Some weeks ago, I went to pay my respects to a man I’d met only once. He was my son’s best friend’s father.
On Saturday, April 15 he went hiking with his five friends on Mount Harvey in West Vancouver. Based on police reports, it seems like the hikers encountered a cornice, which is described as a buildup of snow and ice that creates an overhang. These experienced hikers must have stepped on this cornice, which made them plummet about 500 metres to their deaths.
Five of the six friends died; he was one of them.
My son and his son grew up in North Vancouver and went to the same elementary school. They became very good friends in high school, that age when children don’t particularly want to be seen with parents. His son was a regular guest at our house, as was my son at theirs, but we didn’t meet as parents until graduation night when we sat at the same table, where we chatted like old friends. After all, I had chatted with their son often.
At his funeral the following Wednesday, as I sat in that huge Korean church in Surrey, I had time to just think. All the priests spoke in Korean for the entire ceremony, and I did not understand one word. Yet despite that, I understood their sorrow. I understood their pain. I understood their anguish. That kind of loss is the same in any language.
As the ceremony drew to a close and the priest asked the family to view the body for the last time, even without understanding the Korean language I realized what he must have said, and I felt the dread of knowing that they were about to say the final goodbye. I cry easily, but I had expected to remain stoic especially when I realized the funeral would not be in English.
How could I cry when I didn’t understand what’s being said?
Yet as the deceased’s family stood and approached the coffin, I felt a strange heat envelope me. I quickly looked away because I didn’t want to see their expressions. I figured it would have been raw since the family had only learned about his death three or four days before. How could they be ready to say their final goodbye? But the moment I lowered my head, I heard a wail from the front of the church; it was heart wrenching. And as I felt my eyes beginning to fill, a chill ran down my spine. I tried to keep the tears at bay, but I couldn’t. Before I knew it, tears were streaming down my face.
I quickly yanked open the zipper of my purse and started rummaging.
“Tissue. I need tissue,” I thought.
I needed it now. Before I embarrassed myself. I wasn’t sure if it would have seemed strange that I was crying over someone I barely knew. Someone I’d met only once.
I didn’t want to be that weird person at the back of the church weeping when he wasn’t my friend. But I wanted to weep. I wanted to join in with those wailing because it felt unfair. I wanted to shout, “How is that fair that you don’t get a chance to say goodbye to your loved one? How are you expected to not fall apart when they’re snatched from you? How do you come to terms with that loss when people’s platitudes don’t help? When the world continues and you can’t get unstuck, what do you do?”
So I continued digging through my purse.
“Where was the tissue?” But I couldn’t seem to find any tissues in my overstuffed purse.
I found my wallet and put it on the seat beside me. Then I found my glasses. Then some Tic Tacs came tumbling out. I even found a bag with the dried mango slices that I had bought in an airport convenience store a few weeks before, but no tissue.
Then, just as I was about to desperately shake out the bag, I felt someone touching my left shoulder. I spun around, and I saw a woman with red-rimmed eyes holding a box of tissues for me. She said nothing. I smiled and mouthed “thanks,” kindly took some of the tissues, and continued to weep without reservation. Even without language she understood what I needed and, despite her pain, she reached out to me.
I really didn’t need to speak the same language to understand and share their pain and sorrow; it’s the same in any language. I can only imagine the pain the family still feels, and I’d like to know it becomes more bearable with time. I hope we, as a community in North Vancouver, will continue to support them and surround them with love and kindness as they continue to adjust to their overwhelming loss. I hope their sorrow will lessen every day until the pain becomes a dull, distant ache.
These deaths have reminded me once again that death, though inevitable, can be so unexpected. I must keep that in mind daily when I say goodbye to the people I love. I must remind them that I love them especially since I never know if it will be the last time I say goodbye. That final goodbye.
Goodbye, Mr. Sohn.
Tanya Haye is a longtime North Shore resident.
What are your thoughts? Send us a letter via email by clicking here or post a comment below.
