LIFE-LOVING, high-achieving Tasmanian Ross Langdon’s greatest accomplishment would have been his baby daughter, the terror victim’s brother has told his funeral gathering.
Mr Langdon, who with his heavily pregnant partner Elif Yavuz was shot dead by Islamist militants in Kenya, has been farewelled by around 120 family and friends in Hobart.
The 32-year-old was remembered as a wine-loving globe-trotter whose excellence as an architect made a difference to the lives of those he helped in Africa.
But Mr Langdon’s brother Craig told those assembled, the child due to the couple this month would have overshadowed it all.
“Rosso’s greatest achievement had nothing to do with the world of architecture,” Craig Langdon said.
“His greatest achievement was to be the birth of his baby daughter.”
The couple had travelled to the Kenyan capital Nairobi from their home in Tanzania to ensure adequate health care for Ms Yavuz, who was eight months pregnant.
Three candles were lit in Hobart and a funeral for Dutch citizen Ms Yavuz and the couple’s unborn child in the Netherlands was among memorial services to have been held around the world.
Mr Langdon’s sister Amy had been visiting her brother in the Ugandan capital Kampala when the couple met in 2011.
“Ross disappeared from the dance floor and I later found him deep in conversation with a bright, smiling brunette named Elif,” she said.
“That was the night that their life journeys collided.
“It’s been a joy to observe their love and respect for each other. They were truly great for each other.”
Described as “talented, idealistic, passionate”, Mr Langdon was famous for his all-nighters at work and play.
Raised in the small Tasman Peninsula village of Nubeena, he’d lived in London, the US and Africa after winning the Sydney University Medal for Architecture when he graduated in 2004.
He had recently designed, without charge, a HIV-AIDS clinic in Uganda and was due to start work on a new museum of African pre-history in Tanzania.
Turkish-born Ms Yavuz, a specialist in malaria, worked for the Clinton Foundation and had been visited by former US president Bill Clinton in August.
The service took a moment to remember the families and friends of the other 69 killed in the Westgate shopping mall attack by terror group al-Shabab two weeks ago.
Another 200 were injured.
Befitting another of Mr Langdon’s greatest loves, those gathered were directed to a coffee van set up for the occasion outside the Hobart funeral chapel.
Mr Langdon was buried in a private family service at Kingston in Hobart’s southern suburbs. -AAP
