"THERE'S a popular song by salsa orchestra El Gran Combo about a man who asks that the love and praise he's earned in life be given to him while he is still around to appreciate it.

'If you think I deserve it,' the song goes, 'why not give it to me now? Don't wait 'til I die to go to the sacred space and then say that I was a good man.'

It's a song that celebrates the idea that love and tributes mustn't happen posthumously. What's the point, really, if the subject is not there to experience it?"