MetaAnomie

The wifey’s grandmother passed away last week and we went out to Gifu for the wake/funeral. She was a whopping 98 years old believe it or not. Odd to think that I have known her for over ten years now.

Anyway, I have been to quite a few of the Buddhist memorial services for her grandpa (they have these on intervals of seven days from when a person passes away till the 49th day, and then some more at different intervals stretching as far as 60-70 years on — the latter I really don’t understand so well), but it was the first time I have ever taken part in a tsuya (wake) and ososhiki (funeral).

Over here, it’s common to keep the body in the house (surrounded by dry ice) until the day of the tsuya. The immediate family gathered there, and the men helped to carry her down the staircase into the hearse. From there, we went to a funeral home to move her into a casket, other people gathered, and a monk was brought in to do the okyou (Buddhist sutra — chanting if you will). After everyone left, the closest siblings (as well as the wifey, princess, Ren, and myself) stayed the night at the funeral home and kept the incense burning. Note that you’re technically supposed to stay awake all night (which explains the characters of the word tsuya - “through the night”) but you can imagine how well that works with a two year-old.

The next day, people gathered again for the funeral service, the monk came again and did the okyou, people put flowers and manju (a sort of traditional Japanese snack that the wifey’s grandma loved) into the casket, it was closed, and the family took a bus to the crematorium. From there everyone went back to the funeral home, had lunch together, and returned yet again to the crematorium afterwards.

The crematorium room was medium size, plain, with one small platform in the center (the building apparently contained multiple rooms like this). The body was laid on the platform, dropped down below, and was then lifted back up again by the time everyone had come back, leaving just the ashes and bones. Relatives lined up two at a time, picked up a bone from the platform together with pairs of chopsticks, and then placed the bone in a small bag/box that will later be split in half: one part going to the family grave and one part going to the main temple in Kyoto at a later date.

By the way, if you have ever wondered why passing food from one person’s chopsticks to another is taboo, I figure you can guess why by now. If you didn’t know, well, now you do.