Eulogy
Honouring the life of Elly Rose Warren
24 June 1996 - 9 November 2016
The short life of our adventurous, loving and caring, Elly Rose Warren.
I am Paul Warren the father of Elly Rose Warren who was born on the 24 June 1996 at Sandringham hospital Melbourne Australia.
Elly was the first child of Nicole & Paul Warren and at a later date step daughter to David Cafarella.
Elly’s tragic death occurred in Mozambique (Tofo) on the 9th November 2016 at just twenty years of age.
The moment Elly was born, we were all hopelessly in love with her. Growing up Elly especially enjoyed spending time with her younger brother Sam and sister, Kristy. Elly loved any opportunity to nurture and nurse any animal caring for any injured or orphaned animal, nursing them back to good health and releasing them back into the wild. A trait that she would carry through her short but wonderful life.
Elly's teenage years were trying at times. Typical teenager, trying to test the boundaries at every opportunity. Elly could be argumentative, loud, adventurous, defiant and rebellious but still was a very caring, strong willed, witty, confident and very intelligent young lady. We all had many debates over issues, which was good fun most of the time as Elly was very set in her ways and beliefs.
Elly would debate anything and her boyfriend Luke once said Elly was so intelligent and always right. Whenever I debated or questioned her she would always have the upper hand because what she said made a lot of sense and you never needed to question what she said.
As Elly began to mature, she became one of the most fearless but fair, caring, loud, opinionated, and talkative people that we all knew. Her love of travel was an addiction and first came about on a family trip to Africa in 2012. It was on this trip that Elly fell in love with the African people and the abundance of amazing wildlife.
Once she returned from this trip, she combined school and part time work, and worked very hard, long hours to save enough money for future solo trips. These included Bali, Thailand, Central America, Africa and many parts of Australia, all funded by herself. Quite an achievement for a teenager whilst also completing Year 12 successfully.
Elly worked extremely hard to achieve her goals in life, sometimes working three jobs at a time to finance and cram in as many trips as possible, working very long hours to finance her trip to Mozambique. She would be so tired that she would fall asleep talking to you at times on the couch. This combined love of animals and travel is why Elly decided to study to become a marine biologist. Elly was to begin her studies at James Cook University soon after she returned from Mozambique.
One of Elly's greatest loves besides eating chocolate and insisting on ice cream for breakfast was her love for her younger brother, Sam. Elly adored him, spoiled him and she took him everywhere and spent as much spare time with him she had.
For me personally Elly was the daughter any father would be proud of. We had our moments like all parents, but we had that special bond between father and daughter. We very much enjoyed the same things in life and enjoyed the same values. I loved and respected Elly dearly and she did the same in return. There is not a day that goes by that I don't miss her dearly. She would always say to me, “I am your favorite dad aren’t I”.
The impact that Elly's death has had on our family has been enormous, something the family will never, ever recover from. The past seven years have been a huge emotional and financial strain on us all. As we mourn for our lovely Elly Rose we reflect on the wonderful short time we were all privileged to have spent with her. Elly loved life and she packed so much in such a short time, and she had so much more to offer. We all miss the future times the family should have had to enjoy with her, celebrate those milestones, her 21st birthday, graduating from university, finding the love of her life and starting a family, becoming grandparents. Elly had spent some of her short life enjoying time with her younger sister and brother growing up into young adults and sharing the sister and brother bond that she loved so much, family was so important to her taking the time to also spend with her young cousins.
There is not a day that goes by where we do not think of Elly. It can be a song being played on the radio, the favorite food of hers that we're having for dinner, a beautiful sunrise or sunset with immense colors in the sky, a rainbow or just a morning stroll along the beach which was uncanny how many times we would come across the dolphins swimming in the bay. We all miss her every day that passes and we will for the rest of our lives.
Elly’s trip to Mozambique
Elly loved Africa and everything it had to offer. She told us that one day she would like to adopt an African child. If Elly was set in her ways there was no stopping her from doing what she wanted in life. She had travelled to Africa a number of times before and loved every minute of it.
On this occasion she was volunteering with a scientific, marine conservation research group, called Underwater Africa. Elly stayed at a place called Casa Barry Lodge, in a popular tourist destination known as Tofo which is a very small fishing village. Underwater Africa's purpose is to scientifically research marine life and the group's main base of operations was operating from Casa Barry. They would go out diving every day, weather permitting, researching the magical abundance of marine life in the Indian Ocean between Mozambique and Madagascar and it was a dream come true for someone like Elly.
Elly was in Tofo for six weeks and loved every minute of her time there, taking plenty of photos and enjoying the easy going lifestyle with rewarding achievements with scientific conservation work and the commitments it entails. Elly was a seasoned traveler who knew what she wanted in life, always planning ahead for her next trip away.
For someone like Elly this was her domain - swimming and deep sea scuba diving with the whale sharks and manta rays. Animals and marine life was Elly's passion, always caring about anything and everything.
Elly was to return home on the 13th November 2016 where she was off again the following weekend to New Zealand with her boyfriend, such was her love for adventure.
As you can see Elly loved life and it's really difficult to come to terms with the fact she is not here any more to enjoy further fantastic adventures and times spent with her family. She was taken way too early in life and deprived of the enjoyment and adventure she would have had no doubt if she was still alive today.