EW09
letters
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2011 THE VANCOUVER COURIER
opinion SHOW PART OF UPCOMING CHUTZPAH! FESTIVAL
One-man play documents death of beloved mother Do you read the obits? Although I’m only in my 40s and hopefully a long way from my last gasp, I regularly read the obituary page in the newspaper. My parents are getting on and older than most of the strangers I read about whose lives have ended. I think about my mum when I read about the passing of women who are remembered for putting others’ needs ahead of their own. Am I preparing for the inevitable? Perhaps, though I’m confident my mother has plenty more years left to tell me how badly I need a haircut and to enclose $50 in my birthday card (quite possibly to pay for a haircut). How people are remembered and how they spent their lives fascinates me. I’m inevitably moved by loving tributes that immortalize the dead, though I wish more people would break free from the formulaic obituary style and speak in their own voice. Obits about women or men who leave behind young children pain me the most. I often wonder about short obits, such as the one for a longtime family friend, our Auntie Erna, who died last fall in Montreal. The sadness was not so much about her passing—she was 92, nearly bedridden and had dementia—as it was about her life and how the horrors of the Holocaust lingered under the surface. She was a Berliner, whose parents and sister were killed by the Nazis. Never once did I hear her speak a word of German, though toward the end she apparently started talking to my Swiss-German sister-in-law in her mother tongue. There also seemed to be an unspoken rule about not asking certain questions. I wish I had. Her three-line obit, which she wrote and insisted on in her will, depressed me. Too brief for such a long life. I bring all of this up because of a one-man show at the Chutzpah! Festival, which starts tomorrow at the Jewish Community Centre. It’s titled How to Disappear Completely and is inspired by the few months a young man spent taking care of his dying mother. Tuesdays with Morrie it’s not. An acclaimed lighting designer for local theatre productions, Erdal is stepping onto the stage in the one-man show, with the voices and images of his mother Mery and others joining him. In 2000, Erdal found out his normally vibrant mother was dying of lung cancer, the result of a two-pack-a day cigarette habit that started at age 12. She was 57. Recently graduated from film school, Erdal immediately flew back to Israel to care for his mother for the last nine months of her life. As depressing is it got, Erdal said,
letter of the week
fionahughes there was also much laughter shared between him and the woman he admired most in the world. “I could ask her advice on anything— she was very smart about life.” Together, mother and son bonded over movies, card games and music. The show’s title is a song by Radiohead his mother loved. Their relationship deepened when Erdal started documenting his mother’s final months—he had studied to be a documentary filmmaker. It was during filming, which his mother agreed to, often becoming the director and ordering him to “cut,” that Erdal really learned about his mother’s difficult but fascinating past. Born in Paraguay, Mery was sent to live with relatives in Buenos Aires at 12 because her father couldn’t feed her. Unlike her cousins, however, she could not got to school but had to work. It was a tough time. At 18, she travelled alone to Israel with only $10 in her pocket. She became a nurse, had two children and returned to university to study literature, obtaining her PhD at 50. “She had many reasons to be angry, but she was not,” Erdal said. “She also had a stoic approach to death, saying, ‘I’ve lived very intensely. Death is inevitable. It’s a tragedy if I bury you, it’s life when you bury me.’” As much as the show is about his mother, it’s also about Erdal. “It’s about who I was 10 years ago and who I am now,” he explained. “It took me a long time to recover from my mother’s death. I’m back to myself, but [her absence] is always there.” Filming his mother’s final months didn’t sit well with Erdal’s sister, who felt it unnecessary to document so much and argued that it was artificial. “She hated that I filmed her and our mother. But it was my therapy and I wanted to make something positive about something negative. And my mother had a need to document her life. She told us stuff we never knew.” Although some tears may be shed during the show, Erdal insists it’s not a downer. “It would be a sin to make a depressing show about such a happy woman.” I look forward to meeting Mery when the show opens Feb.17. fhughes@vancourier.com
According to one reader, the worst thing about hitting a cyclist with your car is the potential damage to your paint job. file photo Dan Toulgoet To the editor: Re: “Stop signs and red lights only evolved with cars,” Feb. 4, Letters. I share Courier letter writer Franco Dominelli’s “no feelings of guilt whatsoever” when he cycles full speed through a stop sign at 2 a.m.
As a matter of fact, after I nail him in the intersection because I had the right of way, the only ill feeling I’ll have while he lays in traction is getting the ding fixed on my ride. Cal Koat, Vancouver
Aboriginal school column steeped in ignorance
To the editor: Re: “Separate mini school won’t solve aboriginal problems,” Feb. 2. This article was extremely offensive. Mark Hasiuk clearly has little to no knowledge of the history here in Canada or of social structures that govern peoples lives. Perhaps he should brush up on the Indian Act, residential school or Canadian history before making judgments on subjects he clearly knows nothing about. What qualifies Hasiuk as an expert on First Nation education? Does he have a bachelors of eduction or is he aboriginal? As a white male, does he ever take a step back to see the advantages life offers him because of his privileged position? He’s probably the type who would deny any such benefits, even though our systems are based on Eurocentric, patriarchal values. These values have been the
site of aboriginal marginalization since contact, and poor education outcomes are only one product of this. First Nations, Metis and Inuit people hold a unique place in Canadian society due our original occupation of this land. The government made agreements with indigenous peoples that assured them equal opportunity to all the things that Canada offers its citizens, including education. If indigenous children are falling behind, is it not the government’s responsibility to see they get an equal opportunity to succeed, even if that education doesn’t look the same as mainstream education? The government is expected to honour treaties. Why should indigenous people, whose land you so love, not get what they are entitled to? Before writing another article, Hasiuk should make
sure his naivety can’t be mistaken for racism. Fiona LaPorte, Vancouver
••• To the editor: I fully agree with Mark Hasiuk’s analysis. Here in South Australia, my late wife Maria and I worked for many years in indigenous student support programs at universities. The state government was persuaded in 1985 to set up a separate aboriginal school, Kaurna Plains, on the rationale that it would lift aboriginal kids’ performance and help them complete their schooling successfully. To date, although about 30 per cent of all indigenous kids eventually go to university, as far as I can tell not a single kid has gone straight from that school to university. I hope that this “way-back” idea of separate schools in Vancouver is given the short shrift that it deserves. Joe Lane, Adelaide, Australia
School board right to turf journalist from forum
To the editor: Re: “Class Notes,” Jan. 28. On whether the Vancouver School Board should have denied your reporter access to a student forum, let me state first that I think Naoibh O’Connor is one of the city’s finest reporters. As an “education activist,” I’ve always found her education coverage fair, insightful and relevant. As a former journalist I also generally favour transparent debate. But I’ve sat through enough meetings to agree that a media presence can stifle debate and/or encourage posturing, neither of which is helpful for those seeking frank advice on sensitive issues.
And as a parent, had my child been a student speaking at that forum, I would have strongly supported the board’s decision to exclude reporters, even one as responsible as Naoibh. Especially since the board also held public meetings offering ample opportunity for those wanting a wider audience for their views. A compromise solution in the future might be for the board to provide a “what we heard” report at the next public meeting that summarizes key messages without putting anyone on the spot. Dawn Steele, Vancouver
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