Runta/New America Media, Profile, Mohamud Yussuf , Posted: Oct 02, 2011

Photo: Omar Abatiyow Mohamed, 84.

SEATTLE, Wash.-- Before the civil war, everything was normal in Somalia and people there lived peacefully. Few thought that some day many Somalis would be neighbors in some of the larger American cities, including Seattle, where about to 30,000 of them currently live. Most of them came to the United States as refugees, thanks to generous U.S. policies.

One of those who ended up here was Omar Abatiyow Mohamed, now 84, known throughout the Somali community here as Abatiyow.

New Responsibility at 76

Abatiyow, who came to the United States in 1993, was age 76 when he began his focus on serving his community 10 years later—by helping his fellow Somalis to die with dignity.

Previously, Abatiyow had worked at a local J.C. Penney store. Prior to that, he had a job at a packaging company. It was a time when not many Somali refugees his age would venture into the job market.

When Abatiyow noticed that people from his homeland were struggling to give their loved ones a decent funeral with all the traditional Somali rites, Abatiyow swung into action.

First, he got funeral homes in Seattle to designate areas where Somalian Americans could be buried. Then he helped his community members prepare for their death near buying gravesites.

Concerned that even low-income refugees could get the honors and burial rites he believed everyone deserves, Abatiyow worked to ensure they could purchase affordable gravesites. He used his business skills, accrued in Somalia, where he had owned a thriving department store, to help people buy gravesites at the wholesale price of $400.

Abatiyow, who recently retired as treasurer of a funeral fundraising committee, said it is challenging to get his community to set money aside for their funerals. The majority of them, he said, are young and don’t feel it is important to think about their end.

“It takes an extra effort to do the task of fundraising,” he said. Abatiyow noted, “You have to speak with highly emotional appeal and bring some examples of some younger people who have died recently.”

Thanks to Abatiyow’s tireless efforts, funeral home such as Day Spring and Fitch have become culturally sensitive to the Somali community’s needs. “We remove our shoes” before entering the viewing room, noted Winston Fitch, whose father owns the Fitch Funeral Home.

I can attest to this new sensitivity from my own experience, having lost my son, Ahmed, when he was just 18 in 2008. Day Spring accommodated all our special needs, including allowing the body to be taken to the mosque so everyone could say their prayers over it.

Because Muslims don’t keep the bodies of their kin very long after their passing, Fitch said his funeral home completes all the paperwork of their Somali Muslim clients within a couple of hours, as opposed to a couple of days for people of other faiths.

Icons of Somali Culture

Elders are icons in Somali culture. They give advice and hold families together. Abatiyow never hesitates to give advice to those he feels needs it.

Now an octogenarian and living with heart problems, Abatiyow lives near his children and grandchildren. He is superstitious and won’t say how many grandchildren he has.

Abatiyow has also heeded his family’s advice and cut back on his extremely busy schedule. He spends a good deal of his time socializing with his peers at a local community center, or sitting in a chair and praying at the local mosque.

Not one to sit idle for too long, though, Abatiyow actively attends to his health. He has enrolled in a fitness program and is careful about what he eats. Rich meals of goat meat and rice are no longer part of his daily fare.

Like many of his compatriots, home is now the United States, and like them, this is where he wants to be laid to rest.

Mohamud Yussuf wrote this article as part of a MetLife Foundation Journalists on Aging Fellowship in partnership with New America Media and the Gerontological Society of America.