WE never know when we will have our curtain call.
It’s a final performance in life that many of us want to postpone as much as possible even as we abuse our bodies.
We dine on cholesterol, sugar and salt; mainline caffeine-spiked drinks into our system; overtax our nerves with too much work and little fun, or vice versa; and sleep only four hours after a night of tweeting, “facebooking,” chatting, computer gaming and other addictive pursuits that zap our good senses.
“It’s the last thing I will do,” my uncle Gustav told me one morning. “People are afraid to call a spade, a spade when it comes to death—There, I’ve said it.”
The word is taboo especially when spoken over scrambled eggs (mixed with a little kamunggay leaves), spicy sausage, fried rice, and hot chocolate.
My Tita Blitte told me death is a tasteless topic especially for breakfast, but it’s only because we have made ourselves think of it that way.
She likes to stress on the words “during my time,” which means in the 1920s, as in: “Ober, during my time we did not discuss death openly. I mean we distanced ourselves from the Specter as if doing so would assure our immortality. We talked about it only when a dear one passed away, and then it wasn’t even about death itself and its place in our life.”
My uncle said, “It’s always about the value of the person who has left us. But have you never wondered about last meals?”
There’s a story about last meals. A man on death row was asked what he wanted for his last menu. He said didn’t want to eat. The jail guard suggested flan, ice cream, lechon, humba, fruit salad, adobo, fried chicken, chicharon and dinugoan. The condemned man looked distressed and told the guard: “I can’t eat those. I have diabetes, hypertension and an enlarged heart.”
If you were to know when you would die, what would your last meal be? There are famous people whose last meals we now know, some of which are surprising.
Celestial meals. The holiest of all last meals was partaken by Jesus with his disciples. It took place during the Passover, and so the table was laden with unleavened bread, lamb served with bitter herbs, and wine. Buddha’s last meal was sukaramaddava, which some sources translate as truffles or mushrooms.
Titanic course. The doomed RMS Titanic had set a 10-course meal for the first-class passengers. The menu reads like President Gloria’s dinner in New York: hors d’oeuvres of oysters, poached salmon with mousseline sauce, pate de foie gras and celery, consommé Olga and cream of barley, lamb with mint sauce, roast duckling with apple sauce, to name a few. Little is said about what the second- and third-class passengers ate. In the end, it didn’t matter. Death is an equalizer.
Power lunch. Men of power and wisdom made that journey to the Great Beyond on a full stomach, not knowing it would be their last meal.
Mahatma Gandhi had a modest meal before he was shot and killed on the way to a prayer meeting in 1948. He had goat’s milk, vegetables, oranges, ginger mixed with sour lemon, clarified butter and aloe.
President John F. Kennedy took breakfast at his hotel in Fort Worth, Texas, before flying on to Dallas just hours before his assassination in 1963. He had soft-boiled eggs, bacon, toast with marmalade, orange juice, and coffee.
Legendary fare. According to legend, Cleopatra ate figs before she died by an asp’s bite, according to legend. Japanese kabuki actor, Mitsugoro Bando VIII, died after eating fugu or buriring.
Celebrity bits. The template for sex appeal Marilyn Monroe had an un-sexy last meal before she died: guacamole and spicy meatballs at a Mexican buffet. Pianist Liberace had an unmusical last meal of cream of wheat with half-and-half and brown sugar.
And what was Julia Child’s actual last supper? The American chef, author and television personality had a humble bowl of French onion soup.