Death of a child in Oaxaca, Mexico

In case of divergent religious customs merge

Alvin Starkman MA, LL.B.

Daniel Perez Gonzalez was a beautiful baby. His parents Flor and Jorge thought so; my wife Arlene and I agreed. Few are able to share our security, however, because we were among the few who saw him alive. Daniel was born in one of Oaxaca and clinical knowledge. I welcomed him into the world along with Arlene, our then 13-year-old daughter of Sarah and Daniel's grandmother (grandmother) Chona. From the womb, the nurse of our recent past member of the extended family of three sets of anxiously loving arms --- Chona, those of her older sister Carmela (Sarah's closest friend in Oaxaca), and then Sarah .

We have a long and colorful history together, my Jewish family in my previous hometown of Toronto and my devoutly Catholic family here in Oaxaca. Chona is our midwife and matriarch of the family. And six months before she and her grandchildren had shouted Mazel Tov at Sarah Bat Mitzvah in Toronto.Over the years we have raised more than a glass of mezcal at milestone birthdays celebration as fifteen years (the when a girl turns fifteen, with similarities to the Bat Mitzvah), we have eaten matzoh together for Passover in Toronto, and we gave welcomed many Christmas, New Year and Day of the Dead, and in Oaxaca.

But was the death of Daniel that reinforced for me, through laughter and tears, the irrelevance of the deep cultural differences in the face of death rituals surrounding universal.

On the day of his birth, was easy to imagine that Daniel's life would be developed as Sarah. At 8 pounds, and with a head full of black hair, the baby seemed very healthy. Like my wife, Flor's pregnancy had been completed. Like Sarah, Daniel was born by Caesarean section; and Sarah, his mother's umbilical cord had wrapped around his neck, causing temporary respiratory distress and need a few days in an incubator. But do not worry, your father and cousin of two obstetricians with connections in the medical community in Oaxaca.To receive the best available post-natal care, and we would dance at her wedding one day.

But then their paths diverged. After two days of life, we mourn the death of Daniel bit of difficulty breathing, beside his coffin in Chona's living room, with family, friends and compadres.

Between birth and death came a crazy quilt of only Mexico's experience that resonated with my memories of the mourning process my Canadian family had suffered when my father Sam died a few years earlier.

Most Oaxacan accept that death hits you at home --- literally. Daniel left the hospital in a white, highly ornamented with satin-lined coffin, bound not for a funeral, but for the living room of the family complex. Once that was resolved on a table covered with sheets, with a large silver crucifix behind him, my compadre Javier and I were sent to the Food Market, to buy white gladioli and flower arrangements. This was far from somber discussion of formal arrangements at Toronto Steele Memorial after the death of my father.

In this passionate and expressive country, even the death rites are incomplete without the drama of shouting and accusations. At the cemetery I learned that Daniel would be buried in a shallow grave as the top of Tia Lolita, his great-aunt who had died in 1990, which was layered over another relative who had died in 1982. But when we met with the businessman in the head, the president, in the hours at the tomb of Lolita only after Daniel's death, we were informed that annual fees had not been paid in ten years. She continued crying a lot, but in the end, after heated debate, the president had "extortion", as was his right, thousands of pesos for arrears of government taxes and administrative charges --- plus about 1000 pesos in the likely event that Daniel would require a vault (literally a vault, the rebar reinforced concrete slab designed to keep occupants from the grave in an orderly configuration). And still not done. Only once Chona had presented sufficient historical documents to convince everyone that, indeed, had the authority to bury Daniel alongside Lolita were the appropriate certificate and receipts issued.

Back home Chona mourners had begun to arrive. Soon after, George and I dropped 150 different pastries, which is used to dip into the traditional hot chocolate served to those attending such meetings. I then experienced another profound thrill of dj vu. The notably slower pace of society Oaxaca morning was gone. With efficient dispatch, Chona and family turns the home into a house of mourning, the organization needs such as car seat, and orders outside of those attending the service from the kitchen. There Chona under the roof I traveled back in time to my mother's kitchen, filled with friends and relatives who had not seen in years, just after my father's funeral. I heard my mother's friend Rayla the organization that would bring what meals into our home for Shiva --- the week of mourning following the burial of a Jew.

Then there were the inevitable tragicomic moments. When I gave the eulogy for my father, I could not resist telling a story about him that made reference to a shared moment that involved passing gas. In Mexico, the black humor of death is even more visceral.When Chona and I went to the cemetery to ensure that the preparations for burial were highly developed, he found the president and his media adviser foot down on the concrete slab above the dome --- along with being part of a human mandible. Chona was outraged, and began to scream, "that can not be the aunt Lolita!" We came up with many theories for the mystery bone, all revolving around the amorous activities of the dead, not to repeat in this newspaper. That kept us going until they finally found the complete skull of Tia Lolita, still covered with the traditional headdress of fine to avoid mosquito bites. Ultimately, the conclusion that a few years ago someone had been buried alongside Lola. Mystery of the additional jaw resolved. Here in southern Mexico, multiple burials in one grave, sometimes at different levels and sometimes the extraction of bones after several years of non-payment of fees may occur. In any case, in exchange for a handsome tip the president agreed to clear a place for Daniel Box and hide the head of Lolita and the remaining bones in a sack at one end of the opening of the tomb.The funeral will take place the next day, no different from the speed with which Jews bury their dead --- but very different from the traditional adult habit of Oaxaca is characterized by the death of several days of prayer, visits and other rituals before burial, similar in purpose and function of the Shiva Jewish period after the funeral.

Later that night at the house, heard a cassette recording of nursery rhymes. While in the Jewish tradition is not permitted music during mourning, these tunes seemed appropriate. Arlene tenderly placed a small rattle beside Daniel, in accordance with local custom. One young woman said a 20-minute prayer, strikingly similar in nature to the Kaddish prayer or suffering "in a home of Shiva. Then more food --- a rich black mole with rolls, tortillas, salsa and more --- prayer. When the father finally came late to the obligatory humor about the clergy, someone joked that he had shown for a meal.

By the next afternoon, we were putting a generous display of flowers in the back of a pickup truck.Javier and I took final photographs of the baby, and then Jorge placed his son in the back of a 1980s white stationwagon, on his last trip.

The cemetery ritual constant familiarity with my own Canadian experience with Mexicana. A few soft prayers, placed a few handfuls of earth onto the coffin, inconsistent and our two friendly cemetery workers placed the concrete slab back between the remaining parts of the lid of the vault, then mixed and applied cement to seal the vault. Reminiscences of the Jewish custom, Chona asked Javier and I to help with the blade of the earth, then invited everyone home for dinner.

Back at the house there was no music. Chatter took its place. Finally, after most people had gone and only the barren white altar and gradually wake burning candles, remained, Arlene and I decided to go downtown for a walk, sad and emotionally drained, but strangely comforted. After a Oaxacan funeral for a Catholic baby, I felt exactly the way I did the first time I went out after getting up from my father Shiva.