Dearly departed

Funerals may be difficult to negotiate, but that’s no reason to goof around at them

Unless you’ve been living on Mars, you must have seen pictures of that now-infamous ‘selfie’ that Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt clicked with US President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron at the memorial of the late, great Nelson Mandela. The three world leaders, grinning cheesily into the camera, craned their necks together to get into the frame, oblivious to the thunder-faced Michelle Obama who looked pointedly away.

I am no mind reader, but I can pretty much guess what was going through Michelle Obama’s head as her husband grinned goofily for the camera. What on earth are you thinking, Barack? This is the memorial service of a remarkable man who inspired millions across the globe. Countries from across the world have sent their leaders to pay homage to his soul. This is a solemn occasion to mark the passing of a true hero. This is not the time to pose for a ‘selfie’.

But then, much of the world was thinking along the same lines. Memorial services and funerals are supposed to be about remembering those who have passed on and honouring their lives, not posing for cheesy pictures on the sidelines. You can just about forgive giddy teenagers for gaffes like these, but heads of state and government? Seriously, what is the world coming to?

Of course, there were those who said that we were making much ado about nothing. The Mandela memorial service was about celebrating his life and having a rollicking good time while at it. So, what was wrong if Obama and Cameron decided to flirt a little or even pose for a picture with Ms Thorning-Schmidt? It was all in good fun, and knowing Nelson Mandela, he would probably have chuckled along, or even leant in for a piece of the action.

As the debate raged on, I couldn’t help but wonder: what is the right funeral etiquette these days? There was a time when there was general agreement that funerals were solemn occasions, where grave faces and discreet tears were the order of the day. People came clad somberly in black (or white), sat quietly to pay their respects, and then left to allow the family to mourn in peace and privacy.

These days, however, all that seems to be changing. First off, in India at least, nobody seems to abide by the all-white dress code. People come wearing pretty much what they like, from jeans and kurtas, to saris and shorts, all in colours of their choosing. Many people don’t even bother to sit through all the bhajans, leaving as soon as they have marked their attendance with the family. Those who do, fiddle discreetly with their phones, answering mails and sending smses so that they don’t miss out on a single minute of a working day. And the close friends and family members who stay back for a cup of tea or coffee afterwards, shuffle awkwardly as they try and make conversation with the bereaved – and take off as soon as they can without violating the laws of common decency.

Part of the problem, of course, is that all of us are – at some level – rendered acutely uncomfortable by death. There is an element of ‘There, but for the grace of God, go I’ in our reactions to the news of someone’s passing. And in that maelstrom of emotions, we find it hard to negotiate the best way to communicate our sympathy to those who have lost a loved one. “I am so sorry about your loss,” sounds exactly like the cliché it is when we say it to someone who has lost a parent, a spouse, a sibling, or even worse, a child. But no matter how acutely we feel for them, we don’t seem to have the vocabulary to express the depth of our feelings. And so, it just seems easier to just avoid any meaningful conversation until the worst of their grief has passed.

But no matter how uncomfortable we feel, it behoves us to treat a funeral with proper respect. And that means turning up on time, instead of half way through the prayer service. It involves dressing in a manner that respects the memory of those that have passed (it doesn’t have to be funereal black or white so long as you stick to formal wear). It means no cracking silly jokes, just to break the tension.

And even if you can’t think of what to say, don’t avoid meeting those who have lost a loved one. Just hug them close, and give them the chance to weep on your shoulder, should they want to take it. Don’t make them embarrassed about their tears. Don’t tell them to cheer up. Never say, “Don’t cry”. Offer a tissue to wipe their tears, give them the space to share their feelings with you, and most of all, allow them to grieve in your presence.

It doesn’t matter if you are not good with spoken words. Find some other way to acknowledge their loss. Write a letter sharing anecdotes about those who have passed on. If you have some nice pictures of the departed soul, frame them and send them to the family as a remembrance. Share a book or a piece of music to help those grieving.

But whatever you do, don’t take your lead from the leader of the free world and goof around at a memorial service. And (I had hoped that this would go without saying, but clearly I was wrong), for God’s sake, don’t take a selfie.

Feet of Clay

Why do we expect our heroes to be epitomes of all-round perfection?

Doing my usual trawl of news sites recently, I came upon an interview with Nelson Mandela’s eldest daughter, Dr Makaziwe, popularly known as Maki, the child of his first marriage to Evelyn Mase (whom he left for Winnie Mandela).

A child when her father was sent to prison, she was grown up with kids of her own by the time he was released. But all her hopes of establishing a close father-daughter relationship with him were soon belied. She says now that while Mandela may be a warm, extroverted presence for the entire world, with his own family he seems incapable of expressing his love, always remaining a distant, emotionally unavailable figure.

As I read through the long interview – in which Maki is at pains to point out that she no longer holds his emotional coldness against her father; that’s just the way he is and she has made her peace with it – I couldn’t help but be reminded of all the other larger-than-life political figures who seemed to have failed those closest to them.

The most famous example of this phenomenon – in which an iconic leader wins over the world but fails to gain the affection of his own immediate family – is, of course, Mahatma Gandhi. Those of you who remember the controversy over the film, Gandhi, My Father, will recall the salient facts. The Mahatma had a strained relationship with his first-born, Harilal Gandhi, who became a drunk, converted to Islam in an apparent attempt to provoke his father, then reconverted to Hinduism before dying a penniless alcoholic.

He said famously of the man who was referred to as the Father of the Nation: “He is the greatest father you have…but he is the one father I wish I did not have.”

Ironic, isn’t it? That Gandhiji, the man who was affectionately called Bapu by the entire country, failed his own son so spectacularly? That Mandela, the man who is held up as a symbol of hope and reconciliation in the entire world, couldn’t emotionally connect with his own daughter?

But while it may be jarring to discover that our idols have feet of clay, perhaps we really shouldn’t be that surprised. So, our heroes also have dysfunctional families just like the rest of us. Of course, they do. We may have built them up as larger-than-life mythological figures on our imagination. But at the end of the day, they are only human, made of the same flesh and blood as you and me. Just as we struggle with the various facets of our personality, so do they. And yes, just like us, sometimes they fail at one thing or the other.

Some of them may turn out to be spectacular failures as fathers. Others may be revealed as terrible sons. Some may fail at being faithful husbands. Others may fall well short of our modern standards of political correctness.

But for all their faults, there is still something about them that marks them out as leaders of men. They may be bad at the small stuff, but by God, they know how to deal with the big picture.

Take Winston Churchill, for example. If he were alive and in British politics today, he would be exposed for the racist bigot that he was. His view on Indians – whom he derided as “breeding like rabbits” – was that they were a “beastly people with a beastly religion”. He damned Hindus as a foul race “protected by their mere pullulation from the doom that is their due”. He hoped for “bitter and bloody communal violence” in India so that the Raj could last longer. And yet, despite these racist views that were expressed all too often privately, who can deny that Churchill’s leadership was pivotal in defeating Hitler in World War II?

If the media had been as intrusive at the time that John F. Kennedy was President of the United States, Camelot would not be the one thing that JKF is famous for today. Instead, he would have been seen a Clinton-esque figure best-known for his serial adultery and the fact that he had sex in the White House pool with a succession of women. Several years later, Bill Clinton went one further by having sex in the Oval Office itself. But unlike Clinton – whose entire Presidency became a late-night show gag after the Monica Lewinsky episode – JFK got away with it, until more recent biographies unearthed all the dirt about what would today be termed his ‘sex addiction’.

And more’s the pity, if you ask me. Think about it. Do we really need this kind of intensely personal, sometimes distressingly private information about our leaders? Do we really need to know if they are cheating on their wives? Or that their sons and daughters are disappointed in them? Quite honestly, what purpose does this serve?

At the end of the day, we have to judge our public figures by their public lives and their achievements in this arena. And if we want to do that, then their private lives should remain just that: private.