Value of 'face'

On Wednesday and Thursday, I passed by a private house where a funeral wake was ongoing.

The first thing I noticed was the dozens of floral wreaths displayed - an indication of prominence and social standing.

In my opinion, sending a wreath or scroll to the family of a deceased is only a public showing of support and contribution to the deceased's family. It does nothing to help the family in monetary terms, like defraying the cost of the funeral, or in case the deceased was the sole breadwinner, help the family with the unexpected financial crisis. On the other hand, if the family is financially independent, monetary contribution could give them the freedom to re-direct the funds to other meaningful causes.

The only people who gained from this form of contribution are the giver itself, in terms of 'face', the florists and the nurseries, and the maker of scrolls. Unfortuantely, this practice is the norm, especially in the business world, where 'face saving' is of paramount importance.

I am not saying that we should all do away other forms of contributions and stick to monetary ones only, as it is a matter of preference. And for businesses, this gives them publicity too. I just feel that it is a waste as all those stuff are on display for a few days only, until the funeral, and the cost of those wreaths and scrolls could come to thousands of dollars. From my guess, those that I saw from this wake alone, could easily come to $15k to $20k. Imagine what one could do with that kind of cash.

Once in a while, I do notice the obituaries of some prominent people requesting for 'no wreaths or scrolls', and the monies collected would be donated to charities. What a nice, final parting gesture this would be. Unfortunately, not many people in the business world would like to take the initiative to send cash instead of wreaths/scrolls for fear of offending the family of the deceased, unless the family indicated so.

LY's wake and funeral were done according to Buddhist rites. When I was at the wake, I saw a set of guidelines encouraging prudence and simplicity instead of extravagance. The extravagance that was discouraged included placing an obituary. A small, semi-display obituary usually starts from a few hundreds of dollars. Accordingly, LY's son had informed us through smses.

I'd been contemplating on this, and maybe when my time comes, I could send a personal, final good-bye message to all relatives and friends via sms. But, I am sure this is going to freak out a lot of people. (lol) Perhaps those who do not wished to be freaked out by such a notification should let me know so that I can remove them from my list. I understand that not everybody talked of death as openly as cancer survivors do.:)