body does not change colour when laid in state”, he added.
Not every corpse can find its way into the mortuary of Ebenezer Funeral Parlour. When bodies are brought in, they are carefully reviewed and accepted only when the funeral home authorities are convinced about the circumstances surrounding their death.
The Ebenezer Funeral Parlour has a workforce of 27 with three main departments — mortuary, administration and transport. “We are in business and whatever is attached to funerals, trust that we will deliver. We have caskets, shrouds, suits, pillows, mats, wreaths, hearses etc. We also have canopies for the grave and the device for lowering the coffin into the grave”, he said.
The Parlour charges GH¢4.50 a day for the first 14 days for preserving bodies. The amount increases to GH¢7.00 from 15 to 28 days while 29 days onwards attract a daily fee of GH¢8.00.
Touching on how much it will cost to engage the services of the funeral home, Mr Kwadjo said it depends on the requests and taste of the customer.
“For example preserving a body for a month will cost about GHC 160 and an extra GHC40 for embalming and handling. The price of a casket ranges from GHC400 and GHC2300. A shroud for a man (new suit) cost GHC600. Otherwise a second-hand suit which costs GHC60 will do. The undertaker who is usually the lady who washes, dresses the corpse as well as decorate the place the body will be laid charges GHC450.
If a customer wants elaborate decor, he/she incurs an extra cost of GHC400.
“Hiring a hearse from the home to places within Accra costs GHC450 for the Mercedes Benz and GHC420 for other vehicles. Using pallbearers cost GHC160. For food, drinks, hiring of chairs, canopies among others, we engage the services of appropriate service providers and charge the cost against our customers”, he added.
Contrary to what pertains at Ebenezer Funeral Home, Madam Gladys Naa -Ashong Hesse, 80, an undertaker from Osu who has been washing and dressing corpses since she was a school girl doesn't charge for her services. She accepts whatever her customers deem fit to give her after the job has been done.
“I do not charge my clients because of a promise I made to God sometime ago. I told God I would do something for Him in return if He delivered me from a certain situation. So my free services is what I use to thank God for His deliverance”, she said.
Asked if she knows of the going rate for undertakers, Madam Hesse answered in the negative. “I cannot tell what other people charge because they are often not willing to disclose and I do not press to know”, she added.
According to Madam Hesse, clients call her usually based on recommendation from other people. Others sometimes just walk in and request for her services. “Sometimes I get so many calls that I pass on some of the jobs to others. I remember once, I had to handle eight bodies on one particular day”, she said.
Touching on some of the challenges of an undertaker, Madam Hesse said “some of the problems are sometimes insults from the bereaved family. I often overlook that because bereaved persons express their emotions in a variety of ways and they get easily irritated.
Also there is the possibility of contracting diseases since I may not know what the person died of. Thus I wear gloves for all jobs and insist on no talking in the room during work”, she added.
Madam Hesse, who is a teacher by profession learnt undertaking from her mother, a seamstress who used to do it for only family members.
“I also did it just for family members when I started on my own in 1970. The first corpse I handled by myself was an aunt of mine. I now do it for the general public”, she said.
Story by Jayne Buckman-Owoo
Monday, August 4, 2008
Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies ~ 3rd August, 2008
Alexander Solzhenitsyn Dies At 89MOSCOW (AP) ― Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the Nobel Prize-winning Russian author whose books chronicled the horrors of dictator Josef Stalin's slave labor camps, has died of heart failure, his son said Monday. He was 89.Stepan Solzhenitsyn told The Associated Press his father died late Sunday in Moscow, but declined further comment.Through unflinching accounts of the eight years he spent in the Soviet Gulag, Solzhenitsyn's novels and non-fiction works exposed the secret history of the vast prison system that enslaved millions. The accounts riveted his countrymen and earned him years of bitter exile, but international renown.And they inspired millions, perhaps, with the knowledge that one person's courage and integrity could, in the end, defeat the totalitarian machinery of an empire.Beginning with the 1962 short novel "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich," Solzhenitsyn (sohl-zheh-NEETS'-ihn) devoted himself to describing what he called the human "meat grinder" that had caught him along with millions of other Soviet citizens: capricious arrests, often for trifling and seemingly absurd reasons, followed by sentences to slave labor camps where cold, starvation and punishing work crushed inmates physically and spiritually.His "Gulag Archipelago" trilogy of the 1970s shocked readers by describing the savagery of the Soviet state under the dictator Josef Stalin. It helped erase lingering sympathy for the Soviet Union among many leftist intellectuals, especially in Europe.But his account of that secret system of prison camps was also inspiring in its description of how one person — Solzhenitsyn himself — survived, physically and spiritually, in a penal system of soul-crushing hardship and injustice.The West offered him shelter and accolades. But Solzhenitsyn's refusal to bend despite enormous pressure, perhaps, also gave him the courage to criticize Western culture for what he considered its weakness and decadence.After a triumphant return from exile in the U.S. in 1994 that included a 56-day train trip across Russia to become reacquainted with his native land, Solzhenitsyn later expressed annoyance and disappointment that most Russians hadn't read his books.During the 1990s, his stalwart nationalist views, his devout Orthodoxy, his disdain for capitalism and disgust with the tycoons who bought Russian industries and resources cheaply following the Soviet collapse, were unfashionable. He faded from public view.But under Vladimir Putin's 2000-2008 presidency, Solzhenitsyn's vision of Russia as a bastion of Orthodox Christianity, as a place with a unique culture and destiny, gained renewed prominence.Putin now argues, as Solzhenitsyn did in a speech at Harvard University in 1978, that Russia has a separate civilization from the West, one that can't be reconciled either to Communism or western-style liberal democracy, but requires a system adapted to its history and traditions."Any ancient deeply rooted autonomous culture, especially if it is spread on a wide part of the earth's surface, constitutes an autonomous world, full of riddles and surprises to Western thinking," Solzhenitsyn said in the Harvard speech. "For one thousand years Russia has belonged to such a category."Born Dec. 11, 1918, in Kislovodsk, Solzhenitsyn served as a front-line artillery captain in World War II, where, in the closing weeks of the war, he was arrested for writing what he called "certain disrespectful remarks" about Stalin in a letter to a friend, referring to him as "the man with the mustache." He served seven years in a labor camp in the barren steppe of Kazakhstan and three more years in internal exile in Central Asia.That's where he began to write, memorizing much of his work so it wouldn't be lost if it were seized. His theme was the suffering and injustice of life in Stalin's gulag — a Soviet abbreviation for the slave labor camp system, which Solzhenitsyn made part of the lexicon.He continued writing while working as a mathematics teacher in the provincial Russian city of Ryazan.The first fruit of this labor was "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich," the story of a carpenter struggling to survive in a Soviet labor camp, where he had been sent, like Solzhenitsyn, after service in the war.The book was published in 1962 by order of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, who was eager to discredit the abuses of Stalin, his predecessor, and created a sensation in a country where unpleasant truths were spoken in whispers, if at all. Abroad, the book — which went through numerous revisions — was lauded not only for its bravery, but for its spare, unpretentious language.After Khrushchev was ousted in 1964, Solzhenitsyn began facing KGB harassment, publication of his works was blocked and he was expelled from the Soviet Writers Union. But he was undeterred."A great writer is, so to speak, a secret government in his country," he wrote in "The First Circle," his next novel, a book about inmates in one of Stalin's "special camps" for scientists who were deemed politically unreliable but whose skills were essential.Solzhenitsyn, a graduate from the Department of Physics and Mathematics at Rostov University, was sent to one of these camps in 1946, soon after his arrest.The novel "Cancer Ward", which appeared in 1967, was another fictional worked based on Solzhenitsyn's life. In this case, the subject was his cancer treatment in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, then part of Soviet Central Asia, during his years of internal exile from March 1953, the month of Stalin's death, until June 1956.In the book, cancer became a metaphor for the fatal sickness of the Soviet system. "A man sprouts a tumor and dies -- how then can a country live that has sprouted camps and exile?"He attacked the complicity of millions of Russians in the horrors of Stalin's reign."Suddenly all the professors and engineers turned out to be saboteurs — and they believed it? ... Or all of Lenin's old guard were vile renegades — and they believed it? Suddenly all their friends and acquaintances were enemies of the people — and they believed it?"The Stalinist era, he wrote, quoting from a poem by Alexander Pushkin, forced Soviet citizens to choose one of three roles: tyrant, traitor, prisoner.He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970, an unusual move for the Swedish Academy, which generally makes awards late in an author's life after decades of work. The academy cited "the ethical force with which he has pursued the indispensable traditions of Russian literature."Soviet authorities barred the author from traveling to Stockholm to receive the award and official attacks were intensified in 1973 when the first book in the non-fiction "Gulag" trilogy appeared in Paris."During all the years until 1961," Solzhenitsyn wrote in an autobiography written for the Nobel Foundation, "not only was I convinced that I should never see a single line of mine in print in my lifetime, but, also, I scarcely dared allow any of my close acquaintances to read anything I had written because I feared that this would become known."The following year, he was arrested on a treason charge and expelled the next day to West Germany in handcuffs. His expulsion inspired worldwide condemnation of the regime of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.Solzhenitsyn then made his homeland in America, settling in 1976 in the tiny town of Cavendish, Vermont, with his wife and sons.Living at a secluded hillside compound he rarely left, he called his 18 years there the most productive of his life. There he worked on what he considered to be his life's work, a multivolume saga of Russian history titled "The Red Wheel."Although free from repression, Solzhenitsyn longed for his native land. Neither was he enchanted by Western democracy, with its emphasis on individual freedom.To the dismay of his supporters, in his Harvard speech he rejected the West's faith "Western pluralistic democracy" as the model for all other nations. It was a mistake, he warned, for Western societies to regard the failure of the rest of the world to adopt the democratic model as a product of "wicked governments or by heavy crises or by their own barbarity or incomprehension."Some critics saw "The Red Wheel" books as tedious and hectoring, rather than as sweeping and lit by moral fire."Exile from his great theme, Stalinism and the gulag, had exposed his major weaknesses," D.M. Thomas wrote in a 1998 biography, theorizing that the intensity of the earlier works was "a projection of his own repressed violence."Then-Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev restored Solzhenitsyn's citizenship in 1990 and the treason charge was finally dropped in 1991, less than a month after a failed Soviet coup. Following an emotional homecoming that started in the Russian Far East on May 27, 1994, and became a whistle-stop tour across the country, Solzhenitsyn settled in a tree-shaded, red brick home overlooking the Moscow River just west of the capital.While avoiding a partisan political role, Solzhenitsyn vowed to speak "the whole truth about Russia, until they shut my mouth like before."He was contemptuous of President Boris Yeltsin, blaming Yeltsin for the collapse of Russia's economy, his dependence on bailouts by the International Monetary Fund, his inability to stop the expansion of NATO to Russia's borders, his tolerance of the rising influence of a handful of Russian billionaires — who were nicknamed "oligarchs" by an American diplomat.Yeltsin's reign, Solzhenitsyn said, marked one of three "times of troubles" in Russian history — which included the 17th century crises that led to the rise of the Romanovs and the 1917 Bolshevik revolution. When Yeltsin awarded Solzhenitsyn Russia's highest honor, the Order of St. Andrew, the writer refused to accept it. When Yeltsin left office in 2000, Solzhenitsyn wanted him prosecuted.The author's last book, 2001's "Two Hundred Years Together," addressed the complex emotions of Russian-Jewish relations. Some criticized the book for alleged anti-Semitic passages. But the author denied the charge, saying he "understood the subtlety, sensitivity and kindheartedness of the Jewish character."Yeltsin's successor Putin at first had a rocky relationship with Solzhenitsyn, who criticized the Russian president in 2002 for not doing more to crack down on Russia's oligarchs. Putin was also a veteran of the Soviet-era KGB, the agency that, more than any other, represented the Soviet legacy of repression.But the two men, so different, gradually developed a rapport. By steps, Putin adopted Solzhenitsyn's criticisms of the West, perhaps out of a recognition that Russia really is a different civilization, perhaps because the author offered justification for the Kremlin's determination to muzzle critics, to reassert control over Russia's natural resources and to concentrate political power.Like Putin, Solzhenitsyn argued that Russia was following its own path to its own form of democratic society. In a June 2005 interview with state television, he said Russia had lost 15 years following the collapse of the Soviet Union by moving too quickly in the rush to build a more liberal society."We need to be better, so we need to go more slowly," he saidFollowing the death of Naguib Mahfouz in 2006, Solzhenitsyn became the oldest living Nobel laureate in literature. He is survived by his wife, Natalya, who acted as his spokesman, and his three sons, including Stepan, Ignat, a pianist and conductor, and Yermolai. All live in the United States.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Fear of death leads to Obituary obsession
Obituary enthusiast used hobby to overcome fear of death
By Jaana Laitinen
Hannu Luntiala, 55, suffered long from a fear of death. It started to eat at him already in his youth, when he found tobacco.
"The pleasure of smoking was combined with a sense of guilt. It became a dilemma. I stopped smoking later, but the fear was there and it stayed."
Soon he found himself reading death notices in newspapers. Reading between the short lines he tried to guess what the cause of death might have been. He did not get much out of the texts, he noticed. The pieces were narrow and dull, and repeated the same verses. He moved on to obituaries. He says that they revealed a world that he had never experienced before.
"They had fascinating life stories, hilarious narratives and unintended drama. An entire life condensed into 30 to 40 lines."
It was apparent in many of the obituaries that the deceased person had not quite lived life to the full. The life might include "huge amounts of work", and not much else. From time to time there might be a story about a person who dared to live as he or she wanted. Such lives are often short and hard, but by no means empty. Luntiala admits that he admires people who dare to live the kind of life that results in a good obituary. "They are bohemians, who do not care about education or careers. The obituary of author Kari Kontio was magnificent." Luntiala began to start writing obituaries himself. He wrote them about both imaginary people, as well as celebrities, from popular singer Sammy Babitzin to French President Charles de Gaulle. Some described people who kept their noses to grindstones, but there was also dark humour about a memorial service at the crematorium next to "the Mega Burn furnace". The stories have now been published in a book called In Memoriam. Luntiala has yet to write his own obituary. "Actually, everybody should write his own obituary once every ten years after reaching the age of 40. It is a way to see if one's life has gone as one would have liked." If someone else writes an obituary for Luntiala some day, he has a request. "I hope that it says that he saw that there is more to life than just work." For Luntiala, jazz and writing help him unwind from his job. He has previously published a collection of short stories as well as a text message novel. Luntiala nevertheless enjoys his work as director-general of the Population Register Centre. "I once saw a movie where a police officer was told that if you screw this one up, we'll send you to work at the population registry", Luntiala laughs. "People have an unbelievable image of the work that we do here. This is a vantage point into society. I enjoy this job, and now that I am boss, I can pretty much decide how to do this thing." Luntiala's fear of death is easing. Writing obituaries helps. He also stopped trying to run away from death. "I ran around in the forest like crazy for ten years. Then they measured that my oxygen intake is at the same level as that of a man lying on the sofa. I stopped right there." However, he is still not on completely good terms with death. "Death is a great injustice. It comes so soon. Life could be twice as long, or at least half of life could be free time. Now people are allowed to do what they want to do for five per cent of their lifetime. "I've been expecting people to rise to the barricades to shout that death is wrong. Who they would be protesting against, I don't know." Luntiala has two adult sons - both of fans of heavy metal music. He met the two recently, and was startled when he saw the back of one of them as he was walking away. The black T-shirt had just one word: "Kuolemanpelko" - "fear of death". "I thought that it must be in the genes. Now my son has it."
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 17.3.2008
By Jaana Laitinen
Hannu Luntiala, 55, suffered long from a fear of death. It started to eat at him already in his youth, when he found tobacco.
"The pleasure of smoking was combined with a sense of guilt. It became a dilemma. I stopped smoking later, but the fear was there and it stayed."
Soon he found himself reading death notices in newspapers. Reading between the short lines he tried to guess what the cause of death might have been. He did not get much out of the texts, he noticed. The pieces were narrow and dull, and repeated the same verses. He moved on to obituaries. He says that they revealed a world that he had never experienced before.
"They had fascinating life stories, hilarious narratives and unintended drama. An entire life condensed into 30 to 40 lines."
It was apparent in many of the obituaries that the deceased person had not quite lived life to the full. The life might include "huge amounts of work", and not much else. From time to time there might be a story about a person who dared to live as he or she wanted. Such lives are often short and hard, but by no means empty. Luntiala admits that he admires people who dare to live the kind of life that results in a good obituary. "They are bohemians, who do not care about education or careers. The obituary of author Kari Kontio was magnificent." Luntiala began to start writing obituaries himself. He wrote them about both imaginary people, as well as celebrities, from popular singer Sammy Babitzin to French President Charles de Gaulle. Some described people who kept their noses to grindstones, but there was also dark humour about a memorial service at the crematorium next to "the Mega Burn furnace". The stories have now been published in a book called In Memoriam. Luntiala has yet to write his own obituary. "Actually, everybody should write his own obituary once every ten years after reaching the age of 40. It is a way to see if one's life has gone as one would have liked." If someone else writes an obituary for Luntiala some day, he has a request. "I hope that it says that he saw that there is more to life than just work." For Luntiala, jazz and writing help him unwind from his job. He has previously published a collection of short stories as well as a text message novel. Luntiala nevertheless enjoys his work as director-general of the Population Register Centre. "I once saw a movie where a police officer was told that if you screw this one up, we'll send you to work at the population registry", Luntiala laughs. "People have an unbelievable image of the work that we do here. This is a vantage point into society. I enjoy this job, and now that I am boss, I can pretty much decide how to do this thing." Luntiala's fear of death is easing. Writing obituaries helps. He also stopped trying to run away from death. "I ran around in the forest like crazy for ten years. Then they measured that my oxygen intake is at the same level as that of a man lying on the sofa. I stopped right there." However, he is still not on completely good terms with death. "Death is a great injustice. It comes so soon. Life could be twice as long, or at least half of life could be free time. Now people are allowed to do what they want to do for five per cent of their lifetime. "I've been expecting people to rise to the barricades to shout that death is wrong. Who they would be protesting against, I don't know." Luntiala has two adult sons - both of fans of heavy metal music. He met the two recently, and was startled when he saw the back of one of them as he was walking away. The black T-shirt had just one word: "Kuolemanpelko" - "fear of death". "I thought that it must be in the genes. Now my son has it."
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 17.3.2008
Friday, March 21, 2008
Chantal Sebire is dead...........
Chantal Sébire is dead, but the debate she ignited over French laws prohibiting victims of terminal diseases from receiving euthanasia is certain to live on. Just 48 hours after a Dijon court rejected Sébire's request that doctors help her end her agony-stricken life without risking legal punishment, the 52 year-old was found dead in her home Wednesday night. Initial tests Thursday were unable to determine whether Sébire's death was induced or the result of the rare disease that left her horribly disfigured and in near-constant pain. But news of her passing provoked renewed dispute over France's ban on assisted suicide, which the former schoolteacher had sought to overturn in her final days.
France ponders a suffering teacher's legal petition to be allowed, under existing laws, to end her life
Sébire came to national attention earlier this month, when French media picked up on her plea to get help ending her life. Her malady, esthesioneuroblastoma, causes inoperable tumors to grow in and spread from the nasal passages, disfiguring and destroying the face before finally destroying the brain. The disease had already blinded and otherwise handicapped Sébire, and left her wracked with pain for hours on end despite medication to allay her suffering. Sebire explained her request for medically assisted suicide saying she wanted to leave the world following an evening of celebration with her three children — and avoid the prolonged coma she'd most likely fall into, which would make her a burden to her family.
While campaigning for office, President Nicolas Sarkozy indicated he was sympathetic to revising France's current law, which forbids assisted suicide but allows doctors and families to stop administering life-sustaining treatment to terminal patients. But last week, the Elysée responded to Sébire's written request for help to Sarkozy by indicating he could not sidestep legislation. Ahead of Monday's court rejection of her petition that the law be interpreted to permit active euthanasia, members of France's conservative government similarly rebuffed Sébire's plea with reactions ranging from evident compassion and empathy to cold legal rationalization — and in at least one case, prickly indignation. Housing Minister Christine Boutin declared that she was "scandalized that people can envision granting this woman death because she's suffering and deformed," adding that if France legalizes "the right to kill, we're heading towards a barbarian society."
Yet despite ethical reservations, it became very clear Sébire's case deeply moved a majority of people in France, both in and out of government. "Her illness has left French people shattered these last days," said French government spokesman Luc Chatel when news of Sebire's death broke. "[Sébire] inspired great respect among our citizens."
Even more importantly, however, her case has also gotten many people across France reexamining their attitudes toward the assisted suicides of terminal patients that are legal in Belgium, Switzerland and the Netherlands. France's standing law was written in 2005, after a mother and doctor provoked the death of a young man who no longer wanted to live in his paralyzed, virtually shut-in condition. Marie Humbert — the mother of that man — has continued denouncing the law for only allowing the passive act of interrupting life-sustaining treatment. Some 300,000 people have signed Humbert's petition to depenalize active euthanasia.
Some French observers of Sébire's case note that laws banning assisted suicide haven't prevented it. Instead, they say, the prohibition has only sent the practice underground, where doctors and medical workers secretly consent to respect patients' pleas to end their lives via over-medication or other means that aren't often detected. Some suspect that may be how Sébire finally died. "I find it very difficult not to offer an exit door that isn't one of love with one's family," commented French Foreign Minister and trained doctor Bernard Kouchner on radio station RMC Thursday. In the future, he said, France must prevent desperate terminal patients from "having to commit suicide in some kind of clandestine manner in which everyone suffers — especially their loved ones. I have a lot of admiration for Chantal Sébire [and] we must create an exception to the law... that would be human, necessary."
France ponders a suffering teacher's legal petition to be allowed, under existing laws, to end her life
Sébire came to national attention earlier this month, when French media picked up on her plea to get help ending her life. Her malady, esthesioneuroblastoma, causes inoperable tumors to grow in and spread from the nasal passages, disfiguring and destroying the face before finally destroying the brain. The disease had already blinded and otherwise handicapped Sébire, and left her wracked with pain for hours on end despite medication to allay her suffering. Sebire explained her request for medically assisted suicide saying she wanted to leave the world following an evening of celebration with her three children — and avoid the prolonged coma she'd most likely fall into, which would make her a burden to her family.
While campaigning for office, President Nicolas Sarkozy indicated he was sympathetic to revising France's current law, which forbids assisted suicide but allows doctors and families to stop administering life-sustaining treatment to terminal patients. But last week, the Elysée responded to Sébire's written request for help to Sarkozy by indicating he could not sidestep legislation. Ahead of Monday's court rejection of her petition that the law be interpreted to permit active euthanasia, members of France's conservative government similarly rebuffed Sébire's plea with reactions ranging from evident compassion and empathy to cold legal rationalization — and in at least one case, prickly indignation. Housing Minister Christine Boutin declared that she was "scandalized that people can envision granting this woman death because she's suffering and deformed," adding that if France legalizes "the right to kill, we're heading towards a barbarian society."
Yet despite ethical reservations, it became very clear Sébire's case deeply moved a majority of people in France, both in and out of government. "Her illness has left French people shattered these last days," said French government spokesman Luc Chatel when news of Sebire's death broke. "[Sébire] inspired great respect among our citizens."
Even more importantly, however, her case has also gotten many people across France reexamining their attitudes toward the assisted suicides of terminal patients that are legal in Belgium, Switzerland and the Netherlands. France's standing law was written in 2005, after a mother and doctor provoked the death of a young man who no longer wanted to live in his paralyzed, virtually shut-in condition. Marie Humbert — the mother of that man — has continued denouncing the law for only allowing the passive act of interrupting life-sustaining treatment. Some 300,000 people have signed Humbert's petition to depenalize active euthanasia.
Some French observers of Sébire's case note that laws banning assisted suicide haven't prevented it. Instead, they say, the prohibition has only sent the practice underground, where doctors and medical workers secretly consent to respect patients' pleas to end their lives via over-medication or other means that aren't often detected. Some suspect that may be how Sébire finally died. "I find it very difficult not to offer an exit door that isn't one of love with one's family," commented French Foreign Minister and trained doctor Bernard Kouchner on radio station RMC Thursday. In the future, he said, France must prevent desperate terminal patients from "having to commit suicide in some kind of clandestine manner in which everyone suffers — especially their loved ones. I have a lot of admiration for Chantal Sébire [and] we must create an exception to the law... that would be human, necessary."
Pearl Cornioley ~ Resistance Fighter ~ is dead
Pearl Cornioley, Resistance Fighter Who Opposed the Nazis, Is Dead at 93
By DOUGLAS MARTIN
Published: March 11, 2008
Pearl Cornioley, who parachuted into Nazi-occupied France to work as a courier between the British and the French resistance and rose to command 3,000 underground fighters, died on Feb. 24 in the Loire Valley of France. She was 93.
Pearl Cornioley was known by many names in World War II.
Her death, at a hospital, was confirmed to The Associated Press by Caroline Cottard, the secretary of the retirement home where Ms. Cornioley lived.
Ms. Cornioley, who was 29 when she was sent to France in 1943, commanded troops who killed 1,000 German soldiers and wounded many more — while suffering only a tiny number of casualties themselves. She presided over the surrender of 18,000 German troops.
Her unit interrupted a railway line that connected the south of France to Normandy more than 800 times in June 1944, the month of D-Day. It also regularly attacked German convoys.
Sometimes carrying a case of cosmetics to pose as a traveling saleswoman, she had many brushes with danger. She hid in a cornfield as German troops fired random shots into the field. She was almost killed by a resistance leader who doubted her identity. The Germans offered a million-franc reward for her capture.
Pearl Witherington, as she was known at the time of her wartime exploits, was British by birth and French by upbringing. Her code name was Wrestler, her nom de guerre was Pauline, and in wireless transmissions to Britain, she was “Marie.”
Ms. Cornioley was an operative of the Special Operations Executive, which the British formed to support and coordinate resistance in the occupied countries of Europe. Agents from many walks of life, from business to journalism to academia, joined what was essentially a by-invitation-only club. Women were welcome because they might be viewed as less suspicious, and many proved to be excellent agents.
‘The girls who served as secret agents in Churchill’s Special Operations Executive were young, beautiful and brave,” Marcus Binney wrote in his book “The Women Who Lived for Danger: The Agents of the Special Operations Executive” (2002).
“At a time when women in the armed forces were restricted to a strictly noncombatant role in warfare, the women of S.O.E. trained and served alongside the men,” he continued. “They fought not in the front line but well behind it.”
Ms. Cornioley stood out. In his book “Set Europe Ablaze” (1966), E. H. Cookridge called her “one of the main pillars of the network” of the S.O.E. and the resistance fighters they supported. She was the only woman to become a network leader.
Cecile Pearl Witherington was born in Paris on June 24, 1914. A great-grandfather was a chemist who introduced the recipe for Worcestershire sauce to Lea & Perrins, and a grandfather was an architect in London, according to Mr. Binney. Her father traveled the world for a Swedish company that supplied paper for banknotes.
Her father’s heavy drinking and spendthrift habits shattered the family, obituaries in British newspapers said. As the eldest of four daughters, Ms. Cornioley started working at 17 as a secretary and made extra money by teaching English at night.
When the Germans invaded France in 1940, she was working for the air attaché at the British Embassy. The family left Paris in December and followed a circuitous route to London. There, Ms. Cornioley got a job at the Air Ministry.
But she burned with anger over France’s defeat and began searching for a way to fight back. Luckily, her French was superb.
“And anyway I didn’t like the Germans,” she was quoted as saying in an obituary in The Independent. “Never did. I’m a baby of the 1914-18 war.”
Through an acquaintance, she found her way to the S.O.E., which she joined on June 8, 1943. In training, she was recognized as the best shot, male or female, the service had seen. The commander wrote, “Very capable, completely brave.”
On the night of Sept. 22-23, she parachuted into France, near Châteauroux. Her two suitcases landed in a lake, where they were lost. Within hours, she was reunited with her French fiancé, Henri Cornioley, who had escaped from a German prison camp and joined the resistance. The two then worked closely.
This mix of love and war has caused many to see Ms. Cornioley as the inspiration for Sebastian Faulks’s popular 1998 novel, “Charlotte Gray.” In 2001, the book was made into a movie of the same name, directed by Gillian Armstrong and starring Cate Blanchett.
Ms. Cornioley insisted that romance was not her motivation for going to war. In an interview with The Telegraph in 2002, she said: “There was a job to be done. I didn’t put my life at risk just so I could be with Henri.”
But in October 1944, after being separated and almost killed, the couple made it to London, where they married. They moved to Paris, where Mr. Cornioley worked as a pharmacist and Ms. Cornioley as a secretary for the World Bank.
He died in 1999. Ms. Cornioley is survived by their daughter, Claire.
In 1995, Ms. Cornioley published her memoirs, which she wrote with Hervé Larroque. One tale concerned a “really cute” rabbit she took everywhere with her. The rabbit was oblivious to machine-gun fire.
Ms. Cornioley received many honors, but the one that stuck in her mind was the one she turned down. That was Member of the British Empire, or M.B.E. She had been offered the civil version, not the military one.
She sent an icy note saying she had had done nothing remotely “civil.”
By DOUGLAS MARTIN
Published: March 11, 2008
Pearl Cornioley, who parachuted into Nazi-occupied France to work as a courier between the British and the French resistance and rose to command 3,000 underground fighters, died on Feb. 24 in the Loire Valley of France. She was 93.
Pearl Cornioley was known by many names in World War II.
Her death, at a hospital, was confirmed to The Associated Press by Caroline Cottard, the secretary of the retirement home where Ms. Cornioley lived.
Ms. Cornioley, who was 29 when she was sent to France in 1943, commanded troops who killed 1,000 German soldiers and wounded many more — while suffering only a tiny number of casualties themselves. She presided over the surrender of 18,000 German troops.
Her unit interrupted a railway line that connected the south of France to Normandy more than 800 times in June 1944, the month of D-Day. It also regularly attacked German convoys.
Sometimes carrying a case of cosmetics to pose as a traveling saleswoman, she had many brushes with danger. She hid in a cornfield as German troops fired random shots into the field. She was almost killed by a resistance leader who doubted her identity. The Germans offered a million-franc reward for her capture.
Pearl Witherington, as she was known at the time of her wartime exploits, was British by birth and French by upbringing. Her code name was Wrestler, her nom de guerre was Pauline, and in wireless transmissions to Britain, she was “Marie.”
Ms. Cornioley was an operative of the Special Operations Executive, which the British formed to support and coordinate resistance in the occupied countries of Europe. Agents from many walks of life, from business to journalism to academia, joined what was essentially a by-invitation-only club. Women were welcome because they might be viewed as less suspicious, and many proved to be excellent agents.
‘The girls who served as secret agents in Churchill’s Special Operations Executive were young, beautiful and brave,” Marcus Binney wrote in his book “The Women Who Lived for Danger: The Agents of the Special Operations Executive” (2002).
“At a time when women in the armed forces were restricted to a strictly noncombatant role in warfare, the women of S.O.E. trained and served alongside the men,” he continued. “They fought not in the front line but well behind it.”
Ms. Cornioley stood out. In his book “Set Europe Ablaze” (1966), E. H. Cookridge called her “one of the main pillars of the network” of the S.O.E. and the resistance fighters they supported. She was the only woman to become a network leader.
Cecile Pearl Witherington was born in Paris on June 24, 1914. A great-grandfather was a chemist who introduced the recipe for Worcestershire sauce to Lea & Perrins, and a grandfather was an architect in London, according to Mr. Binney. Her father traveled the world for a Swedish company that supplied paper for banknotes.
Her father’s heavy drinking and spendthrift habits shattered the family, obituaries in British newspapers said. As the eldest of four daughters, Ms. Cornioley started working at 17 as a secretary and made extra money by teaching English at night.
When the Germans invaded France in 1940, she was working for the air attaché at the British Embassy. The family left Paris in December and followed a circuitous route to London. There, Ms. Cornioley got a job at the Air Ministry.
But she burned with anger over France’s defeat and began searching for a way to fight back. Luckily, her French was superb.
“And anyway I didn’t like the Germans,” she was quoted as saying in an obituary in The Independent. “Never did. I’m a baby of the 1914-18 war.”
Through an acquaintance, she found her way to the S.O.E., which she joined on June 8, 1943. In training, she was recognized as the best shot, male or female, the service had seen. The commander wrote, “Very capable, completely brave.”
On the night of Sept. 22-23, she parachuted into France, near Châteauroux. Her two suitcases landed in a lake, where they were lost. Within hours, she was reunited with her French fiancé, Henri Cornioley, who had escaped from a German prison camp and joined the resistance. The two then worked closely.
This mix of love and war has caused many to see Ms. Cornioley as the inspiration for Sebastian Faulks’s popular 1998 novel, “Charlotte Gray.” In 2001, the book was made into a movie of the same name, directed by Gillian Armstrong and starring Cate Blanchett.
Ms. Cornioley insisted that romance was not her motivation for going to war. In an interview with The Telegraph in 2002, she said: “There was a job to be done. I didn’t put my life at risk just so I could be with Henri.”
But in October 1944, after being separated and almost killed, the couple made it to London, where they married. They moved to Paris, where Mr. Cornioley worked as a pharmacist and Ms. Cornioley as a secretary for the World Bank.
He died in 1999. Ms. Cornioley is survived by their daughter, Claire.
In 1995, Ms. Cornioley published her memoirs, which she wrote with Hervé Larroque. One tale concerned a “really cute” rabbit she took everywhere with her. The rabbit was oblivious to machine-gun fire.
Ms. Cornioley received many honors, but the one that stuck in her mind was the one she turned down. That was Member of the British Empire, or M.B.E. She had been offered the civil version, not the military one.
She sent an icy note saying she had had done nothing remotely “civil.”
More on the Vultures of Mumbai!!
When Dhun Baria learned her mother’s corpse would take at least a year to decompose, she slipped into the grounds — a place few Zoroastrians are allowed to enter — and took photographs and video footage that have shocked her community.
Orthodox elders of the religion, whose followers are also known as Parsis, say the funeral system is working fine.
But Baria challenges that with her stack of pictures, a 15-minute video clip and thousands of handbills she has been distributing in the community showing rotting corpses and body parts.
‘The dead have no dignity’“Would you like to have the bodies of your mother, father, daughter piled up in a horrible state?” asked Baria, whose mother died nine months ago.
“It is a terrible sight, the stench is horrible. It’s as if the bodies have been tortured. The dead have no dignity,” she said.
Parsis have placed their dead in a “dhokma,” or Tower of Silence, to await the vultures at Malabar Hill — now the city’s wealthiest neighborhood — since 1673.
Followers of the Bronze Age Persian prophet Zarathustra, Parsis consider fire a symbol of God’s spirit, so cremating the dead is a mortal sin, while burial is seen as a contamination of the earth. But the vulture is precious to Parsis who believe it releases the spirits of the dead.
Vultures under fireOver the past 15 years, millions of South Asian vultures have died from eating cattle carcasses tainted by a painkiller given to sick cows. Conservationists estimate that more than 90 percent of India’s vultures have died, creating havoc for Parsis’ funeral rites.
The IUCN-World Conservation Union lists India’s three species of vulture — the oriental white-backed, long-billed and slender-billed vultures — as critically endangered, the category for animals closest to extinction. It could not provide exact population figures.
And with three to four Parsis dying daily in Mumbai, a city of 16 million people, it is clear that there are nowhere near enough vultures to consume the corpses.
While bodies are coated with lime, scattered complaints are now heard about smells wafting through the affluent neighborhood.
Baria and other reformists are demanding that the Parsi Panchayat, or council governing the community’s affairs, permit burial or cremation within the funeral grounds.
CONTINUED
Orthodox elders of the religion, whose followers are also known as Parsis, say the funeral system is working fine.
But Baria challenges that with her stack of pictures, a 15-minute video clip and thousands of handbills she has been distributing in the community showing rotting corpses and body parts.
‘The dead have no dignity’“Would you like to have the bodies of your mother, father, daughter piled up in a horrible state?” asked Baria, whose mother died nine months ago.
“It is a terrible sight, the stench is horrible. It’s as if the bodies have been tortured. The dead have no dignity,” she said.
Parsis have placed their dead in a “dhokma,” or Tower of Silence, to await the vultures at Malabar Hill — now the city’s wealthiest neighborhood — since 1673.
Followers of the Bronze Age Persian prophet Zarathustra, Parsis consider fire a symbol of God’s spirit, so cremating the dead is a mortal sin, while burial is seen as a contamination of the earth. But the vulture is precious to Parsis who believe it releases the spirits of the dead.
Vultures under fireOver the past 15 years, millions of South Asian vultures have died from eating cattle carcasses tainted by a painkiller given to sick cows. Conservationists estimate that more than 90 percent of India’s vultures have died, creating havoc for Parsis’ funeral rites.
The IUCN-World Conservation Union lists India’s three species of vulture — the oriental white-backed, long-billed and slender-billed vultures — as critically endangered, the category for animals closest to extinction. It could not provide exact population figures.
And with three to four Parsis dying daily in Mumbai, a city of 16 million people, it is clear that there are nowhere near enough vultures to consume the corpses.
While bodies are coated with lime, scattered complaints are now heard about smells wafting through the affluent neighborhood.
Baria and other reformists are demanding that the Parsi Panchayat, or council governing the community’s affairs, permit burial or cremation within the funeral grounds.
CONTINUED
Vultures needed ~ permanent employment in Mumbai
MUMBAI, India -
For centuries, the Zoroastrian dead have been wrapped in white muslin and left at a leafy funeral ground on downtown Mumbai’s Malabar Hill, where they are devoured by vultures.
Only then, according to the tenets of the ancient religion, can the soul be freed.
But with just a handful of the endangered birds remaining in the city, and with solar panels installed to speed up decomposition working poorly during the monsoon rains, some Zoroastrians are demanding a change.
Pictures of rotting corpses piled at the funeral grounds, secretly snapped by a mourning woman, have sparked a furor over the ancient rituals.
For centuries, the Zoroastrian dead have been wrapped in white muslin and left at a leafy funeral ground on downtown Mumbai’s Malabar Hill, where they are devoured by vultures.
Only then, according to the tenets of the ancient religion, can the soul be freed.
But with just a handful of the endangered birds remaining in the city, and with solar panels installed to speed up decomposition working poorly during the monsoon rains, some Zoroastrians are demanding a change.
Pictures of rotting corpses piled at the funeral grounds, secretly snapped by a mourning woman, have sparked a furor over the ancient rituals.
Goddard~Obit : A start not the END!
"Bit morbid this," my friends are going to say and the kids will begin to think my recent bout of flu hides something more uncertain.
"He's been looking a bit fraid at the edges, letting himself go. Didn't shave for 3 months over Xmas."
But the truth is I'm excited about this blog for Obituaries, interested in exploring the different routes to the final exit. Not mordid at all ~ just a natural and healthy interest in the subject of death, funeral rites and the fine tradition of Obituary writing.
So kids, put away all thoughts of getting your hands on any money for the foreseeable future. Concentrate on keeping in my good books ~ buy me some expensive gadgets!
I'm the healthiest 66 year old around here!
"He's been looking a bit fraid at the edges, letting himself go. Didn't shave for 3 months over Xmas."
But the truth is I'm excited about this blog for Obituaries, interested in exploring the different routes to the final exit. Not mordid at all ~ just a natural and healthy interest in the subject of death, funeral rites and the fine tradition of Obituary writing.
So kids, put away all thoughts of getting your hands on any money for the foreseeable future. Concentrate on keeping in my good books ~ buy me some expensive gadgets!
I'm the healthiest 66 year old around here!
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