![]() ![]() It just came so close to these feelings, these women who were almost wailing, who were singing about their brother who was no longer there. It’s an old song, but I thought they were singing it only for him. He meant everything to me.” At that moment I didn’t know this was a known song. This one is called “I Had a Brother in Arms” and they sing it in their high-pitched voices and I can still recall the sound of them singing, “I had a brother in arms, I had a brother and he died. ![]() I looked it up later and there’s these songs that are related to these ceremonies when people die in Suriname, the Dede Osu. And then his sisters, they stood around the grave, around the coffin, and they started to sing a song. I think for me the most significant moment of this funeral was there were all these people, all these family members that I didn’t know. So I went to the funeral and they said, “Your sisters are in there.” “Sisters? I didn't know I had any.” Which is again one of those typical situations where we have siblings we don’t know. “So I had missed the first tradition, which is you stay and there’s a wake in the house of the person who died. It says their yorka is in the next plane and their kra remains in our rituals. Says they had stretched here long before I arrived. It says they were nothing new, that dreams like those aren’t built for us, but as before, they stand on our backs and crumble at our doors. It tells tales of utopian dreams built in brutalism. This tree, the one that saw everything, still stands despite the weight of all it knows. But I see this image and know this one speaks. They were more an aesthetic feature of my urban landscape. I didn’t grow up hugging them or even climbing them. I’ve never felt the pull some others do to trees. Quinsy talks of The Tree That Saw Everything as a monument, both in the significance given it by the survivors and community of Bijlmer, but also in the active support needed to care for the tree and by proxy the memories of those who imbue it with meaning. While visiting Bijlmer, Julianknxx spoke to artist, activist and trouble shooter of all kinds, Quinsy Gario. ![]()
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