A Kenyan Funeral

July 27, 2009

Last Saturday I attended my first funeral since I’ve been in Kenya. As I wrote about before, I attended a wedding and absolutely loved it – the whole community was included and there was lots of dancing and singing involved. I was interested to see if these same themes would appear at the funeral.

Mathew, one of the most educated and respected men in the community passed away two weekends ago (I hadn’t met him, although I had passed by his house many times). The funeral preparations began immediately. His relatives and friends from all over the country were informed of his death and I am sure that more than 100 came to Eregi. The whole community also knew of the death (information spreads here like wildfire), and because this man was especially respected and revered there was sure to be a huge crowd.

The funeral proceedings actually stretched out over several days. On Thursday there was a memorial service at the church and as I was walking on the main road in Eregi I saw a motorcade of about 15 cars and dozens of motorbikes roll by with hundreds of people seated inside or hanging onto the sides. On Friday, I was told that thousands of people turned out at Mathew’s house for an overnight vigil.

The burial was on Saturday, and I would estimate that there were at least 2,500 people in attendance. People were seated on chairs with a tarp strung above them to provide shade, some were seated on the grass, and some stood in the open or in the shade. The church choir was there (those women can sing!), the Catholic priests were there, and of course there were many family members, friends, his work associates, and other community members.

As expected, there were many sad moments at the funeral. But the majority of the time was not spent lamenting the loss; instead, everyone who spoke focused on celebrating his accomplishments in life. Unlike Western funerals, almost no one wore black. The close female family members wore white, but everyone else (the women especially) wore all different types of colorful clothing. It wasn’t a “festive” atmosphere, but I would call it more of a “celebration” than a “funeral.” There was plenty of singing, and, after the eulogies when the casket was being prepared for burial, dancing as well.

Like the wedding, the funeral was a community event. At one point people were invited to come forward and give a donation to help the family with the funeral costs. People contributed what they could – in the donation bucket I saw everything from the equivalent of a nickel to a $20 bill. There was plenty of food available after the burial, and the hum of conversation continued throughout the day. Funerals and weddings are truly magnets for drawing people in the community together. I am sure that everyone in the area knew of the funeral, and most if not all probably knew the man who died by face or on a personal level.

Maybe these sort of community gatherings occur in small towns in the US, but as a lifetime city-dweller the idea of a whole area coming together for social events like weddings and funerals is quite foreign to me. People living here in Eregi and the Kakamega region as a whole certainly face more than their fair share of daily challenges, but I think that the close ties people have with their fellow community members play a key role in helping everyone get by. I witnessed the ways the ties manifest themselves at the wedding, and at the funeral I saw more of the same.