Ese Wor Sokun Tong.        (  omusono owner )

Uren Kekechiw

This is a Chuukese Catholic hymn that I got introduced to as a child growing up. This is just a piece of my history living the island life and with my matrilineal grandparents who were strong Catholics. 

I with my older half siblings, cousins and friends would sing along with our grandma as she likes to sing these songs in the morning. I had no choice because I was her only room mate as I was tasked to look after her and her pets which I hated it at first. My grandpa was tucked away alone in his own small house near our main house and oh boy they were both morning persons. He was in his 80s and unable to walk but he would just shout for food in the morning and my grandma with her hymns in her shaky but still very good voice singing high notes and all. This was my daily torture until it became a habit for me to pretty much wake up early and sing like a bird. 

This one is especially stuck with me because it was her favorite. It was sung at almost every Catholic funeral on the island including my grandfather’s. It is a song for funerals but to us as kids, it was one of the very few songs we knew at the time so of course we’d sing it all the time even as we marched down the road to go swimming, fishing on Sambas bridge, pick our breadfruits or collect firewoods. 

My grandma in her last days had lost her good voice so I started helping sing her favorite songs until she kept repeating this one hymn because it describes the process of a dying person in the while being circled by loved ones (clans and relatives as the song says). 

At her funeral, she missed her last kiss from me because I was heavily sleeping after staying up all night just mingling with cousins and friends. I suddenly woke up to the roaring sound of this hymn as the crowd sang beautifully to her when they buried her. I peaked through the window and just thought that it was very fitting. 

I dropped a few silent tears in realizing that my roommate/grandma is finally put to rest. May she rest in peace.

Ri o' ri o' juufon o' amani

Priscilla Sappa Hainrick

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Jancyta Mazawa

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YSYPWO Nemin 🎵❤️🖤

Lai&Jay

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