Daniel Vosair

So I mentioned in a previous blog that a man from Hybe had died in early May.

I decided to attend the funeral and pay my respects. I attended the funeral with my host sister Katka, Starka, and Starka’s daughters (Elena and Alica). Daniel Vosiar was a member of the adult choir in church, the one I attended and helped with (playing piano at rehearsals) for a while. He was 59 years old. He was born and raised in Liptovsky Mikulas and worked there for a majority of his life. The church was packed with people (like 4 times the amount of people who show up to regular church services), so that was really nice to see. The altar and pulpit were covered with black cloths, and every single person there was dressed in black from head to toe. I had to borrow some things from Katka, including shoes.

Before we left for the funeral, I kept thinking, I SHOULD know what he looks like, and I’m sure I would recognize him right away, but I can’t remember what he looks like now. I started looking through some of my pictures from when my family visited, because we attended an adult choir practice and took a few snapshots. I asked Katka to help me find him, and she found him in one of my pictures. “Ah, that’s him!” But it’s only a picture of his backside. Katka starting running through the photo albums they have on their computer, trying to find him in pictures of community events. She found two others, besides the one I had; one was of the back of his head, and his head was cut off the top of the photo in the other. It was a bit frustrating and eery, and I never did see an actual photo of him. There was just something sad about that, because I wanted to remember him and keep him in my memory, but without pictures it’s so difficult to hang on to the memory of him. Without pictures, memories can fade so quickly. Although I’ll never really be sure, I think I do remember him. At the second or third rehearsal I attended, things were getting more comfortable and I was talking to the choir members a bit more. After we had finished for the evening (around 6 pm), a few of the older men came up to me and were joking around a bit, trying to speak with me, and one was like, “Ok, we should go have wine now! Let’s all go have some wine! Come on!” And he was smiling and jabbing me in the shoulder, and he really wanted me to join the old guys for some wine. He was pretty jolly and friendly. This is the memory he will hold in my mind, whether or not it was actually him. I just wish I could remember what he looked like.

We used a special type of Spevnik (the Spevnik is the traditional book of worship for Slovak Evangelicals), used especially for funeral occasions. It was quite interesting. It’s a small black book with hymns, and the hymns are divided into different sections. The section used is specific to that person and/or how they passed (for example tragedy, old age, in battle, if they were children, etc). The service itself was quite formal, and there was very minimal crying. I think their perception of death is that it is very natural, a part of life, and it is less…emotional? (for lack of a better word…). I think that all humans, regardless of culture, mourn death, but I believe that some cultures individualize death more than others. (Remember, this is only my opinion, and an opinion formed on a service where I couldn’t understand words…). It felt like these people were dealing with his death in a very “matter of fact” type way. It felt like they were acknowledging him as an individual person, of course, but that they were also going through a traditional routine, acting with minimal emotion (on the outside, and keeping their emotions on the inside) and having another ceremony to acknowledge death in general. I hope you can follow my thoughts on this; it’s a bit difficult for me to explain.

At the end of the service, as the organ played loudly, Pastor (Pan Ferrar in Slovak) led everyone outside and onto the street. All of the people present at the funeral walked in a procession line down the main street of Hybe, about half a mile, to the cemetery. When we arrived at the cemetery, everyone one gathered in or around the Smutko Dom (the “sad house”). There is a smutko dom at every cemetery in Slovakia, and it is where Daniel was laying. Another interesting thing about the service itself at the church is that Daniel’s body wasn’t present. It was in the smutko dom, which is a small, wooden, chapel-type building with pews and a small front altar. Throughout the funeral day, the body of the person being mourned is put in the smutko dom, and then all of those who wish to are able to come and see him. (The situation is like our wake, except this is only on the same day as the funeral, and it doesn’t take place at a funeral home. Funeral homes don’t exist here.) The smutko dom was jam packed, and the rest of us circled around the open doorways and once again pulled out our books to sing. After about another half hour of hymns, prayers, and words from the pastor, the pallbearers carried Daniel’s closed casket out to the hearse, which was waiting at the cemetery gates. Once the casket was put inside, we continued to sing around the hearse for another 15 minutes or so. I was quite confused while this was going on, wondering where they would take his body, on his funeral day, other than to his gravesite. I was informed later that he was being taken to the crematorium to be cremated, and that he would later be brought back to the cemetery to be buried at his plot. I guess the casket only serves the purpose of presentation for the body during it’s time spent in the smutko dom.

After Daniel was taken away, some people left, but most of the people started walking through the cemetery. I guess this is the time that everyone visits their loved ones buried in the same cemetery. On the way to the Turcanova family’s gravesites, Katka and I had a big discussion about what was going on. She was helpful and explained a lot to me, and she also taught me new funeral words in Slovak. “Pohreb” is funeral, “hrob” is grave, and “kazet” is casket. On our trip through the cemetery, I was shown the gravesites of Starka’s parents, Starka’s brother, Starka’s husband, and Elena’s husband. We stopped at each for a bit, and Starka, Elena, and Alica spent a decent amount of time ripping dandelions and weeds out of each plot to make them look nicer. Each gravesite (or at least each one that I’ve seen) has it’s own individual platform base, or box around the border, and many real flowers and plants can be planted within the boxes. Anyways, it was a nice experience, and it made me feel closer to them and like I was a part of the family. It especially helped with Starka, because some days I just get so frustrated with her. Seeing her silently visit her family’s gravesites, and my being able to see the graves myself and learn about who they were, helped me to see Starka as more of a real person. That sounds a bit strange, but there are times when I just get caught up with “the crabby old lady that lives in our house” or “the lady that barks at me about how I don’t eat enough food,” and I forget that she has this past. She has a past, her life, where so many of the people she loved were alive and she was young and vibrant. It’s especially difficult to see her as a person at times because I can’t REALLY understand her personality from the words she says, and I can’t ask her about her past experiences, or ask her about her family. I like to think she had a similar moment of realization when my family came to visit. Like she saw more depth to me, and I wasn’t just “this weird silent American girl who lives in their house” or “this girl who makes her crazy because she doesn’t eat enough.” She was able to understand a bit more about me by meeting my family, and just by being reminded that I DO have a family, and a life she doesn’t really know about.

We all went for a short walk after our time in the cemetery together, and then we headed to Elena’s house for coffee. And there, Starka proceeded to bark at me about how I should put sugar in my coffee, and that I SHOULD eat more cakes and cookies. But this time I didn’t mind so much, and it felt a bit different.

So I’ve gotten a bit sidetracked…and back to the point of this entry…I have a prayer request. Please say a prayer for the family and friends of Daniel Vosair. May he rest in peace.