茶叙会 Tea time talk: The forgotten dear ones

Something rather peculiar catched my attention while drinking my cup of tea the other day. While drinking, I started paging a local newspaper, and here it is:

It says " Ashes forgotten away for a year" as title, and that three families each lost an elderly family member last autumn, namely 81, 70 and 50 years old. Today after a year, they still don´t know the where about of the cremated remains of their beloved one?!

Yes, really shocked, I thought this is not happening, considering, what in my opinion, the admirable precision of Sweden when it comes to proffessionalism.

Yes, a country where each of its residents and citizens is accurately labeled with personal numbers, each place and case were checked and double checked, that one button and it shows if you have lost one finger or are they all still entact, where one o´clock is one o´clock no more and no less. - this could not be happening!?

Anyway, continuing the article, it says that the families involved were not allowed to be present in the whole funeral procedure, and now not knowing where to turn to, the case is now "hand bolled" between the funeral agency, the crematorium, and the community´s church, while the Swedish Registry of Population is now planing to start an investigation of the matter.

Feeling really sorry for the concerned families, I nevertheless couldn´t help almost bursting out all the tea in my mouth with unexpected laughter when I read the framed information on the higher right side of the article, which I am not exactly sure if it´s really true or it is just the journalist way of funly mocking the responsible agencies.

Anyway the framed information says:

Here is the rule:

*Families are not allowed to be present during the placing of the cremated remains at the memorial home, but will rather be informed as soon as the ashes are in place. Then the church congregation will send out an informing letter to the surviving family. Normally within two months.

*If the family have not received such letter by the time, they should please contact the community´s church.

*If the ashes are still not in its proper place at the memorial home after a year, the Registry of population will starts an investigation of the matter and its cause.

... well anyway so much for the laughter, .... may these families and their deceased one soon find peace at last ... and as to this, my reading tip to everyone: try reading local papers with your tea instead of national or global ones. I think it´s in the local where real stories of real people like this are.

And speaking about forgetfullness, guess what I´ve forgotten myself - I forgot it´s my mother´s birthday the other day ( who passed away a few years ago ), and so now I bought some fruits to offer in her memory. 

... for chadao ..

Text: 黄琼丝 /Celina Huang

Photo: En kopp Zen Teahouse