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Tag / funeral

A Brief Compendium of Fascinating Archives to Explore

If there’s one thing we love, it’s sticking our nose where it doesn’t belong. Or at least, where others seldom dare to tread. Our jewel box of a planet is overflowing with secrets, stories, and forgotten treasures, and we like to try and keep a finger on the pulse of the best archives, vaults, and…

The Macabre Legacy of Bombay’s Sky Burial Towers

If you were to take a walk in Mumbai’s Hanging Gardens on Malabar Hill, one of the city’s most exclusive neighbourhoods, you might notice vultures circling above the trees in the distance. Behind the park’s manicured lawns and elegant flower gardens lies a 54-acre forest, home to five circular structures known as the Towers of…

A Day in the Life of Mrs. Grim Reaper

She only comes around once in a lifetime. Travel to any small village in Sardinia, and you may still hear hushed tales of the accabadora; “angel of death”; the women chosen by their community to live out their days veiled in black, and charged with the task of ending the lives of others at the mercy of their cudgel.…

Paid for their Tears: The Peculiar Profession of Professional Mourners

The business of death is one as old as time. Today the market size of global death care services is valued at over $100 billion annually and it’s expected to double in the next decade too (an increase attributed to more demand for lavish funerals). But there’s a lesser-known “service” of the industry which those…

The Undertaker Village of Paris: Then & Now

It was a time when divorcées were only allowed to be buried at night, when the Arch of Triomphe wore a black mourning veil, and the business of death was booming in Paris. In fact, over one thousand undertakers worked together in their own veritable mini-city at the town’s edge, from coffin makers and casket…

Beverly Hills of the Dead: Luxury Tombs complete with Kitchens & Air Conditioning

A friend of mine just returned from travelling in the Philippines and told me I should look into a cemetery located in the capital of Manila where the dead have better houses than the living. He was right. Most of these “homes” have their own fully-functioning kitchens, bathrooms and even bedrooms where relatives can sleep alongside their buried relatives. In some cases,…

Burning iPhones and Designer Bags on China’s Day of the Dead

It’s common belief in China that people still need money and material goods in the after-life and that ghosts can go hungry or homeless unless the living can give them a helping hand. The Qingming Festival or ‘Tomb Sweeping Day’ comes but once a year, and when it does, it calls for some serious damage to be…
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