Grandpa’s New Home

We went back to the crematorium to collect Grandpa’s cremains before heading to his new home. I was surprised to see that cremains were not in powder form but small pieces of bones, even the event helper had indirectly applied it.

I had asked the event helper earlier about the coffin, because I thought it was rental, like wedding dresses, that it could be reused for the next body. The middle-aged lady with a which-planet-were you-from kind of smile and explained to me that the coffin had to go with the body, or it couldn’t be done. I was shocked, but continued on, “Then how could you tell apart the coffin from the body?” The cremains’ Chinese name, Bone Dust, left me the impression that cremains were a heap of dust powder and I never thought that it could be anything else. She replied that the wood would be burned into fine powder along with some parts of the body and disappeared into the air. In another word, none of the wood would be part of the cremains.

It turned out that she was right. (Well, she’s an expert after all.) There was almost no dust when Grandpa’s cremains came to us. His bones were in 3 piles: Head, body, and legs. Everyone was supposed to pick up a piece of his leg bone with 1′ long chopsticks, telling him that he was going to a new home, and placing it in the green marble jar that my uncle and my mom had prepared. Once everyone was done with that, my uncle placed Grandpa’s body bones and then head bones into the jar at the event helper’s instructions. When this was done, a work glued the lid to the jar, placed the jar into a piece of yellow silk bag, tied a knot, and handed it back to us carefully. Off we headed for Grandpa’s new home in the nearby mountain.

My uncle’s son carried the jar, because he was Grandpa’s son’s son. When we were outdoors, my uncle’s wife would held a umbrella to shade the jar from the ruthless sun. It took us 4 cars and half an hour through the winding mountain roads to get to the public cemetery.

The surrounding was calm and peaceful and green. The air was so hot and humid that everyone was soaked in sweat. Like most of public buildings in Taiwan, the cemetary was impressive outside but slowly deteriorated inside. Probably due to the low unit fee and the bureaucratic budget, no AC was provided at this overcrowded building. Walking among rows and rows of units with little-to-none oxygen supply, the air was heavy and damp and stagnant, like our bodies. My hair and clothes never got a chance to dry, and I felt like a fish out of water, opening my mouth wide and trying to breathing as much oxygen as I could manage.

When my uncle finished placing the jar in his unit (my uncle and my mom bought the unit next to his for Grandma), it marked the end of today’s long event. Grandpa was properly moved in his new home, and Grandma would be moved from Southern Taiwan in the next three months to accompany him, after 30 long years of waiting.

Everyone seemed to be oneself again, relaxing from the long exhaustive day and heading back to one’s home. I wasn’t sure when I would see some of them again. Life is like a big banquet; sometimes you share a big table with some people, sometimes with others. You never know who will share the same table with you next, so you’d better cherish what you have at this moment.

Grandpa’s Funeral

Grandpa’s funeral was held at 10:00am at Zhi Zhong Chapel at Taipei Second Funeral Parlor. The funeral was held two weeks after Grandpa passed away was because (1) it had to accommodate everyone’s schedule (most our relatives lived in Southern Taiwan), and (2) today was the earliest date they could get before the infamous “Ghost Month” started, which everyday was unlucky for major events. (Coincidentally, Typhoon Kaemi was supposed to arrive Taiwan this evening.) The Second Funneral Parlor was so crowded that we had to fight our way to find a parking spot.

The funeral was long and dreadful as expected. The service came with 1 event helper, 1 host, 1 monk, 3 middle-aged female Buddhist singers, 1 karaoke with a tape of sad music, 1 mortuary spot, 1 wooden coffin going in the fire with the body, a fully decorated Grade B chapel (including lots of red banners from unrelated politicians), dozens of black funeral “uniforms” with appropriate arm bands depending on our ranks of closeness. (My sister quietly pointed out that she, I, and my aunts’ kids were at the bottom of the list except the out-of-place political guests, due to the infamous gender bias.) Lots of strange ritual that seemed weird and bizarre to me, but it was easier to do as what we were told than to question the meaning of everything. After all, it was a ritual for the older generation, which allowed them the rare luxry to show their feelings in public.

My moms, my uncle and his wife, and my aunts consumed the most Kleenex in the ceremony. My generation maintained the coolest composure. The older relatives shed tears, and the younger ones kept stern faces. And my dad was busy videotapping the whole event.

Grandpa’s body was in the coffin for us to observe before going to the crematorium. The yellow paper lotus flowers completely covered the body except his face. He shrunk somewhat, but he looked as if he just fell asleep, not as scary as what I had imagined.

The depressing ceremony itself was enough for me, but the unbearable heat and humidity made the whole event paramount. Without the thick black funeral uniform, I already felt like stuck in a sauna. With the uniform, my shirt and paints were simmered in sweat. The chapel’s giant AC, with most of its cool air escaped through the open door, did nothing to cool me down. When the ceremony finally finished 2 hours later and we followed the coffin to the crematorium, I thought the worse was passed.

We all went to a nearby restaurant, where my uncle had made a reservation for 5 tables. This little restaurant had no AC; the mixed smells of sweat, food, and cigarettes filled the air and made the whole event seem like a hallucination. After the lunch, our relatives left, but we went back to the crematorium to collect Grandpa’s cremains and prepared him for his new home.