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Remember Partha De, the man found living with the skeletons of his sister and his pet dogs for more than half a year? The news created a huge furore among the viewers two years back in June,2015. The man, along with his father lived with the skeletons in their apartment in Shakespeare Sarani, Kolkata. It was only when the 70 year old father died in a fire which resulted in a police investigation, that the gross incident came to limelight. The police found the skeletons from the apartment and according to investigations, the man, Aurobindo De, had fed the skeletons regularly for 6 months as he refused to believe that his daughter was dead. The daughter, Debjani De, was extremely fond of her pet dogs and after their death, she starved herself to death. During the investigation, food was found beside the skeletons, and according to psychologists, this is a state of disillusion where human minds refuse to accept the reality. The skeletons were sent to the forensic laboratory for tests and it was found that the dogs died sometime in 2014 which followed the death of Debjani De.
Think this is the height of morbidity and grossness that is possible? Wait till you read till the end of this article. Here we would bring you three most odd death rituals which are extremely weird to hear about and will undoubtedly leave you stunned.
- The Torajan death ritual– The Torajans belong to a mountainous region in Indonesia. For the Torajans, life and death are linked, and one revolves around the other. Death is not associated with the conventional morbidity and sadness here. They believe, when a person dies, the funeral should be a celebration of the life lived by the dead person, and is an occasion in which the family members and their neighbors take part. Odd it may seem, but people actually save money to have an extravagant funeral which decides the status of the family. Their funeral rituals are held for weeks or months and in some cases, even years, till the family has saved enough money for the extravagant funeral. Till the ceremonies are completed, the person is not believed to be dead but only an ailing person. Till then, the deceased person is fed and taken care of, like other family members. Buffalo sacrifice is an integral part of the ritual which symbolically helps the deceased person to start their journey towards their afterlife. The body is finally laid to rest on the 11th day of the ceremony by putting it in a cave on a high cliff and the soul is believed to longer around the place till the entire process is finished.
- Chinese funeral rituals involving strippers– Loud music, dancing girls, fireworks are not really things we normally associate with death or a funeral procession. However, among a particular Chinese tribe, this is exactly what funerals are all about. Among the people of Taiwan, this is a common practise to make the entire process loud and lavish and strippers are invited to the processions for attracting mourners as it is believed a well attended funeral ensures a good afterlife for the deceased. It is their way of celebrating the life that the deceased person has lived. The strippers are hired apparently to give the dead person “one last hurrah“. The event includes climbing poles, with professional musicians performing, neon-lit stages and fireworks as part of the extravagant funeral. However, the Chinese government has started taking steps against such erotic performances at funerals and to deter people from such grotesque activities, has started punishing people involved in them. Inspite of it, only recently, in 2017, 50 pole dancers had been hired to perform in the funeral procession of the former Chiayi City council speaker Tung Hsiang, in southern Taiwan.
- Brazilian tradition of devouring the ashes of a corpse– The Brazilian tribes eat the ashes of the dead bodies and this is done to ensure that the dead person lives forever. This is considered to be the best way to honour the dead person. It has been called “endocannibalism” by Anthropologists and is considered to be a way of establishing a permanent link between the living and the dead. Though not generally practiced anymore, this was once common among the Melanesians of Papua New Guinea and the Wari people of Brazil.
Ever thought that the cremated remains of your beloved one could be turned into diamonds and you can actually wear them? Yes you read that right, though peculiar it may appear, a Swiss company, Algordanza, uses the remains of the dead bodies, whereby the ash is reduced to carbon and under high heat and pressure transforms it into diamonds. You can either keep the diamond as it is or wear it as jewellery. And wait, that’s not all, if reports are to be believed, the colour of the diamond comes out as the colour of the eyes of the deceased person. And the resultant diamond, which you might want to keep as a remembrance of your loved one, might cost you something between $5000 to $22,000.
Last Updated on by Steffy Michael