From Here to Eternity

4.5 stars. As usual, a memorable and death-positive book from Caitlin Doughty. In this one, she explores death culture from all across the world, from Indonesia to Bolivia to Mexico to Japan. She observes these different cultures sincerely, eager to take back all these death-positive messages back with her, presumably to further her work in The Order of the Good Death in the USA.

“Indonesia” was a fascinating chapter. Caitlin explores Tana Toraja in South Sulawesi, where families live with the embalmed corpses of their dead relatives (sleeping in the same room, in the same bed even) for years on end before eventually interring them. Even after burial, the coffins are regularly dug up for families to hang out with the mummified corpses, to clean them, talk to them, and just remember them for who they were. I've definitely heard of the death culture of Toraja before but Caitlin does provide some fascinating insights into their beliefs and practices. I searched up some photos too and it was all very fascinating (the mummies of babies and children were a little depressing though).

“Mexico” was an emotional chapter for me. I thought it would focus a lot more on the Dias de los Muertos but there were some hard-hitting bits about the death of fetuses, infants, and children. That's a particularly soft spot for me now, being a mom of a young child now.

“Japan” was incredibly fascinating! It's actually very much in-character for Japan but I had no idea that they had such high-tech temples and columbariums. The idea that you can just punch in a code to retrieve or locate a loved one's urn of ashes, or even tap a smart card, is just mind-boggling to me. I do wonder how much it removes one from the act of remembering someone though. I feel like there's a lot of distractions there, whether in terms of LED lightshows or figuring out how to use the technology in the first place, to spend your mental bandwidth in grieving for or just cherishing the memories of someone who passed.

This book also made me think about the death culture in my society and country. Much like the USA, it kinda just seems that there's only one viable option for most Singaporeans nowadays (aside from Muslims, who do get concessions to bury their dead per their religious beliefs) - embalming, cremation, and interment into a columbarium/temple (or having ashes scattered at sea which is becoming an increasingly popular option given the sheer costs of booking a niche for an urn anywhere). In a sense, I guess we've come to accept that route as inevitable for most of us, but this book, as well as Caitlin's own views, really widened my perspective and made me wonder what options do I really have in my country? Have we all come to just accept this one route simply because we all don't want to think about death (death-denial, as Caitlin terms it) and therefore outsource all the arrangements as much as possible? It's all very thought-provoking and I'm honestly really glad I read this book.