Members of cycling and gun clubs from south Kilkenny were among the hundreds of mourners at the funeral in Mooncoin yesterday of a local man, Mr John Cashin (45), who was murdered in India on New Year's Day.
An Indian melody was played and the Indian flag, bearing the symbol of the Wheel of Life, was among the offerings at Requiem Mass for Mr Cashin, who was brutally stabbed to death and robbed in the Madras hotel where he was staying.
Tributes were paid to the kind and quiet man, a veteran traveller to India, whose violent death shocked the Barony of Iverk. He was laid to rest in the family grave in Mooncoin cemetery beside his mother, Eileen, who died eight months ago. The chief mourners were his father, Jim, brother, Joe, sister-in-law, Moira, and niece, Caitriona, who had spoken to him by phone only hours before the fatal attack.
The circumstances of Mr Cashin's death were doubly tragic because he had developed a deep affection for India and its culture, visiting it nearly 20 times over the last 15 years.
"He had total love and total trust for the people of India," according to his brother, Joe. He had acquired a working knowledge of Hindi and had travelled throughout the country. "When he came back, the maps would be brought out and he would already begin planning his next trip," said Mr Cashin.
On his first trip, accompanied by a cousin, he had befriended a young boy who brought his luggage to his hotel from the airport.
On a subsequent visit he became ill and the young man's family nursed him through a fever.
He maintained a strong friendship with this family and often sent them presents, including small amounts of money which enabled them to improve their circumstances.
He had only just begun his latest holiday in the sub-continent when the tragedy happened. He had landed in Bombay and then taken a plane to Madras to visit a Carrick-on-Suir-born nun, Sister Loreto Houlihan, for whom he had brought out family presents.
He is believed to have checked in to a middle-range hotel not far from the convent in a district on the outskirts of Madras.
Less than three hours before his body was found in his room there, he had phoned home to wish his family a Happy New Year. The devastating news of his death reached them the next morning.
John, who worked as a baker in Waterford city, had been a keen sportsman, with an impressive record in competitive cycling in earlier years. "He finished five Ras Tailteanns, and they were nearly 1,000 miles in those days," his brother said. The brothers frequently took part together in cycling races as members of the Carrick Wheelers club, and later formed the Suir Valley Wheelers club in their own home district of Mooncoin.
He was also a member of the local gun club and enjoyed game shooting and clay pigeon shooting.
There was more distress for his family as they had to intervene strongly through the Department of Foreign Affairs to ensure that John's body was brought home for burial, rather than being cremated in India.
When the body arrived back at a Waterford undertaker's they received a copy of the results of the Indian post-mortem. It revealed that he had been stabbed 14 times.
He had been due home from his holiday last weekend. "We should have collected him on Sunday evening from the train in Waterford at 6.30 p.m., and that is the time we went to see his body," Mr Joe Cashin said.
Information on the investigation into the murder has been sparse. The family was told initially that a suspect had been detained, but they have received no update on the police report in the past two weeks.
As an experienced and discreet traveller, who planned his itinerary carefully and was sensitive to his surroundings, John was a most unlikely candidate to be singled out for such an apparently opportunistic murder. "Of all the tourists that would be in India, John wouldn't be rich pickings," said his brother.