body viewing

"She was so tiny in there," says Mrs D. She's still wearing her faded black T-shirt from the funeral. It's baggy and shapeless from many, many funerals.

"So tiny," she repeats. "Shame, she had a brain cancer. And that M, you know? She was crying and crying. She is very sick, that woman."

Body-viewing is an obligatory part of Shona funerals. Everyone files past the open coffin slowly and then the women discuss the state of the deceased afterwards. I guess it's part of the closure thing but I find it hard. I was relieved at Susan Tsvangirai's funeral when a smartly-dressed Shona woman slipped out of the church side-door when I did. "I don't like the body viewing," she said, silver bracelets jangling as we waited by the jam of government Pajeros and Mercs outside. "And my husband is Morgan's uncle."

In this case, it was the wife of a town physician who'd died of a brain tumour. The funeral was at the Anglican cathedral. I'd seen the Mother's Union members in their blue and white uniforms hurrying there on my way home from the school run that morning. "The church was full," Mrs D says with satisfaction. In fact, the funeral seems to have cheered her up, made her forget her arthritic legs for a while.

"Here," she says. "I've cooked some sweet potatoes. You haven't got power, have you?" And she hands me a warm plastic bag.