How Vietnamese Bury Their Dead?
Vietnam was in shocked. Within two weeks its President and Former Leader of its Communist Party passed away due to natural causes. However, I’m not here to tell you about how these leaders lived, although the story is not bad itself. I’m here to tell you what happens when they or any Vietnamese people leave this world and return to their motherland.
After the last breath is drawn and the grieving is done, the deceased is taken to his/her final bath with herbal water. According to traditional customs, taking a bath will wash away the dust of the human realm. When the bathing is done, a coin and a grain of rice are put on the deceased’s mouth.
After that, a chosen shaman selects the date and time for the dead to be put in a coffin. An altar is made with the name and an image of the deceased. Charms and amulets are put in the coffin by the shaman to prevent demons and unwanted guests from troubling the dead or prevent the dead from troubling the living.
Traditional Vietnamese funeral.
According to traditional customs, a bowl of rice, along with a pinch of salt, a boiled egg, and tap water are served to the dead one hour before the funeral. It has been said that the meal is to give the dead a full belly for his/her upcoming journey to the underworld.
In the countryside, the funeral is held in the house of the deceased. In case the house is not big enough for the visitors and relatives, which mostly occurs in the city, then a funeral home is selected. During the funeral, the relatives of the dead wear white headbands, the children of the dead wear addition white cloths and wooden staffs, and the great-grandchildren wear yellow headbands. The clothes and the headbands are often made by cheap ingredients to imply that the grieving is too much for them to handle that they do not even bother to dress themselves up or they are so devastated that they need a staff to walk. Visitors wear blacks and often bring their tribute written in a ribbon wrapped along a flower bed. The flower bed must be white if the deceased was not married. A pack of joss-stick, which is a type of incense, is often carried with them to pay their respect and served in further events.
A funeral held in a funeral home
After the funeral, the coffin along with the grieving family will be transported to a cemetery or a crematorium to be buried or cremated. In the countryside, people often wish to be buried in the middle of their family’s rice paddy. They believed that their soul will return back to the soil to raise the crops, just like the crops have raised them. During the transportation, small bills like VNĐ500 (US$0.02) is scattered along the road for the soul to find its way home.
Along the way to the funeral homes or cemetery, the lifting of the coffin will be handled by sons, grandsons, or close friends of the deceased. Their image and the bowl of rice will be carried by the oldest grandson or great-grandson. Being the oldest grandson, I cannot remember how many times I have to carry the images of my loved ones. However, one thing I do remember is the feeling and the weight of those things
However, the funeral is not the final destination. After 49 days, according to Buddhism, the soul has finished attending seven trials, each lasted seven days, will be free to wander according to the deeds they have done at their lifetime. After the trials, the soul will enter one of the six realms (gods, demi-gods, humans, animals, hungry ghosts, and hells). If a man is a good, faithful person, the soul will reach the good realms and vice versa. As a result, the 49th day is the last day for the soul to remain in our human realm. In order to pay the respect and gratefulness, the family of the dead will summon a Buddhist monk to ‘contact’ the dead and pass the word, wishing them a nice journey ahead. A feast will be prepared, often vegetarian. A joss-stick will be set at the altar to signal the soul to join the feast. After summoning the soul, a monk would remind the soul about the good deeds that he/she has done in his/her lifetime, which is extremely important in case the soul’s judgment have not been decided and the upcoming realms are still in selection.
The process of grieving and moaning the dead will continue. According to traditional customs, the family of the dead has to wear a small black band on the chest pocket of their casual clothes for a year after. In case of a widow or widower, it takes them three years after their partner passed to be able to move on.
The timeline of the deceased will always be marked by the death of the person in the lunar calendar. According to traditional beliefs, only the living celebrated one’s birthday and marked by the solar calendar because the sun represents yang, the living. While the dead are remembered by the day they fell, marked by the moon, which represents yin.
On those days, families are gathered and have a feast to pay tribute to the death and celebrated it with the reunion. The atmosphere is often joyful because according to the customs, the spirits do not one its family to be sad and grieving no more. Food served, plate passed, and song sang in the memory of the deceased.
By the 3rd anniversary of the deceased, a ritual call “cải táng” will be executed for those who choose to be buried. According to ancient customs, because the family members would not let the corpse to be laying in the dirt, soil, and crooked coffin, which is considered dirty, they dig up the grave and clean the decomposing body. Sometimes it is very disturbing when the body is not totally decomposed, especially if the deceased died by cancer. The chemicals treatment tends to slow down the decomposing process and the time for total decomposition might take mostly 10 years. However, the ritual often be done in the dark, the time of the spirits. According to the shamans, winter night is the most suitable time to dig up a grave because winter is the time of the underworld and scientifically, it is the best time to dig up a decomposing body when the sun is not shining and the heat does not spread the contagious bacteria. After lifting the coffin or what is left of it on the ground, every single bone will be collected, cleaned, rearranged by the family members and move to their “new home.” The remained coffin and clothes will be burned away. Most family cannot withstand the ritual when they witness what is left of their loved one. It is even more tragic if the person died by accident. My father once recalls about the ritual to my grandmother who passed away in a train accident: “There are no such things as a whole bone, just a scattered skeleton crippled in the coffin. If the body is not decomposed totally, you must burn the remained flesh or slice it out by a knife. And it was not an easy job to do when it was your own mother’s flesh.”
Moreover, on this ritual, or every event of a person’s journey to the afterlife, they are funded. People from the underworld receive a transaction from their relatives often by fire. That being said, in order to make sure their friends or relatives have a peaceful and wealthy life in their afterlife, Vietnamese burns money-like paper to send them to the dead. Depends on the importance of the events, the amount of paper would be different. For the deceased without family or their family was lost also, a public ceremony is held in the 15th of July in the lunar calendar. July is considered the month of the dead, when the gate of hell is opened and the lost spirits are free to roam among the land of the living. By burning paper money, the living tribute to the lost souls and hope they will not cause any trouble in the following month.
A dig-up grave
Nevertheless, on any occasion, even visiting the graves, Vietnamese always burn some paper money to show respect. However, the money-like paper is being overdone. Sometimes, money is not enough, so the dead in the 21st century are also receiving things like paper-made iPad or villa paper figure made for them by the living. As a result, it causing a socio-psychological problem that everyone wants to give their relatives the best things, leading to burning a large unnecessary amount of paper.
Paper money ready to be burned
Putting all the customs, all the tradition aside, all that people want is to pay some respect and tribute to what their ancestor has left behind. The way to do it might be different, they might be weird. But the love of the living to their ancestor has never changed, from West to East, from time to time. And here I am, in Bulgaria, wishing to put a joss-stick and salute to my great grandfather’s altar on the 9th anniversary of his death, which happened to be a week from now, wondering if I can somehow shorten this 8000 km between me and the altar, even just one step closer.
About the author: Hoang Nguyen is a third-year student at the American University in Bulgaria. He was born and raised in Hanoi, Vietnam and as the eldest son of a family, taking care of deceased family is what he prepared to do after his father passed.
