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french funeral traditions

Patf

By Patf,
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Patf Newbie

Patf

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Sorry to be so depressing, but this occurred this morning.

There was a big funeral in the village, the 92 yr. old father of one of the main local families. Very friendly, nice  people, a son was the last mayor.

I noticed that the daughter of the last old lady to die here was absent, and the daughter of another sick lady who died recently was there but had to be revived, and couldn't follow the procession to the cemetery.

I was wondering if there was a tradition that in the first year of mourning the relatives don't go to the cemetery? Or anything similar.

I couldn't help comparing these traditions with the Jewish tradition of Levayah, accompanying the deceased on their last journey.

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nectarine Newbie

nectarine

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Slightly off track here but worth noting, if you organise something for a crematorium, that the time given is often the time that the deceased ... er,... disappears behind the curtain and the cremation actually takes place. True, this happened once where I was given a time, arrived half an hour early to find the service just starting. People who arrived for the time given were met by the family coming out! I've just organised the funeral for a dear friend and was forewarned so, when given the time for the cremation by the undertakers, replied "ah, but the service will start half an hour earlier won't it". Instant and slightly embarrassed correction by the undertakers who told me to announce the earlier time, rather than the time they had contracted with the crematorium. As I said, slightly off topic from the original posting but worth remembering ,,,
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Patf Newbie

Patf

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That's a good point Norman never thought of that. The lady who wasn't there lives just across the road from the person who just died. You never know.

And nectarine - this was a burial but there was a church service first which lasted nearly an hour. I don't usually go in the church because it's so long drawn out and I can't follow the service.

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Patf Newbie

Patf

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Thinking about your comment Norman - I've only ever asked one person here, an elderly woman,  what it was like during the Occupation, and she didn't say much.

Except, pointing to a house in the distance, 'Elle aimait les allemagnes.' Which could have been the house where the old man lived, who had just died. After that I never asked anyone else, though there are plenty of people still alive who were around during WW2. Too sensitive a subject.

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  • 3 weeks later...
mint Newbie

mint

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The last village where I lived was one of those that the "cockleshell heros" stopped at on their way north to Ruffec in the Charente from Bordeaux.

About a year into our stay, there was a commemoration plaque set up just outside the village with the names of those who were betrayed in that village and were executed by members of the Gestapo.

Because of the plaque, it was natural that this decades-old story came to the fore.  I did ask a friend whether anyone knew the person or persons responsible for betraying the British soldiers.  Yes, he muttered, the family still lived in the village but I never did find out which family................not that I particularly wanted to find out because I wouldn't want a family to be stigmatised on account of the action of one of their forebears.

It is a particularly sad story because there was a film with Paddy Ashdowne round about then  explaining this incident.  The archives showed that the French resistance was already doing something about bombing in Bordeaux harbour and, indeed, their operation was at a more advanced and effective state than ours.  All those poor British soldiers need not have died at all.  But war is like that, isn't it?  Lives are sacrificed needlessly.

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nomoss Newbie

nomoss

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The dilemma for those living in an occupied country has always been whether or not to cooperate with the occupying power.

If they don't, they may be punished or even executed by the occupier, and if they do, they may be punished or even executed by those who replace the occupier.

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mint Newbie

mint

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Oh Norman, I am looking forward to watching the film, thank you for posting it.

I can't now because I have had a somewhat stressful day.  I'd been for an Xray and then I had to find some godforsaken cemetery where our evening marche nordique started.

I drove up and down this depressing road and couldn't find where I wanted.  OH took pity and came out with the dog to show me the place.

Then, it got dark before the walk finished and my eyesight is not too clever in the dark!  Plus, of course, I then had to drive home in the dark.

The walk was lovely and I enjoyed it though, just lately, I always have a painful knee afterwards.

However.......I watched the first few minutes of the film and I think I am going to be able to understand it[:D]

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mint Newbie

mint

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[quote user="NormanH"]I have sent you a link to watch the whole film mint

If anyone else (Chancer?) would like to watch it also send me a pm..

[/quote]

Yes, thank you.  Will get the nibbles and some wine ready and watch it this evening.  It is OH's ping-pong evening and so I will be uninterrupted by ridiculous requests and I look forward to snuggling up with doggie[:D]

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Patf Newbie

Patf

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Yes that's the one. I think the last series has recently been shown.

I haven't watched much of it, but it's supposed to be well reviewed. The french trying to face up to their past.

But if the UK had been occupied I don't think the situation would have been much different. There were a lot of Nazi sympathisers in the UK, especially among the "upper classes".

Censored word N*a*z*i.

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NormanH Rising Star

NormanH

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Not least the owner of the Daily Heil ....

"

Support of fascism

The "Hurrah for the Blackshirts" article by Lord Rothermere

Lord Rothermere was a friend of Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler, and directed the Mail's editorial stance towards them in the early 1930s.[32][33]

Rothermere's 1933 leader "Youth Triumphant" praised the new Nazi

regime's accomplishments, and was subsequently used as propaganda by

them.[34]

In it, Rothermere predicted that "The minor misdeeds of individual

Nazis would be submerged by the immense benefits the new regime is

already bestowing upon Germany". Journalist John Simpson,

in a book on journalism, suggested that Rothermere was referring to the

violence against Jews and Communists rather than the detention of

political prisoners.[35]

Rothermere and the Mail were also editorially sympathetic to Oswald Mosley and the British Union of Fascists.[36]

Rothermere wrote an article titled "Hurrah for the Blackshirts" in

January 1934, praising Mosley for his "sound, commonsense, Conservative

doctrine",[37]

and pointing out that: "Young men may join the British Union of

Fascists by writing to the Headquarters, King's Road, Chelsea, London,

S.W."[38]..

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mint Newbie

mint

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[quote user="NormanH"]Patf I haven't sent this link to this film before...

If you would like it please send me a pm as if I try to send one it comes back to me as if I am sending to myself...one of the famous Forum glitches..

You may be mixing it up with the series for TV called 'un village français'

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saison_1_d%27Un_village_fran%C3%A7ais

[/quote]

Yes, I enjoyed un village français but only the first series because after that, I am not sure what was going on in my life, because I didn't get back to it.

The first series was around the time when Frenchie (for those who remember her) gave me a clip of il pleut bergere and I recognised the tune which accompanies the opening credits.

My then French teacher told me that it was only disguised as a children's song but was really a song of the revolution and a hark back to the time when Marie Antoinette was "playing" shepherdess.

It was really quite a dark series and I found some of the scenes most distressing.

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mint Newbie

mint

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Sorry, not been able to go back to the film through lack of time, Thursday being my busiest day of the week.

Hope to be able to have another look tomorrow morning.  What happened was, it was showing well until just after he took in the man hiding in the bike shed.  Then the frame froze.

I did try to download it but, after the download was complete, it wasn't open-able because it was apparently a different type of fichier.

Will let you know asap[:)]

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