So I begin this post after reading that I missed seeing President Barack Obama by about a half hour as he strolled through one of the streets in Paris that I was on today. This comes after I missed his wife and two daughters by a few hours at the Eiffel Tower on Friday. Friday's visit was a surprise, and had I know they were coming back today maybe I would have made more of an effort to see them. Nonetheless today I experienced the Montmartre cemetery which I saw on my way to Sacre Coeur Basilica and vowed I would come back to as it looked very impressive. Now having seen it, I'm not sure impressive quite describes it.
As you can see in the pictures below the French seem to have gone over the top on their burial processes. It reminds me of fourth grade learning about the pyramids in Egypt and how the resting place had to be extravagant for the deceased. As some of the pictures illustrate it was like a little village of tombs. There was a combination of sepulchers (the room or chapel like structures) and sarcophagi (the above ground casket-looking structures) in the cemetery, each having its own inscription and familial touch to it. Many were inscribed with The [Insert-Last-Name-Here] Family, meaning it was a family burial place, although unlike the plots we see in the U.S., they were usually above ground structures. I saw very few standalone headstones like traditional U.S. cemeteries. Also, I didn't notice a theme of any kind. Just each individual families design of their final resting place. It seems that in the United States we have a sense of extremism, such that if there is money to be made somewhere, we've done it. This system of burial, however, doesn't seem to have taken off. I suppose there is a lot of money to be made making these tombs, but I think it is so counter-cultural that no one has tried it. The other thing I noticed is that it reminded me a lot of a neighborhood. With street names and everything families were laid to rest next to families, only naturally making them neighbors. The only thing they were missing was a tomb number to round out the address, but I suppose that would prompt mailboxes to go up, and I'm not sure the Montmartre Cemetery Homeowner's Association (it would be interesting to find out how that would work) would like that. Lastly, having spent 3 summers in High School maintaining my church's cemetery this posed an interesting problem. We were always told not to really touch the tombstones, just the grass around them. Well, given the densely packed tombs there really wasn't much grass, and I'm not sure what the policy is there for maintaining the tombs, I would guess maintenance is pretty simple (all the more reason to bring this burial culture back to the U.S.).
In all, it was a relatively low-key weekend. A walk last night with a co-worker was nice. We talked mainly about the differences in culture (France vs. U.S.) and were able to maintain that conversation for about 2 hours. Many interesting points from how Macdonald's (Magdo) is different to things like higher education here: about 200-300 euros a year all around, he was surprised to hear how much SHU was per year, and I in return was a bit jealous. I also made it to mass tonight. I found a parish run by Passionists from Ireland who run an English parish in Paris that has about 5 English masses over the course of the weekend. I went to the 6:30 mass this evening and enjoyed it quite a bit. Also, I seem to have jinxed the weather by mentioning I hadn't seen rain yet. Yesterday and today were cloudy and windy and today there was some rain, and this time it was not from plants being watered! Work starts up again tomorrow, so we'll have to see what is in store there, and then next weekend I am off to Namur, Belgium to the Motherhouse of the Sisters of St. Mary of Namur. Sr. Julianne-Marie Farrington, Special Assistant to the President is from that order and has helped me to arrange a visit. It will be nice to be out of Paris and I'm excited to experience Belgium a bit. I hope things continue to be well in the U.S.
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