Memorial Service in Yale

The following is an account from Mr. Huzir, of Pierre's memorial service held in Yale.

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Tuesday 8.20pm US time:

Dear friends,

I have just returned from Pierre's memorial service. Claire has gone to tapau some rice and taufu to add to the dinner she cooked earlier. Lay Hoon and Val are coming over, as well as Pebble, Michel and Adeline as soon as they go over to Peirre's place to tie up some things there.

Pebble has really been accepted by the Salim family; they are all being so kind to her and asked her if she wants to come back with them to Jakarta. She is bonding with Michel and Adeline. When you look at Adeline, who is very pretty, you realise how good looking Pierre really was. He was so handsome in the big photo at the theatre tonight at the Memorial service - the one in his black NUS polo shirt.

It was a cold and slightly wet day. At 5pm it was dusk, almost dark. Winter is upon us. People were streaming into the University Theatre, a handsome 1930s proscenium stage with dark wood and velvert chairs and red velvet curtains, a bit like a cross between Victoria Theatre and the old Drama Centre, but more ornate. The curtains were drawn, and flowers were on the lip of the stage. In front was a riser with a lectern on it and the big picture of Pierre next to it. It was beautifully lit.

House Left was the coffin, the upper half of which was open. Pierre looked very good. Pebble, God bless her, had picked out the most expensive casket and Dr. Salim had agreed, and by golly it was a beautiful piece of cabinetry.

Claire, Lay Hoon, and Val brought a bouquet to put into the coffin on behalf of the Singapore theatre community. It was bright and lovely -- white and yellow lillies and purple things that Val suspects were irises but Claire disputes. Also got green something flower. Anyway very nice leh, wrapped in his favourite colour green paper.

House Right was a piano and seat for a cellist. In the Processional, as people lined up in the central aisle to file past the coffin and pay their respects, a young cellist played the Prelude of Bach's Cello Suite No.2 in D Minor.

The family and Pebble, who had been in James' office, came in last and everybody rose. There were about 400 people there. The stalls were full and there were people in the balcony too.

James welcomed everyone and gave a speech about faith and art and Pierre. I confess I couldn't really take it in. The feelings were too powerful. (Later, I asked if we could get the soft copy of all the speeches tonight and they're trying to arrange that. I will send them when I get them.) His voice was even and calm, only breaking
uncontrollably towards the end.

The Reverend Robert Beloin, the Catholic Chaplain of Yale University, then read the 23rd Psalm.

The cellist played the Sarabande from the same Bach suite.

I got up to speak. I was teary and fragile. I had to force myself to breathe and take it very slowly, making my way through the text I prepared last night. Here it is. I apologise if I left anyone out or made any mistakes:

"It's an honour and a terrible duty to talk of Pierre-André Salim's life in Singapore, to speak on behalf of the hundreds of friends he has on the other side of this Earth.

"In Singapore, Pierre was loved, and we love Pierre still, more fiercely than ever. We hold him close to us even as we are terrified by his loss. The theatre community and his old friends from the National University of Singapore are united both in their pain and in the endless embrace of memories sweet and fine.

"At university, Pierre was a celebrity in his residential college, Kent Ridge Hall, full of good cheer and eccentric charm. He was a joiner, and a doer, the man you wanted on your committee if you wanted your committee to get things done. He was the linchpin of the Hall plays. He was the Stage Manager, the Rag Engineer, the Kent Ridge JCRC Finance Secretary. He played softball. And he flew the flag for what he was involved in: he wore the t-shirts, and he wore the jackets. He loved his university, and they loved him back.

"In 2002, in his final year, doing crew at the University Cultural Centre, he worked on a multi-play event by the company I'm with, Checkpoint Theatre. One of the plays was my political satire, Atomic Jaya. He took a liking to that show, and kept imitating all the different characters during the lighting focus. His great strengths as an actor, in all candour, were… his good cheer and eccentric charm.

"But I am proud that my play was one of the reasons he decided to go into theatre professionally, and to stay in Singapore. He asked Checkpoint to hire him so that he could remain in the country and get his Permanent Residence. We did, and he did, and he worked on our shows, and we came to love him for the same reasons you loved him here at Yale.

"He was smarter than us, and more passionate, harder working yet hugely humble. He had a quiet determination to learn, to improve himself, not for the simple sake of his own career, but for the sake of improving the artistic community as a whole. Quite rapidly, Pierre essentially began to own the entire Singapore theatre scene. He worked professionally on at least 46 productions that I know of before coming to Yale. He did every job, for every company, and he did every job well. He was a production manager, a stage manager, a production stage manager, lighting designer, lighting operator, follow-spot operator, video operator, and something called a chief venue electric.

"He worked for everybody, not because he was desperate, but because everybody was desperate for him and his incredible competence, and his amazing attitude: Singapore Lyric Opera, Dramabox, The Substation, Wild Rice, The Arts House, Gateway Entertainment, Centre Stage, the LaSalle-SIA Repertory Dance Company, the NUS Dance Ensemble, the NUS Centre for the Arts, Dream Academy, Esplanade Theatres on the Bay, the Theatre Training and Research Programme, Toy Factory Theatre. He did a lot of work, and he did big jobs. With Checkpoint, he was Production Manager of Singapore Arts Festival commissions that toured to Hong Kong, and a play that went to Kuala Lumpur. With Wild Rice, he did ten shows, and for the team there, from the Artistic Director to every member of the production team past and present, his loss is unbearable. He loved Singapore theatre, and they loved him back. Their tributes have flooded in over the last two days. I invite you to read them later in the booklet that Yale has prepared.

"He loved theatre so much. Accompanying his brother to Pierre's apartment yesterday on Chapel Street, my heart broke when I saw the bundles of backstage passes hanging on hooks on the wall, souvenirs of every show he's ever done, from the Singapore Arts Festival to the Esplanade to international tours, two or three dozen of them. He loved our world, the insane life we lead as theatre practitioners. Yet ultimately, theatre-making for him was a joyous thing, and he was not only joyful in the making of it, but he brought joy to all he made it with. Even in his seriousness he was light; in his discipline he was free.

"Pierre loved his family. Dr. Salim, he spoke of you often to his friends, with such love and pride in your achievements in medicine. He was a naughty child, he said, and you were strict with him, but that made him the man that he was, quiet and orderly but full of exuberant kindness and love for the world. One day when my wife was scolding me a little for buying so many books, Pierre said, 'That's just like my Dad, he always collects books, non-stop. My mother has just gotten used to it.' Thank you. Mrs. Salim, Pierre said you knew him best, Ibu; he knew what sacrifices you made to be with him in France, and he understood the depths of a mother's love. He was a very good boy. Michel, he used to say, 'My brother is a genius. He is so much smarter than me.' He worried about you, almost as though he were the elder. He wanted you to succeed, to take your place in the world as the genius that you are. Adeline, you were his adored baby sister; two weeks ago he showed my wife and I pictures of you, full of pride at you studying medicine, following in your father's footsteps. You should all be very proud of him. We respected him, and we loved him, in Singapore, and here in New Haven.

"We cannot speak of Pierre without speaking of the woman he has loved for the last year and a half. Pebble Tan is a stage manager from Singapore, a sophomore at Carnegie Mellon, and someone my wife and I have known since 2002. She is here today; she was supposed to visit Pierre for Thanksgiving; she was supposed to go back to Jakarta for Christmas to meet Dr. and Mrs. Salim for the first time. Pebble was Pierre's first girlfriend. He'd never wanted to be in a relationship before, because, he said, if you are not serious, then why bother? When he told me about Pebble, in August, I asked him if they were serious, and he said, with his usual manner, 'We are serious.' Pebble tells me he was always kind to her, and had time to listen to her problems and give her advice, even after an exhausting day of work at Yale. He left a tulip outside her office door at 8am one day so that she would find it. He sent her flowers when she was on tour. He was always encouraging her to achieve her potential. She wants you to know that she feels honoured to have been in his life, to have made him happy, and to have had him make her so very happy.

"But he has gone. He cannot be retrieved. Can we find him in the trivia of his life? His favourite colour was green. Eric Cantona was his hero, and if you don't know who Eric Cantona is, now is a good time to learn. His drink was Bacardi and Coke, or latterly, Southern Comfort; even a saint is allowed bad taste in one area. His favourite food was pan-fried Shanghainese dumplings, which Pebble made for him on his birthday. His favourite song was 'Usah Kau Lara Sendiri', by Katon Bagaskara and Ruth Sahanya. It's an Indonesian song that meant, to him, don't let go.

"We won't let you go, Pierre, we won't ever let go of you, unless and until you go to a better place than this world; in which case, go with God, and go with our thanks for the gift of your life."

I slowly went back to my seat. Bronislaw (Ben) Sammler, the Professor of Technical Design and Production, the head of Pierre's program got up to speak. He is in his late 60s and was very affected by Pierre's death. On Sunday night he had told me that Pierre was one of the best students he ever had. He spoke simply and movingly. Again, I couldn't really listen. I found myself wracked with silent sobs.

Next, one of Pierre's second-year TDMP classmates, Tom Delgado, got up. He said that before every class he would always count to ten, because there were ten of them in their program and he wanted to make sure everyone was there. Now, he said, even with Pierre's death, he still thinks there are ten, and on graduation, they will still be
thinking of themselves as ten. They all loved and respected Pierre. By the time he was finished speaking, you could hear the whole theatre crying.

Michel Salim got up to speak. He sounds like Pierre, but even more French, and even more intellectual. His was a beautiful speech. He read Caius Catullus' poem On the Burial of his Brother. Our hearts, which have broken so many times in last few days, broke again.

Sharon Kugler, the Yale University Chaplain, delivered a closing prayer. The casket was closed and then the members of Pierre's class bore it out to the waiting hearse to the strains of the recessional. Everyone was sobbing.

Later, we all went down to the basement, to the Experimental Theatre, for the reception. A row of tealights lined the stage. On tables and stools of different heights were arranged pictures of Pierre; handsome, with a cast, working, sleeping. What a beautiful soul.

The booklets with your tributes were taken by everyone. Many, looking at it, said, "this is amazing." Thank you, all of you, for showing the Yale people how we celebrate each other and how we are a family.

Okay, darlings, I have to makan now. Claire has come back. In the end she went to York Noodle House to order Spicy Basil Wok Noodle. This was one of Pierre's favourite hangouts. He told us he would go there once a week because he had a class that finished at lunchtime nearby. Claire said she went in and ordered the food and the waitress said, "I'm sorry about Pierre." She was Indonesian. "He used to order this all the time," she said.

"I know," said Claire.

She brought her the food: "It's on the house."

We'll eat it and think of you, Pierre. We love you and miss you.

Love,

Huzir

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