La novena

I stood on tip-toe, trying to see past two rows of black hair into the room. Heat escaped from inside the chapel, a cement oven topped with rough boards and tin, filled with so many bodies. Despite my height advantage, my view was restricted to the tops of heads, the altar, and a gecko carelessly making his way up the bright blue wall. Further stretching reveals pairs of large hands and heads are bowed, while tinier duplicates fidget, looking for cues on when to kneel, sit, stand. Communion is taken, and the ceremony is closed. Afterwards, the priest tells us to go in peace, and one by one we make our way to the Virgin at the front of the chapel. We touch fingertips to her shiny teal fabric, make the sign of the cross, and exit into the night.

This is the second mass for Don Sexto Inti, who passed nine days ago. Despite his age, this was unexpected- he took a bad fall while the rest of the town was in a meeting on Wednesday morning. As far as I can tell, must have broken some ribs and died of complications. The cause of his death remains a mystery to me because it remains a mystery to his family. People here often still trust the advice of a local curandero, or practicioner of traditional medicine, over that of a doctor in Villa Montes. His cause of death will go down in family record as simply a bad fall, a stroke of bad luck.

Tonight after the mass, shadows file silently down Chimeo’s main stretch of dirt road. A few hundred meters from the church lay Don Inti’s house, where he and his wife seemed to forever be seated together, taking their mate, chicha, or aguardiente. Although Sunday afternoons will no longer be accompanied by the sound of his copleando, Don Inti hasn’t gone far: he now rests in the cemetery across the street, beneath a fresh mound of red earth. He has had company there all week; friends lighting candles, leaving flowers, or joining him for one last round of aguardiente. Seats have been placed in a semi-circle around the family’s dirt yard, and Don Inti’s wife, Adela, sits at its head. The scene is illuminated by two 60-watt bulbs, newly installed, hanging over her head. Zancudos and escarabajos follow a parabolic loop around the light. Adela sits next to a wooden bed, bare but for candles at its corners and His clothing, neatly folded in the line where he once slept. This is tradition - nine days after a loved one has departed, his clothes are laid out, surrounded by candles, as a way to see him off into the next life. It is said that if this ceremony is not preformed, the deceased may come back for their belongings, bringing with them back luck or ill wishes. I try to imagine what Dona Adela could be thinking- is she letting Him go? Is she thinking about their lives together? If so, is she thinking about their youth, or their more recent years spent taking care of Him, in his near invalid state? What was their love like- did she always love Him, or did she grow to live Him with time, habit, and children? Sadness sits deep in her large brown eyes. Her mouth reveals nothing though, and she sits silently, attending to Him for the last time.

In the shadows His daughter, discernable by the black they will wear for the next year, ladle a soup of pasta and boiled beef into plastic plates, serving the guests one by one. Two whole racks of beef remain hanging from a tree near the kitchen, and their fragrance in the air tells me they’ve been there since the early morning. Spoons go from plates to mouths reluctantly- not that it isn’t appreciated, but its late, and this is a heavy meal. Each takes down her own hefty portion valiantly, out of respect for the dead and his family. Plastic buckets of chicha are filled from a 50-gallon drum, to be passed around the circle and taken, cup by cup. After the third round it begins to rain and I take my cue to exit, avoiding the heavy drinking that’s sure to come.

Back in my kitchen, the town is silent but for thunder and rain in the distance. Despite the intermittent heavy rain, the sound of drums and pim pim continue on until the early morning. The family will keep vigil by His bed all night, and in the morning bury His clothes with Him as a final goodbye.

Its been nine months in Chimeo, and Ive now tasted a bit of all parts of life in our tiny tin roofed chapel: birth, marriage, baptism, winter, summer, and as if to finally finish the circle, a death.