Virtual Tomb

Hiruki Family Tomb, Fukue, Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan

In Japan, in accordance with Buddhist tradition, the bones of a deceased family member are placed in an individual urn and kept with those of their ancestors in a family tomb (ohaka). Living family members visit the tomb on Ohigan (Spring and Fall Equinox) and during Obon (Festival of the Dead) in the summertime. Most Japanese people live in big cities these days, and must travel long distances to their ohaka, which tend to be in smaller cities and towns in the countryside. In families whose members live far away, not everyone can make it back to their ohaka for Obon every summer to pay their respects.

I read a recent newspaper article about the Kannonin Buddhist temple in Hiroshima, Japan, which offers virtual tombs for a family's deceased relatives. For a family like mine, living across the Pacific Ocean, a virtual ohaka, accessible anytime from anywhere in the world, makes eminent sense! Just call up this image, light some incense and hang some lanterns around the computer monitor...

Links:

Personal Experiences With Buddhism: "My Childhood Experience with Ohaka-mairi"
Part of "In Search of Enlightenment", Japanese American Frank Seisaku Bishop's comparison of Japanese and Tibetan Buddhism

Choice of Exits: People Opt for Nontraditional Funerals, Graves
A overview of new Japanese methods of burial.

"Rest in virtual peace"
A BBC News report on how the traditional way of maintaining graves in Japan is being updated for the 21st century.

High cost of dying a grave issue for Japanese
Think living in Japan is expensive? Try dying. Funeral costs in Japan are among the highest in the world

Breaking with family tradition at the cemetery
Japanese fed up with the costs, travel and other traditions associated with family graves pay their respects in new ways, like common graves.

Designer graves take pain out of tending the dead
As less people are taking the time to tend to the family's final resting place, more are switching to low-maintenance graves and alternative burial methods.

Planning for your own death
Those without relatives contract out postmortem arrangements

Japan - Hi-tech Cemeteries
Ancient tradition and the latest in high technology can both be found in Japanese rituals to honor the dead. A popular funeral parlor on Osaka where Pink Floyd blends with Buddhist chants.
(RealAudio 4:15)

Virtual Tamagotchi Cemetery
Do you remember tamagotchi the virtual bird-like pets? They may be electronic, but unless you take very good care of them, they don't live forever. At this website, you can give your dead tamagotchi a proper online burial!

Ties Talk Archive: Ohaka
I introduced the topic of ohaka to an e-mail group of Japanese Americans, half expecting to hear back, "What is an ohaka?" I was surprised and heartened by the depth of feeling these Nikkei-jin have for their ohaka.

Halving the Bones
Japanese American Ruth Ozeki Lounsbury attends her grandmother's funeral in Japan and returns with a Tupperware container holding some of her grandmother's bones.

Kofun: Ancient Japanese Tomb
These keyhole-shaped mounds were how Japanese buried their earliest emperors from the 4th to 6th centuries AD, before the arrival of Buddhism.

Sapporo Family Keeps Dead Dad
Millennium madness? Some relatives have a hard time saying goodbye.

Man Leaves Father's Body On Ice for 13 Years
Heat wave and unpaid electricity bill lead to discovery.

Funeral houses winning as more patrons cash in their chips
Despite an economy that's been in the doldrums for over a decade, there are some businesses in Japan that countless numbers of people are simply dying to get into.

Dead bodies could enrich soil faster: scientist

Dr. Bob Prescribes Do-It-Yourself Mummification

Find-A-Grave
View the gravestones of the famous [Feature Story]

Celebrate Life! Inc.
A different way to say goodbye

Final trip - sending ashes of loved ones to space
"Space funerals" are just one example of changing funerals in Japan

My Green Heaven
Burial alternatives break new -- or no -- ground