Death Cafe Whangarei No#9
A write up of Death Cafe Whangarei no#9
By Jo Moselen
We met at another new venue for our 9th Death Cafe, at this venue we were able to occupy a room to ourselves, although that did not achieve a quieter space as comments were made to it being a bit airless and echoed. We were 15 in number including 2 of us hosting the café. There were 5 people who had not joined us before.
We started with introductions and how people were feeling at that time about life and or death.
One person had recently experienced the death of a partner and shared her feelings of lack of support and the difficulty she experienced with the medical system and support services. Another person shared her concern about caring for an elderly friend and the responsibility around that.
Themes within our conversation included, our medical system, animal grief, people not knowing what to say to someone who has experienced the death of a loved one, “End of Life Choice Bill” with 2 attendees being able to update us on the progression of this bill, advance care plan, how our relationship with our mortality supports us to live in the present, being the best us at any time, Halloween and Day of the Dead.
Comments from evaluation forms were positive, people felt inspired, relieved, encouraged and valued the experience.
There was some discussion about future venues and for more open less noisy spaces, suggestions were made to hold a picnic in a cemetery at Halloween which for us in the Southern hemisphere is April 30th or in a park or some other outdoor venue. We will think on this.
I always feel grateful and uplifted by the sharing and connection between everyone that comes to a death café and I look forward to the next one.