waking the dead

next wed, we (my aunt, my brother, and i) will be at the cemetary to exhume the remains of my paternal grandparents. it will definitely be an interesting affair. it's been 40 years since my granddad passed away (1969) and 34 years for my grandma (1975). if my memory serves me well, they were both placed in the traditional chinese coffins - the huge gold ingot shaped ones - that singapore had done away with some years back. this type of coffin has been known to withstand decay many decades after the burial. as such, it would be interesting to see what they look like now and the state of our grandparents' bodies - whether they are still intact, decayed, mummified or what...

and as i could sense, after all these years, we are more curious about how the bodies look like rather than emotional about having lost our ancestors. nonetheless, we are respectful in carrying out this tasks and ensure that they are exhumed, created and moved to their new resting place (which is in the next block to my dad's niche at the columbarium).

and as my aunt aptly put when she went to pay respects to my grandparents, she told them that they will be moving house from their current bungalow to new hdb flats.

:-)