By Kristy Hocking
You may have caught wind of the cat cafe craze, or grazed at one of Amsterdam’s “green” cafes, but have you ever dined in with death? North Sydney Community Centre is home to conversations about the inevitable end, in the form of a death cafe event.
Developed by Jon Underwood and Sue Barsky Reid, based on the ideas of Bernard Crettaz, death cafes have grown popular among 97 countries through individuals who wish to talk in community, with no agenda.
The meetings are an inclusive and confidential space with rules – no services are to be promoted, or spruiked. The goal is to increase awareness of death and the process of dying, with the intention to help people make the most of their lives.
Death – the one guarantee to life, closely followed by taxes – fails to make the school syllabus. As such, many feel ill-prepared – whether it’s the departure of a loved one, or a personal terminal diagnosis.
Seasoned wedding and funeral celebrant Nicky Solomon believes in getting organised, beginning with the practicalities. The death cafes are not necessarily a gathering to share grief.
“It’s not somewhere for people who are deeply grieving,” said Solomon. “I am not a trained psychologist. I don’t have the background to do that … it’s more about the nitty gritty of death and dying.”
It’s not uncommon to encounter an avoidance of the subject matter, as many people shy from approaching mortality with their loved ones.
Director of North Sydney Community Centre Sarah Cunningham emphasises the importance of community connection and holding conversations around dying.
“In Australian or western civilisation, I don’t think that we necessarily deal with this really well,” said Cunningham. They (death cafes) really should be the opportunity for people to come together in this kind of form … so that it just becomes something that is talked about as opposed to something that isn’t and shouldn’t be talked about.
“It’s also not to normalise it to a point where we’re saying that you should turn off your feelings … quite the opposite. I think it’s much more about exploring your feelings and having them discussed and open and even validated.”
Voiceover artist and death literacy enthusiast Deborah Bauer knows first hand the feelings that arrive with the impending departure of a loved one, as well as the practicalities at hand.
“My dad passed away from dementia,” said Bauer. “He was 92, so he had a fantastic life and we celebrated his life but he had a difficult life. He was born in 1925 in Hungary, Europe. He went through Second World War, and he was in the Holocaust so it was pretty tough.
“He came out to Australia and thought it was the most amazing place in the world .. when he got dementia he basically couldn’t understand what was happening to him. We understood as he declined that we would potentially be facing his death.”
Bauer and her family were trying to keep her father comfortable and calm through his periods of confusion and fear of his impending death.
“There was zero (information) offered from palliative care,” she said. “That was about 10 years ago.”
Solomon has seen many iterations of death cafes, from the inevitable circling around feelings, to the more practical aspects of the departed.
“My husband died seven months ago and we were caught out,” she said. “I didn’t have his passwords … he did all the banking and the financials. I didn’t know how to do all those things.
“These are the things I tell other people, organise, make sure. We had always planned to put those in process, but he was a young, fit 61-year-old and we didn’t feel that urgency.
“People think they’re going to have time.”
You can join Nicky and her co-host Isla Tooth at North Sydney Community Centre on Friday, May 22nd, between 10am and 12pm. For more information head to North Sydney Community Centre.
Featured image: Nicky Solomon at North Sydney Community Centre. Photo: Kristy Hocking
