Worth to share.

The following is actually one of the course work me and my colleagues did when i was in year 2... when checking the computer today i suddenly found this in one of the old folder... i guess this might be kind of interesting to share here (Note: no plagiarism allowed ^^), especially just after Chung Yeung Festival.... dunno how i wrote this thing when i was in year 2... i guess i'll make a good Arts or Journalism student at that time... Nevermind...

Shopping for Funeral?

Introduction

A funeral is a ceremony marking a person's death. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from the funeral itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor. These customs vary widely between cultures, and between religious affiliations within cultures.

The funerals in Hong Kong, apart from deeply associated with religious beliefs about the nature of death and the existence of an afterlife, also have important psychological, sociological, and symbolic functions for the survivors. With the great influence of Chinese traditional culture and Confucianism, funeral has evolved from just serving the physical purpose of burial to rituals that represent the respect their family members had for the deceased. Funerary rites and customs are concerned not only with the preparation and disposal of the body, but also with the well-being of the survivors and with the persistence of the spirit or memory of the deceased.

In a conventional funeral setting, the family members of the deceased have to perform a tedious array of burial rituals and do the necessary preparation, ranging from the dressing up for the deceased body; selection of burial method, whether to be buried or cremated; the way the mourning is conducted, in which religious believe that could range from Taoist to Buddhist; selection of coffin; design of the funeral hall; and offering to deceased. Among all these, we became particularly interested in the paper offerings made to the dead. Not only are they of high artistic value, burning of such paper offerings is also one of the most commonly performed death rituals in Hong Kong.

We have interviewed several of those in the paper offering business in hope to search for the meaning behind the paper offering and the future of this mysterious industry.

Paper Offering

“People in Hong Kong love paper offering,” proclaimed a paper-offering shop owner. To understand this phenomenon, we have to first look at the symbolic meaning behind such items. First of all, it is very much related with the images of afterlife the Chinese have in mind. In traditional Chinese folklores and believes, people, once they are dead, will have their souls or spirit continue to exist in an underworld, where the lifestyle and the need for the souls remained unchanged from the people alive. This creates the need for the paper offering to satisfy the need of the deceased. The family members of the deceased, in order to show their care to their departed loved ones, will try their best to help the deceased to adapt to the life in the underworld; one way of doing so is through the paper offering. In psychological theories explained such ritual process as a manifestation of fear and guilt related to the inevitable confrontation with death and as a mechanism to help mourners come to terms with their loss.

In the upcoming sections, we are going to cover more on the different varieties of paper offering available.

Past and Present of Funeral Shopping Business

As we have interviewed three of the big firm from the funeral shopping business, they all agreed that the nature of the funeral shopping business change a lot from the past until now.
In the past, people tended to buy more traditional things for the people who passed away. But, in these days, it is totally different. People tended to order much more new things than the past and even some requested for a tailored made paper-offering. They said that it is time for them to change the things in the shop. Many people now preferred some new things like Rolex Watch, Gucci‘s Handbag, Play Station 2 etc. It is a big change in the funeral shopping business. From this change we may conclude that people believed that people will go to another similar world as the one we are living now after death. So, people here chose to burn things which they used or liked before they passed away in order to maintain a good life quality in the other world or even a better one.
Secondly, it is hard for the funeral shopping business to carry on as competition is getting much more excited. Many people now enter the market and the demand has no change at all or even it is getting small, it may cause a severe competition. As the trend of buying things for funeral has changed, it made the trading environment worse.
People now tended to buy more in funeral and buy less or just some conditional in the daily time such as Ching Ming festival and Chung Yeung festival. As the demand is getting less, it made the competition for the funeral shopping business much more intense. Also, huge amount from China‘s supplier make the trading environment much more competitive one. That is, Salary for workers in China is much lower than the one in Hong Kong and the materials in China also cheaper than in Hong Kong. These two factors lower the production cost of paper offering, so, it may affect the demand for the goods which made in Hong Kong. From this trend, we can foresee that the supply will soon depends on China’s factory, and the one in Hong Kong will be eliminate in times.

Lastly, it is about the problem of continuity. From the interview, we know that there are not many new blood entering in this business especially for the handmade paper offering. Skills of making paper offering have nobody to succeed. The youngsters now even don’t know what to do and they just following their parents when buying things for the death. But, the interviewers are all quite optimistic that they don’t afraid of the new trend of shopping for funeral as they think that the tradition is already deeply rooted in Chinese mind so people will keep on follow the tradition to burn things for the death .

“Excuse me, may I ask what I should burn in my father’s funeral?” We were interrupted by a mid-aged man when we were having an interview with the shopkeeper of the paper offering store. In the modern society, funeral rituals are becoming more and more formalized. Let’s trace back the evidence and reasons of the formalization from paper offering.

In Hong Kong, many people are actually lacking of knowledge about funeral rituals, especially the younger generation. In the past, cultural and traditional background influenced people very much. Strong believes have developed among them which drove them to persist with every details and procedures in funeral rituals. So nowadays when preparing for a funeral, most of them will follow the advice of their elders. Youngsters do not know the actually meaning of those props. Like paper money, there are nearly a hundred different types and each type serve for different purposes. But who cares about these now?

As modern people are well-educated, they think paper offering in a more scientific and practical view. It is not convincing to say that the real things would establish in the underworld. Many of them realized that paper crafts will only become carbon dioxide, water, dust or some toxic gases after burning causing air pollution. Also, it would cause air pollution, land pollution, material depletion etc. Paper offering are also regarded as burning money. All paper buildings, paper servants, paper cars are going to be incinerated at the end. So why do we still burn those paper offering?

Actually it is observable that the nature of burning paper offering has changed and becomes more and more formalized. People burn because they are told to burn. They do not care what is going to be burnt, but just burn something. They choose packages in funeral shops rather than searching for the items they need. There are pressures from relatives because for those who refuse to do so would be regard as unfilial. But does it mean filial if we burn something? Also, they burn because others burn. It is the problem of face. When people saw others paid a certain amount of money on one’s funeral, they must do something in order to be comparable. The scale of the funeral rituals and preparation is a show-off. Like movie stars, their funerals’ expenses often exceed some millions of dollars.

By investigating the business of paper offering, it is notified that the trend would become formalized. It is not doubtful towards the bereaved people for their filial heart, but the concern is that do we think it is a suitable way? Or just copy from the past meaninglessly? How well can the paper offering business flourish in such an ever-changing Hong Kong? Will this combination of art form and psychological relieve product continue to exist with time?

We do not have a definite answer of the above-raised questions. Even though we do regard such incineration of paper offering is nothing but formalities, the formalities would not fade out because it is a way for people to relieve their grief of the lost ones. This practice will go on unless a more effective way of relieving grief is present, which might be decades, if not longer, away from now.