Manuela’s hometown gathers to say final farewell

“WE WILL look up to the sky and remember her and somehow, by doing that, it will continue the way it was.”

These were the words of Arlette Riedo as she wiped away her tears, smiled and waved up to the bright blue sky dotted with hundreds of colourful balloons that were released by those who loved and remembered her 17-year-old daughter, Manuela.

Outside the small white church on the side of a green hill and overlooking the glistening lake, the tiny Swiss town of Wohlen united to say goodbye to the girl who had grown up there, made many friends, met her childhood sweetheart and, as her mother said, “truly lived” her short years.