single


  • Photographer
    Alberto Buzzola
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Company/Studios
    onasia
  • Date of Photograph
    2009 December 19
  • Technical Info
    Color file converted BW

The elder among the grandsons carries the spirit tablet of the deceased woman during a complex and emotional Buddhist funerary ceremony. As in strict Taiwanese Buddhist tradition the spirit's tablet has to accompany the dead body loaded in the hearse to the crematorium where the last rite will be perform before cremation.

Story

On the morning of December 19th, the body of Chin Len Lin, a octogenarian mother and grandmother body is taken for the last journey to her final resting place. From the woman's native house to the crematorium the eldest among her grandsons will carry along her' spirit's tablet in religious silence. The soul of the deceased has yet to be liberated from the body and the sense of loss still pervade the families of the defunct who, as the hearse pass by, chant sutras in her honor. Although emotional, the Buddhist funerary ritual reminds us that we must accept the impermanence of life on earth and that dead is just another part of it.
I followed the entire ritual from morning till evening when the burnt body had finally released the spirit (soul) to new life under new forms or to Nirvana.

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