ROBERTA JEAN MAUNDERS

Condolences & Memories (1 entries)

• I was thinking of Roberta today (Easter Monday 2012, 7 years and more after her passing). I was fortunate enough to have worked with this remarkable woman at the Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg when I was training in Geriatric Medicine. Roberta evinced deep love for The Other, with complete acceptance, and with quiet determination to advocate for every one of our patients/clients (she was the Social Worker on our unit). When Roberta spoke, (in a still, small voice) everyone hearkened to her wise counsel, opinions, and advice. One particular instance has stayed with me to this day. A frail elderly man, Mr. S., born in China in the 1890s, had been admitted to the Geriatrics unit (D5 in the old building) with end-stage disease. He had come to Canada under the stringent and exclusionary laws that many immigrant Chinese men had to endure - and it meant having to leave his family behind in China. Canada had not been particularly kind to him, yet he had made a life for himself despite these privations, and he had supported his family from afar. I do not believe that he was literate, and he really could not converse in English. He had lived the latter part of his life in Chinatown doing menial work but had scrimped and saved for one reason in particular: so that he could return to China to be buried and reunited with his people, if no opportunity had arisen for him to return there in his lifetime. In 1981 it was still very challenging to travel to China from Canada, politically- and otherwise. Mr S. had no one to travel with him, and he was plainly too ill in any event. He made it clear to Roberta (through the assistance of translators) that it was his dying wish that he be reunited with his ancestors in his home village. Needless to say, Roberta saw to it - - personally. Her steadfastness, her advocacy on behalf of those less-fortunate, her fortitude and her great spirit led to her accompanying Mr. S's remains to Southern China, where his remains were interred, just as he had wished. I learned a lot about rectitude and selfless service from Roberta, a woman from whom silence was golden, and whose every word was thoughtful and considered. She was a holy woman held in the highest regard by one and all. May her memory be as for a continuing blessing to those who knew and loved her. - Posted by: David Brook (co-worker 1980-1982) on: Apr 09, 2012