Funeral

One of my friends' grandparents died this last weekend, and I wanted to take a chance to write a little bit about Korean funerals. At least from the viewpoint of an outsider: I'm not sure all this is exactly true about ALL Korean funerals. This is just my experience...

In Korea (I know this to be true), they have funeral homes connected/inside of hospitals. So, if you have a funeral, it would be in an attached building to the hospital or else be in a basement area. This particular funeral location was in a connected building. It was huge! After walking in, you find your family greeters who meet you at the door and take any monetary gifts you might have to help the family pay for the funeral expenses. I think this is actually a really great idea. It helps with the financial burdens a family might have in preparing for something like this.

After walking in, there is a small area where there is a picture of the deceased person surrounded by lights and flowers. You pick up one of many white flowers wrapped in tinfoil in a jar at the entrance of the small room, and lay it on the table in front of the picture where all the other flowers have already been laid. Then, I assume that most Korean people would full face-to-the-floor bow. In this Korean funeral, the family is Christian, so people would just stand and say a short prayer. This process takes maybe 10 minutes. Then you get are brought to another bigger room with tables on the floor and are ushered to sit down and eat.

I was so happy to be there for my friend, and I know she was happy that I was able to come and encourage her. We talked for 3 hours about her family and her grandfather's history. He had some really interesting stories, and I would have loved to have met him! The family members who were women all wore white robes. The blood-related sons wore arm bands with 3 white bars. And sons-in-law wore arm bands with a lower number of white bars.

It was interesting hearing that the family stays there overnight all together and the funeral lasts between 3-7 days. It's a good chance for other people to be able to travel and pay their respects I guess. But a long time to mourn.