This might be another failed project attempt. Although we don't have any redeeming video we did have a complete experience and looking back on everything now I feel as if there were a lot of this that could be recorded and reported. Instead of uploading a video that might be very bad and get me a 7 on this project or lower I might as well write about everything leading up the the actual funeral and hope for a 8 or higher. Probably just an 8 because part of the assignment is to have a video or audio, but there were a few missed opportunities.
The project started with the idea to go visit a funeral because even though it was something that we all had done before it was probably the easiest thing to do. It seemed that way at least because I knew a Funeral Home that was close to my house and I know the president of the Funeral Home. At the same time I wasn't sure how far that would have gotten us considering that the president is not always their due to his Alzheimer's. This however did seem like the best idea because it was a place that I knew better than any other Funeral Home and all of the other ideas seemed less fun. We called Benta's Funeral Home at 12:20 pm during school on a Thursday. One of the members in our group, Lucas talked to a receptionist that transferred him to someone else who said it would be alright if we were to come to a wake on Saturday from 3-4pm and observed the way things were done. The project actually seemed to be going really easily compared to the Birth Unit project which was similar to this but involved no prior planning. It was done at the last minute compared to this which had been well thought out.
A piece of audio that probably should have been recorded at the moment but wasn't was the phone call between the person who picked up at Benta's Funeral Home and Lucas. It went something like this:
Lucas: "Hi my name is Christopher R, I was calling to talk to a staff member at the Funeral Home about me and a few friends coming in to view a wake for our school project. We had been learning about the care of the dead at our school and we had a project assigned on visiting a funeral or a wake and just sit in the back for a little while and view things."
Receptionist: "Well okay, Ill transfer you to someone to see what I can do, hold on one second"
THEN LUCAS HOLDS FOR MORE THAN A SECOND
Receptionist: "Hi, Alright there is going to be a public viewing on Saturday. Would you like to get a pencil to write this information down. Saturday from Three pm to Four pm, you and your friends can come between those times"
Now the thing that always messes up things for teenagers in this day and age is lateness. I live very close to the Funeral Home and for me getting to the funeral home would only take about 5 minutes walking. The other members of the group however lived many different places throughout the city and the plan to get to the funeral home 15 minutes early didn't work. In fact getting to the funeral home on time didn't work. Getting their 15 minutes late didn't work for that matter. The earliest person was Jasper and then Lucas 10 minutes later. 15 minutes before 4pm Kevin arrived. Before Lucas arrived though I spoke to the lady who was the current receptionist. That conversation should have been recorded as well and went something like this.
CHRIS: Hi my name is Chris and I was told through phone call on Thursday that me and a few of my friends would be allowed to come to the funeral home and see how care of the dead was done. I called ahead of time and they said Saturday between 3 and 4 would be a good time to come.
RECEPTIONIST: Hi, well. What school do you go to?
CHRIS: School of the Future.
RECEPTIONIST: And what are you trying to do?
CHRIS: Well I was told it would be okay if we were to just sit in the back for a few minutes and observe how a funeral was and the way people react and respond to different things during the funeral. I was just wondering if this was still true and whether we would still be allowed to do this.
RECEPTIONIST: Well I'm not sure about that because usually the answer would be no for a question like that but because you said someone did tell you this I will call the Funeral Director and we can see what he thinks about it.
So we went into a waiting room that had one woman sitting their reading a magazine. The magazine was only choices between Oprah and Essence. We waited here for about fifteen minutes in that time Kevin showed up and everything was pure and clean. Their was a sound of a water fall. Kids walking in and out of the doors, dressed up with their parents who were also dressed up. There were a few people who were dressed up in formal African dresses and everyone was in black except for one kid who seemed like he was around 3 years old who was dressed up in white. The place was very nice, the music was perfect and their was just peace. Nothing making to much noise everyone speaking in a low voice. One minute before the actual service started came the the Funeral Director.
FD: Hey, what was the problem?
CHRIS: Well we called a few days ago and we talked to someone who said it would be alright if we were to come into the funeral home and attend a wake, for our school project. They told us it would be okay if we were to come between 3-4.
FD: Well I don't think that would be possible now because this is close to the time when the service is suppose to start and that would kind of be an invasion of privacy if we let you go in there with no relation to anyone in the family. Any other day however the wake or viewing is open to anyone who wants to come in for a little while and pay some respects to the dead but the time now is close to the actual service so I'm not sure if you should actually come in. If you come back another day you can do your project with someone else.
The funeral director was more delayed then Kevin was in this whole process because we were all there close to 3:30 and it took the funeral director about 20 minutes to come down stairs with the service starting in one minute. He was actually really nice though, when he came in he patted me on the head. I'm not sure how I felt about that. He explained it to us really well and shook our hands as we left. The project like the one before it took some kind of turn for the worse but at the same time it was probably more successful.
Here is the crappy 2 minute video filmed by jasper
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knI-nnK-Asg
Chris, I'm sorry that your project did not go very well. It was good of you to admit that it could have been more successful, and I enjoyed your detailed narrative of the various interactions at the funeral home. However, you could have analyzed the experiences you did have a bit more. For example, what do the magazine options in the home reveal about their expecations of who they will be serving? How did the behavior of the employees there compare to your expectations and what did the dialoge reveal about their goals in their daily work? The fact that the funeral director would not let you in to view the wake because it was an invasion of privacy was interesting to me; it was a unique idea that I had not before considered, yet it reveals that he was most concerned with the grieving family under his care.
ReplyDeleteChrissss nice post maaaan. I like how we both have narratives of our experience but they are different. I thought it was interesting to see how you thought about the funeral home and how people were acting etc etc. I also like how you included dialogue because even if I wasn't there, I feel like it makes it very descriptive and easy to picture. Even though the project didn't go as planned and we didn't have a video, you did a good job writing about it..
ReplyDeleteI liked that even though your original idea for the project didn't work out, you still got something out of the experience. Your descriptions of the funeral home were interesting, and although you didn't get to go to the wake, it still seems like you got something out of the experience.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite line was: "We waited here for about fifteen minutes in that time everything was pure and clean. There was a sound of a water fall."