Burning bodies catches on

New ways to handle corpses are popping up from around the world

AN ANCIENT ASIAN tradition is heading west. Judges in London last week gave an Indian resident the right to have his body set alight on a bonfire after his death. It would be the only way to have “a good death” according to his beliefs, argued Davender Ghai, 71.

He had originally been refused to have his body set on fire on the grounds that burning corpses outdoors clashed with the British sense of decorum. “Even burning dry leaves in your garden is not allowed in some parts of the country,” one UK critic said. “There’s no way we would allow you to chuck grandpa on the bonfire.” But in a surprise decision, judges okayed the request.
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Actually, this could be the answer to the shortage of cemetery space in many cities in Asia and the rest of the world. When one of your relatives drops dead in the supermarket car park, you just sprinkle them with paraffin, take out your cigarette lighter, and—whooomf!—they become a pile of ashes which can be neatly swept up and put into a jar.

Of course, you’d have to have rules. If someone dies in an airplane, for example, you’d want to wait at least until the meal service was completed before organizing a funeral pyre. And if any of my children are reading this, PUT THE MATCHES AWAY. I am probably just having a deep asleep.
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Countries are dealing with grave-site shortages in a variety of ways. Greece has adopted the Hong Kong system where burial spaces are rented on short-term leases, and the corpses are then moved to smaller premises. (In Hong Kong, that’s exactly how living people are treated too.)
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Meanwhile, some places in Asia have signed up for a new trend from the West called “natural burial” where bodies are wrapped in biodegradable wrappings and buried in normal soil, with a shrub or a tree over it instead of a grave stone. There’s something charming about this. Except for when the dog digs up Grandpa’s head and brings it back to you.
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But going back to Mr Ghai, conservative people in Britain are worried that he may have set a precedent. What if the 560,000 other British people who share his Hindu beliefs want to burn their rellies in the open air? And what if the Tibetan folk who favor “sky burials” follow suit? They like to chop up their dead relatives, place the lumps high on towers, and let vultures carry off the pieces. I would hate to do that for a deceased person. However, there are quite a few live people I would LOVE to do that to.

When this columnist’s father died, he left a request that his body be burned and the ashes buried under a copper-beech tree. That was 17 years ago. The tree is now huge. And every time we drive past it, it waves to us. Of course, it MAY just be the wind, but you never know.

In the meantime, if you see vultures hovering over the roof of my apartment block, just look the other way for a while, will you? I’m just taking care of business.
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Technorati Tags: funny funeral,funeral pyre,cremation,humor

Comments

[Foxlore]

I had a living will created just before I came to Hong Kong, so that in case anything happened it would be very clear (legally) what I wanted done with my remains. Basically it was a ‘donate the best and burn the rest’ policy. This was primarily because I don’t want to come back as a member of the walking dead when the zombie-apocalypse occurs. ;-)

Uncle N’s tale about his father mad me a bit nostalgic for my parents’ home in Florida. They a small animal farm and growing up there we have had many animals pass away over the years. For all of our dogs, we have always had them buried under a tree in the back pasture (if anyone has seen Marley & Me there is an almost identical scene in that film). That tree has grown to be a big and beautiful sight to see and has survived numerous Florida hurricanes. I have always felt that whatever ashes are left of me I would like placed there as well.

Regarding the ‘Come to Florida’ image…that is a funny, but likely not far from the truth. Florida is the retirement capital of the US and there is no shortage of cemeteries and funeral organizations. There was in fact a huge scandal involving a big cemetery company very near to my parents’ home. The scandal began back in 2001 in which the company was basically reselling plots, digging out the current ‘tenants’ and dumping them in the back woods. The whole incident has been going on for 8 years and has only recently completed the litigation, which resulted in the victimized families getting a rather large settlement. Chronological articles relating to the entire incident can be found here.

Needless to say, this is just another reason I don’t wish to be interred.

[Thiru Cumaran]

Hehee...loved the funeral home ad.

Yes, burning corpses does save a lot of space. However, there is a lot of wasteage involved.

As an example, for my grandma, we got a coffin made for about Sri Lankan RS.65,000 (about USD600) and then had to burn her in the coffin along with a whole load of white cloth and some wooden fixtures! What a colossal waste!

[Dancer]

Erm... burnt corpses do not turn out a nice pile of ash. What you get is a nice set of charcoal bones (if you are really using incinerators) where you need to pick them up, put them in the bone grinder, and grind it up for it to actually turn out like ash.

If you use normal bonfire, it's not going to be a pretty sight. Some flesh should still be there...

[Karuna]

@Dancer
It is traditional practice for Hindus to burn their dead, practiced by most in India.
Cremation is very thorough process. Takes about a day to complete. These places are typically outside city limits.
When you a cremate someone, it can be a profound experience. For as the body burns, you realize that life as we experience is transient. The body is just a vehicle.

[Christy]

Bone grinder! Now that's something I'd like to get my hands on ;-P

[fardel]

Nury
couldn't you choose a more funny subject?
Two years ago I went to a cremation ceremony for an old beautiful lady I just met.
It was a terrible experience.

"clashed with the British sense of decorum"
Did you mean , the British sense of humor,or did you mean lack of common sense?
In a country which boils steaks instead of frying them , would you expect them to burn/Roast anything ?

"vultures hovering over the roof of my apartment "
I thought that in Hk ,vultures were going after live people only!

[Nury]

How come you guys know such much about getting rid of dead bodies???

There's definitely a good short story idea here.

A guy writes a blog about disposing of corpses.

The people who comment add so much detail that he realizes they are murderers...!

[Christy]

I've always wondered -- if you stand near an incinerator and breath in, do you inhale part of the bodies-turned-fume, kind of like inhaling their souls?

[Karuna]

@Christy, if you believe in the concept of soul. It means at the point of death, the soul has left the person's body. Then what you inhale near an incinerator is just smoke and ash.

If you do not believe in the concept of soul and believe the body is the person. Then, you may believe that you are inhaling the person. Something similar to our Nury's belief of his dead father waving to him through a tree.

[Karuna]

@Dancer, hope you are in town tomorrow and joining us for lunch at LKF

[Dancer]

@Karuna
I have no doubt that cremation can be a spiritual experience for the bystanders. I still think it's messy business.

As for lunch, I hope I can turn up to lunch tomorrow as well.

@Nury
'The people who comment add so much detail that he realizes they are murderers...!'
What do you mean you just 'realise'? Here I thought you understand our souls when you showed us your Horrorscopes.

Sorry, I still didn't get the info about when and where is the lunch tomorrow. Some help?

[Vaibhav]

Hindus believe in the original 5 elements required for sustaining life. Earth, Water, Air, Fire and Space.
We come in contact with all during our lifetime except fire. which is why we believe in burning the dead.
Having been through the whole process just last year. It also involves going to the place the next day and picking out the bones which werent burned and taking them to the river Ganga to release them in the water there.

[fardel]

"nd taking them to the river Ganga to release them in the water there....."

......where multinational companies pick them up to transform them into cattle feed.

This is one of the theory for the mad cow disease

[Harry]

From "Black Adder", set in the past, I emphasize -
"Bit cold in 'ere."
"Throw another Catholic on the fire."
Actually, this doesn't work. When a fuel is wet it uses a lot of energy to evaporate the water. If it's wet enough, it takes more supplementary fuel to consume it than is generated by the thing being burnt. Corpses are like that. They contain so much water that burning them is a heavy consumer of fuel. And, in many countries, precious wood, like sandalwood, is used. It's a terrible waste to cut down a fine tree, just to burn it. A crematorium at least uses a fuel such as natural gas, which is cleaner, gives a much hotter fire and does completely consume the corpse.
In case anyone asks, I'm an engineer on combustion systems. I've never burnt a corpse but I have designed systems for burning wet refuse, wood waste, etc.

[Jeff]

It was long ago and far away, and you the columnist but a wee toddler. But I remember your father most fondly. Can you tell me where the copper-beech tree grows?

[TS]

You're always gonna have problems lifting a body in one piece. Apparently the best thing to do is cut up a corpse into six pieces and pile it all together.
And when you got your six pieces, you gotta get rid of them, because it's no good leaving it in the deep freeze for your mum to discover, now is it? Then I hear the best thing to do is feed them to pigs. You got to starve the pigs for a few days, then the sight of a chopped-up body will look like curry to a peehead. You gotta shave the heads of your victims, and pull the teeth out for the sake of the piggies' digestion. You could do this afterwards, of course, but you don't want to go sievin' through pig poo, now do you? They will go through bone like butter. You need at least sixteen pigs to finish the job in one sitting, so be wary of any man who keeps a pig farm. They will go through a body that weighs 200 pounds in about eight minutes. That means that a single pig can consume two pounds of uncooked flesh every minute. Hence the expression, "as greedy as a pig".

OK, before you guys stitch me up with the police tomorrow, I thought I'd better let you know that this is a quote from the film "Snatch".

[Pyro-Uli]

My idea for a living will and testament would be the following:
"donate what can be used by others, burn the rest to ashes, build a calibre 300 fireworks bomb using the ashes, shoot a huge fireworks display at the expense of the deceased and save the "memorial bomb" as the last."
Now that's something to look forward to, isn't it?!

[Murderess-Uli]

Anyway, Nury, of course there's a murderer in all of us, don't you think?

[Karuna]

@Harry
Butter ghee is added to increase the temperature. Wood fire by itself does not reach the required temperature.
And dried cow dung is used along with wood.
Typically, only a few sticks of sandalwood are added to the funeral pyre.

@Dancer, see you at Post-97 for lunch. Hope you bring the bone grinder !!

[sej]

Hmm... mental note to self...

Don't cross *anyone* on this forum!!

Too many people here, seem to know how to torture, murder or clean up afterwards!

[Vaibhav]

To lift it from here would seem kind of costly considering we're a country which considers cows holy.
And to be taking it to US to make feedstock. It reminds me of the article by Nury on foodmiles.

We're messing with the balance of nature. We're going to solve the problem by ourselves soon. Either by correcting ourselves or making the earth free of people.

[Angela]

On recycling of cemetery - reminds me of Milan Kundara's 'old dead must make room for the young dead'

[farah]

dead people, burning bodies and vivid ways of disposal?? first thing i read on sunday morning after the earthquake news? now i wouldnt be able to sleep for next 2 days.

thanks folks!

[Kay]

Dancer, you're a bit creepy: you talk about going to lunch and then gracefully change the subject to disposing of dead bodies.