All Saints’ Day, a way to reconnect with ancestors

At 7 a.m. this Thursday (October 31), Madame Z. Pavilla, aged 92, left her house in La Trinité. She intended to take the bus towards the Macouba cemetery to clean the family vault.

Above all, she wanted to honor her mother who asked her “not to forget him in the cemetery.”

The day before, Madame Pavilla dreamed of her mother.

It was of paramount importance that she went to Macouba, her hometown where life had been so hard in the past.

Madame Pavilla walked alone on the road with a determined step. Dressed in black and white, she carried a plastic bag which contained a brush, a cloth and candles.

Despite her painful knee, she stands well. Two buses passed without stopping for her.

As she was preparing to return home without having accomplished her mission, a good Samaritan offered to drop her off as far as Macouba.

She didn’t hesitate. Even though those around him told him that someone else was going to take care of cleaning the vault. She wanted to see it with her own eyes.

In the small town in the North, the cemetery located behind the old church was already in full activity. We clean, we change the flowers and we apply a new coat of white paint. The smell of bleach filled the air.

The Pavilla family vault hadn’t been cleaned in a while. Cobwebs hung above the vault. The tiles were very dirty.

Madame Pavilla found water and a broom. She cleaned everything.

She thought much more intensely about her mother and the other relatives buried in the vault. His heart was heavy. She felt sadness. In the cemetery, she felt a presence.

For her, cleaning the vault is an act of love, a duty of memory, a recognition ofgodsa moment to reconnect with the deceased.

The weather was exceptionally good at the Macouba cemetery, which surprised everyone. Normally, it rains heavily on grave cleaning day.

The new flowers brightened up the cemetery. Some made jokes about Saint Basil being capable of triggering serial deaths when he announced his arrival in a commune.

According to funerary traditions in the West Indies, Saint Basil leaves with the dead. He would even have a list of names of the people he came to pick up.

Before leaving for La Trinité, Madame Pavilla took care to light candles in the family vault. Of course, this is premature. We light the candles on November 1st. But she doesn’t know if she will be able to go to the Macouba cemetery to participate in the All Saints’ Day tradition.

She did her best to respect her mother’s wishes and not abandon her.

On the way back, she passed the Basse-Pointe church and made the sign of the cross.