Speaker 1: When you get to the end of your life, what
Speaker 1: do you want your last memory to be. Do you
Speaker 1: want it to be that you've just made a deal
Speaker 1: that provided you with billions of pounds that you're never
Speaker 1: going to be able to spend. Or do you want
Speaker 1: that to be the conversation that you had with somebody
Speaker 1: that you've barely met and you've made a significant difference
Speaker 1: in the life and it's forever changed.
Speaker 2: When we set out to make this show about how
Speaker 2: to Live Forever, we had no plans to grapple with
Speaker 2: death or grief. This show was supposed to be weird
Speaker 2: and funny and full of lightness. And then we started
Speaker 2: thinking about immortality and life extension and then talking to
Speaker 2: scientists and philosophers, and within a pretty short time, our
Speaker 2: little team looked at one another and said, Ah, I
Speaker 2: guess we're going to have to talk about death, because
Speaker 2: it's the flip side, the quiet part, that unavoidable elephant
Speaker 2: in the room. And so at some point we knew
Speaker 2: that confronting death was something we'd have to do, But
Speaker 2: weirdly it turned out to be one of the sweetest
Speaker 2: conversations all season. I'm Munga's particular This is Skyline.
Speaker 3: Drive how to Live Forever. So far on How.
Speaker 2: To Live Forever, we've bombarded you with Petrie dishes and cryptobros,
Speaker 2: cryogenics and organ sacks and even more stuff you're probably
Speaker 2: still trying to wrap your head around. But today I
Speaker 2: wanted to tell you about some of the brightest people
Speaker 2: I met guiding folks through a dark space and the
Speaker 2: international phenomenon known as death cafes. Death cafes are events
Speaker 2: where people gather without judgment or agenda to talk about death,
Speaker 2: and the organization is led by two extraordinary British women.
Speaker 1: I'm Jeles Baski. I'm one of the co founders of
Speaker 1: Death Cafe. I run Death Cafe as a volunteer and
Speaker 1: work as a doctor in the NHS.
Speaker 4: I'm Susan Barskih. You do work part time as a psychotherapist.
Speaker 4: I voluntarily work with Death Cafe, assisting jewels, with some
Speaker 4: admin and with some links to the media.
Speaker 2: And tell me what is your relationship with one another?
Speaker 1: Susan's my mum.
Speaker 2: It's pretty simple.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, So the founder of Death Cafe is my
Speaker 5: brother John.
Speaker 2: John Underwood was endlessly curious, a lifelong seeker who grew
Speaker 2: up in Chester, England. He studied politics, philosophy and economics
Speaker 2: at Oxford. He fell in love with Buddhism and even
Speaker 2: worked for a while out of Buddhist center in London.
Speaker 1: John was always very philosophical, always searching for meaning in
Speaker 1: his life. I think he's kind of felt that the
Speaker 1: root of all evil was the lack of time and
Speaker 1: energy that people apply to the idea of death and dying,
Speaker 1: like all based in consumerism and politics, and people are
Speaker 1: kind of grasping for all of these things that they're
Speaker 1: never going to achieve because they don't think is this
Speaker 1: really that important? And that was something that he strived
Speaker 1: to do every single day.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me a little bit more about the
Speaker 2: jin of the cafe, Well.
Speaker 4: My husband saw an article in a newspaper about a
Speaker 4: man called Bernard Critaz who was a Swiss sociologist and
Speaker 4: he had held things called cafe motel in bars in Switzerland.
Speaker 2: Creta's cafe mortels were informal salons where people were invited
Speaker 2: to talk about death. It was a purposefully no rule
Speaker 2: set up inviting all commerce, with the only plan being
Speaker 2: to talk as openly as possible about this taboo topic.
Speaker 2: His first was in two thousand and four, and eventually
Speaker 2: he held hundreds around bars in alpine towns like his.
Speaker 2: He even got to Paris in twenty ten, where a
Speaker 2: journalist wrote a piece about it for The Independent. After
Speaker 2: John caught wind, he connected with Kreta and attended his
Speaker 2: final death cafe in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Speaker 4: Berard Cretaz stud I hand my mantle over to you
Speaker 4: was a really lovely moment.
Speaker 3: Oh wow.
Speaker 2: And so how does he end up starting the cafes.
Speaker 4: It started in his kitchen in Hackney and East London,
Speaker 4: and he's got some friends together and some people that
Speaker 4: you knew. In September twenty eleven and I facilitated the
Speaker 4: first one.
Speaker 1: The first death cafe was a little bit different than
Speaker 1: death cafes look now, So there was a burning of
Speaker 1: effigies there. It was quite structured. There were sort of
Speaker 1: activities and whatnot. And then mum said to him John,
Speaker 1: stop just let people talk. Let there be some silence
Speaker 1: and some space for people to kind of just start
Speaker 1: to speak about the things they're important to them. And
Speaker 1: it was after that that John created the guidelines alongside
Speaker 1: my mum, which are very specific about what death cafes
Speaker 1: are and are not and how to run them?
Speaker 2: Can you walk me through a typical death cafe meeting today?
Speaker 4: Well, the thing is that it's always different. It depends
Speaker 4: on the people that go. Before it starts, I have
Speaker 4: music playing that is my own personal preference. And then
Speaker 4: people sit down at the appointed time, and I and
Speaker 4: always forget to tell them how long we're going to
Speaker 4: be there, which is an hour and a half. Please
Speaker 4: turn off your phone, Please be respectful to everybody's views,
Speaker 4: and can you tell us what's brought you here today?
Speaker 4: And that is literally what you do. And the conversation
Speaker 4: then flows from there.
Speaker 1: With some introduction about how death a cafe started, like
Speaker 1: it was started by John Jiels. Yeah, yeah, and then
Speaker 1: there will be in a reiteration a little bit of
Speaker 1: the guidelines. Death cafes are always free. We only ask
Speaker 1: for donations which pay for costs. We're not going to
Speaker 1: lead anybody to a course of action or conclusion. This
Speaker 1: is literally just no topics. Everybody can speak about whatever
Speaker 1: they'd like to speak about. You shouldn't run a death
Speaker 1: cafe in order to promote your product or your service. Hi,
Speaker 1: I don't actually say any of you should?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 4: Plus yeah, Well I have recently started running a regular
Speaker 4: series of death cafes, which I've never done before, And
Speaker 4: what I really love is how much closeness and intimacy
Speaker 4: can develop in the hour and a half that you
Speaker 4: speak with these strangers. And I'm never probably going to
Speaker 4: see most of them again, and it's incredible that you
Speaker 4: need to experience it to understand. But it never ceases
Speaker 4: to amaze me how such a simple thing can bring
Speaker 4: such closeness between people.
Speaker 2: And I hear that there's cake a piece events. Why
Speaker 2: the cake?
Speaker 1: There's always cake, so Joan described it as having kind
Speaker 1: of like a midnight feast. But it's a bit kind
Speaker 1: of naughty talking about something that's so to do whilst
Speaker 1: having delicious cake and cups of tea, because their ritual
Speaker 1: of eating is nourishing and therefore kind of life prolonging.
Speaker 4: Always make okay, that's part of my preparation. I've done
Speaker 4: a ginger and spice treakle cake and lemon drizzle cake,
Speaker 4: chocolate cake. I'm wondering about coffee and walnut, but I
Speaker 4: don't know whether that's a bit niche. I don't know
Speaker 4: what you think me.
Speaker 2: I shouldn't have a pinion of the vial.
Speaker 4: There is a belief that it's going to be very
Speaker 4: sad and mournful going to a death cafe, but certainly
Speaker 4: the one I did last week, people laughed a lot.
Speaker 4: It was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2: Do you feel like when people walk out of these
Speaker 2: cafes that they have a renewed spirit of life? Do
Speaker 2: they seem lighter? Like? What's the feeling of the person
Speaker 2: that walks out of these places versus the person who
Speaker 2: comes in?
Speaker 4: I think the sharing makes it you feel lighter. And
Speaker 4: it's like I was thinking about after a therapy session,
Speaker 4: if I've done a reasonable job, people walk out feeling better.
Speaker 4: It's almost like their face. You know, people's faces can
Speaker 4: be worried and creased, and then when they relax, their
Speaker 4: faces look like the bean I and I think they
Speaker 4: look like that when they come out of a death cafe.
Speaker 2: So tell me, like, are these clubs? Are they for grief?
Speaker 2: Why exactly do people join?
Speaker 4: Well, they've joined for a variety of reasons. Curiosity is
Speaker 4: one of them, and another one is the fact that
Speaker 4: it's not always acceptable in our culture to be talking
Speaker 4: about death and dying, and people want to feel free
Speaker 4: to be able to do that. It's not just about grief.
Speaker 4: Griefs often comes up in the conversation, and we.
Speaker 1: Actually discourage people who are what we call in the
Speaker 1: white hot heat of grief from attending the cafes just
Speaker 1: because there are places that are much better for providing
Speaker 1: grief support than death cafes are. Grief is always going
Speaker 1: to make an appearance, I think, because the majority of
Speaker 1: people who are thinking about death and dying have had
Speaker 1: an experience in their lives which is directly associated. But
Speaker 1: having said that, you've also got people who attend who
Speaker 1: have never had that experience, and you know, had thanatophobia
Speaker 1: or fear of death, and this kind of is almost
Speaker 1: like an exposure therapy to provide them with an opportunity
Speaker 1: to make that first journey into maybe coming to terms
Speaker 1: with it.
Speaker 2: It was just a matter of time before our conversation
Speaker 2: came around to grief, partially because grief is at the
Speaker 2: heart of their story and why Susan and Jules continue
Speaker 2: to run Death Cafe International. Jules is also a physician
Speaker 2: and she was pregnant with her second child during our conversation.
Speaker 5: You know, John was doing this full time and it
Speaker 5: was his baby, whereas you know I'm kind of balancing
Speaker 5: this alongside my own family life and you.
Speaker 1: Know, working in a job that takes quite a lot
Speaker 1: of from me.
Speaker 2: John Underwood died in twenty seventeen, six years after that
Speaker 2: first death cafe in his kitchen and Hackney.
Speaker 3: He was just forty four.
Speaker 2: When we come back from a quick break, we'll hear
Speaker 2: more about his life and how facing his own death
Speaker 2: helped others, including his own family, deal with the measurable loss.
Speaker 1: John had been feeling unwell for a couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: assuming it was a kind of flu bug, and then
Speaker 1: he collect appsed very suddenly after taking his children to
Speaker 1: a swimming class. So we all rushed over to the
Speaker 1: hospital where he was and we were with him whilst
Speaker 1: he was on life support. He'd had a brain hemorrhage
Speaker 1: as a result of a rare form of leukemia called
Speaker 1: acute promyolytticul leukemia, which would have been treatable if they'd
Speaker 1: discovered the source of the bleeding before it had caused
Speaker 1: catastrophic damage by resort of a stroke. So my mum
Speaker 1: and I were with John, and I think a lot
Speaker 1: of it was for me anyway, knowing what John would
Speaker 1: have been wanting at that point, and then because of
Speaker 1: Death Cafe, he'd already created this vast network of people
Speaker 1: who knew about him and had been on the front
Speaker 1: cover of the New York Times and had been in
Speaker 1: the Huffington Post. You know, he was a public figure.
Speaker 2: John's wife Donna, announced his passing in a blog post
Speaker 2: on the Death Cafe website. As you all know, the
Speaker 2: objective of death Cafe is helping us all make the
Speaker 2: most of our finite lives with shocking poignancy. On Sunday,
Speaker 2: the twenty fifth of June, we experienced the finiteeness of
Speaker 2: life at its most brutal, and more specifically, the finiteness
Speaker 2: of the life of John Underwood, founder of Death Cafe,
Speaker 2: dad to two truly amazing children, and my husband.
Speaker 3: He was forty four.
Speaker 2: What was it like to lose him? But also to
Speaker 2: know that he was ready or thinking about his death
Speaker 2: in a way that a lot of people don't or
Speaker 2: don't make time for.
Speaker 1: There was some comfort for me that he had discussed
Speaker 1: the fact that, you know, we don't know how long
Speaker 1: we're going to be here. This could be the last
Speaker 1: time that you see somebody, or you get to hold
Speaker 1: that person dealing with his legacy. Making sure that Death
Speaker 1: Cafe was being run gave an opportunity to focus on something.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it necessarily helped with grief because
Speaker 1: it was so sudden and he was so very important
Speaker 1: to all of us, but it provided me with an
Speaker 1: outlet from the energy that was kind of coming from
Speaker 1: the situation.
Speaker 4: Working on Death Cafe maintains a sort of closeness with
Speaker 4: him that I might not feel otherwise. The fact that
Speaker 4: he started this and we're carrying it on is a
Speaker 4: really a good feeling.
Speaker 2: What's it been like to carry on some of his
Speaker 2: legacy for you?
Speaker 1: When I'm doing this work, I feel like I'm kind
Speaker 1: of embodying a part of him that still exists a
Speaker 1: lot of the replies that I send to people are
Speaker 1: based on interactions that he's had with them in the past.
Speaker 1: You know, I use his email accounts, so I'm looking
Speaker 1: at like, what's the history with this person? What would
Speaker 1: John have said about this particular difficult thing that's appearing.
Speaker 1: But then I think there's also an element of is
Speaker 1: this what's required in the world because things have changed,
Speaker 1: Like he wasn't here through COVID and the kind of
Speaker 1: political and rest that's happening across the world at the moment.
Speaker 1: You know, would this have made a difference to the
Speaker 1: decisions that he would have made.
Speaker 2: You've described John as a seeker, and you've also described
Speaker 2: him as someone who felt a greater calling to leave
Speaker 2: a big job to take on what to him was
Speaker 2: a more important job. And you've also described him in
Speaker 2: this shade of almost like naughtiness, this fun and this
Speaker 2: convivial person. Can you describe who John was to you
Speaker 2: and who he was in the family.
Speaker 1: He would sit up for hours having one on one
Speaker 1: conversations with somebody about his view on what they were
Speaker 1: telling him about and provide some quae kind of judgmental
Speaker 1: views sometimes, but I think, you know, it kind of
Speaker 1: came from a place of wisdom and experience, And I
Speaker 1: think there are some people who just have this kind
Speaker 1: of special quality about them that you can't necessarily describe,
Speaker 1: but it's kind of like a presence and a thoughtfulness
Speaker 1: that you're just kind of born with.
Speaker 2: That.
Speaker 1: In addition to that, he was also like incredibly silly
Speaker 1: and a joker, and you know, just made people laugh
Speaker 1: and said daft things a lot. He was a very
Speaker 1: loving son, or was very good at listening. If you
Speaker 1: wanted to think something over it was a good person
Speaker 1: to phone and and say this is happening, what you think?
Speaker 1: And just being around him was just brilliant. He was
Speaker 1: a great dad as well, a really good dad.
Speaker 2: Was he an optimist? No? In your minds, what is
Speaker 2: the sort of ultimate goal for this movement? And would
Speaker 2: even consider it a movement?
Speaker 1: We describe it as a death cafe movement. I think
Speaker 1: that it's taken off so much that describing it as
Speaker 1: something less would kind of be indervaluing it. And it's
Speaker 1: made quite a significant change. You know. We have people
Speaker 1: who are quite prevalent in the death and dying industry
Speaker 1: who've said how influential John and death Cafe has been
Speaker 1: to them.
Speaker 2: I was doing some reporting in San Francisco, which is
Speaker 2: obviously a land now of bitcoin and billionaires and people
Speaker 2: who have sort of worked around certain rules to their advantage.
Speaker 2: And I think that in Silicon Valley there are these
Speaker 2: real deep philosophical questions about death, but it's turned from
Speaker 2: what might have been about accepting death to not accept it.
Speaker 2: Death right like that you should be prolonging your life
Speaker 2: as long as possible. That there are ways to upload
Speaker 2: your consciousness. That we think talking about death gives our
Speaker 2: life meaning, when in fact that's just because that was
Speaker 2: the limit that we previously had. And I'm curious, like, one,
Speaker 2: have you encounter these spaces which seem to be growing
Speaker 2: in the US, And two, like, what do you think
Speaker 2: about that counter weight to what I think is like
Speaker 2: the really beautiful work you're doing at Death Cafe.
Speaker 1: So there's there's people like Brian Johnson, right, who are
Speaker 1: trying to live for as long as possible, and they're
Speaker 1: dedicating their life to extension of their physiological abilities. I
Speaker 1: can kind of see the appeal of doing that. You know,
Speaker 1: if you're enjoying your life and you want to make
Speaker 1: the most of it, you want to try and get
Speaker 1: as much as you can. But then you're also downplaying
Speaker 1: every single other element of your existence for the pursuit
Speaker 1: of elongation, which kind of seems a bit reductive, I suppose.
Speaker 1: So are we focusing so much on life extension to
Speaker 1: the point where we can't actually focus on the interactions
Speaker 1: that we have every day with our families and the
Speaker 1: people we work with and the people that we see
Speaker 1: in the street, You know, are those maybe the more
Speaker 1: important parts of our existence. There's an interesting Buddhist lesson
Speaker 1: about this bowl of ice cream. You're really craving this
Speaker 1: like beautiful bowl of ice cream. You start eating it
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh, this is fantastic. It's huge, and
Speaker 1: you keep on eating it, and then about halfway through
Speaker 1: you're thinking, oh, this is the worst thing I've ever done.
Speaker 1: You know, I feel terrible. I'm sick and bloated, my
Speaker 1: face is sticky, and you know, you think that this
Speaker 1: ice cream is going to be everything you ever wanted,
Speaker 1: and it turns out that actually it's not, because never
Speaker 1: ending ice cream is never going to be everything that
Speaker 1: you want it to be.
Speaker 4: I really have no desire to live forever. I'm glad
Speaker 4: that my life is finite, and as I get older,
Speaker 4: older and my body becomes less comfortable place to be in,
Speaker 4: it's only going to get worse. I don't relish the
Speaker 4: idea of living forever.
Speaker 1: There's a bit of give and take with the whole thing,
Speaker 1: Like we want to be living the longest life possible
Speaker 1: in the best health that we can achieve, and so
Speaker 1: I can understand people making these steps to make their
Speaker 1: bodies a little bit more sustainable, So you might start
Speaker 1: vitamins and supplements and you might think, oh, I know
Speaker 1: that my joints are going to get worse if I
Speaker 1: don't exercise, so I'm going to do that. And you
Speaker 1: integrate these things into your life because you know it's
Speaker 1: going to bring you an element of happiness. You're going
Speaker 1: to be around your loved ones for longer. So it's
Speaker 1: a bit of a balance. You know, John was far
Speaker 1: too young for a person to lose their life. And yes,
Speaker 1: you can achieve a lot, and you can have an
Speaker 1: incredibly meaningful existence, but death is terrible at the end
Speaker 1: of the day.
Speaker 4: Like for the people that are left it's terrible.
Speaker 1: I think there's a don't you know, there's the experience
Speaker 1: of the person themselves goes through when they're dying. It's
Speaker 1: an incredibly painful experience. They have to deal with the
Speaker 1: emotions with their family members as well. So I don't
Speaker 1: think it's just the people that are left behind. And
Speaker 1: I suppose when you work with death and dying in
Speaker 1: the way that we do, you think about death in
Speaker 1: quite a different way, and you know you've got to
Speaker 1: start somewhere, right. You can do nothing, or you can
Speaker 1: try to change the kind of general populace from the
Speaker 1: ground up. And if you can just make these small
Speaker 1: moments in people's lives a little bit better or a
Speaker 1: little bit more thoughtful, if that's the best you're going
Speaker 1: to do, at least you've done something.
Speaker 2: As we've wrapped up our conversation, my mind kept going
Speaker 2: back to the semester I spend to bed and the
Speaker 2: sky burials I'd witnessed there this ritual that reminds mourners
Speaker 2: of the impermanence of life. Knowing that John was a
Speaker 2: devoted Buddhist, I wondered if at the core, death cafes
Speaker 2: perform a similar rule.
Speaker 3: What is your goal for.
Speaker 2: Someone who comes to a death cafe beyond sort of
Speaker 2: walking out and feeling lighter, Like, do you think they
Speaker 2: should all wake up every morning and consider the fact
Speaker 2: that they might die today or that their life is impermanent.
Speaker 1: I think knowing that it's had the tiniest impact on
Speaker 1: someone's life, that they kind of that they do think
Speaker 1: about death and dying. For me, it's made my interactions
Speaker 1: with people much more meaningful because I think, is this
Speaker 1: the last time that this person is ever going to
Speaker 1: speak to anybody else? And If that's the case, is
Speaker 1: that the kind of taste in your mouth that you
Speaker 1: want to leave them with?
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for listening. That is it for
Speaker 2: the bonus episodes of this season of Skyline Drive. I
Speaker 2: would like to thank Jules Barski and Susan Barski Reid
Speaker 2: for taking the time to share their story and John's.
Speaker 2: If you'd like to learn more about the death Cafe movement,
Speaker 2: please go to Deathcafe dot com. There might be one
Speaker 2: near you, and if not, maybe you'd like to start one.
Speaker 2: We'll also put a link in the show notes. If
Speaker 2: you liked this series, please please tell a friend and
Speaker 2: it really does help if you rate and review, so
Speaker 2: of course we would be appreciative for that too. And
Speaker 2: if you didn't know already, making this show has been
Speaker 2: such a joy.
Speaker 3: I've loved getting to learn and share with all of you.
Speaker 2: So if you want to ask a question, share a story,
Speaker 2: or just get in touch, do not hesitate to reach out.
Speaker 2: You can reach me at insta at M particular and
Speaker 2: hopefully we'll get to do a season three in the
Speaker 2: not so distant This interview was produced by the wonderful
Speaker 2: Lizzie Jacobs. Additional production and research by Mary Philip Sandy.
Speaker 2: Thanks as always to our editor Mark Latto, who told
Speaker 2: me the series was going to be about depth before
Speaker 2: I was ready to admit it. This episode was mixed
Speaker 2: by my good pal Dylan Fagan, who's over there in
Speaker 2: the booth eating a giant slice of cake. Thank you
Speaker 2: so much for listening.