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Forget Coffins – Organic Burial Pods Will Turn Your Loved Ones Into Trees
Nichy
Explorer
I've always wanted to be cremated when I die, but this seem a way much better idea... thought?
It’s the first Italian project created to promote the realization of green cemeteries in our country.
Capsula Mundi is a container with an old perfect shape, just like an egg, made with modern material -starch plastic- in which the dead body is put in a fetal position. Capsula Mundi is planted like a seed in the soil, and a tree is planted on top of it. The tree is chosen when the person is alive, relatives and friends look after it when death occurs. A cemetery will no longer be full of tombstones and will become a sacred forest
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Personally, I like it, would choose it...a little creepy though. Reminds me of some episode of the Twilight Zone or similar.
@silver lol put it that way, it's a little creepy, but I like the though I giving something back to the earth... instead of taking space in the cemetery
I have seen similar things before and I like the idea. But how will loved ones feel with the spot they go to "visit" or recognize their loved one, dies? Some of them are seeds planted with the ashes, but many seeds do not germinate, so that also is a concern with that type. It's intriguing though and I'm sure will continue to gain steam.
My dad told me once "When I die, cremate me, and throw me off the side of a mountain pass. That way, there is a good chance a bird will pick up a portion of me and crap me out on someone's windshield." A return to the cycle of life, in some form or another, is preferred for me, too. I don't want some sad marker, weather worn, depicting a small snapshot of this life. I find graves desolate and sad, and that's not how I want anyone I loved to remember me.
I used my mom's ashes when planting flowers and bulbs. Still have some left actually...eventually she will be all over my yard! --I love the pod idea. To me burials, and especially viewings of bodies, are what's creepy.
A few years ago when I was a bit worried about needing a place for my own ashes, the nicest of the local cemeteries has columbariums, but there was one section where ashes could just be scattered around a flower bed.
I like the idea of scattered my ashes, I want mine to be scatted in the ocean.
I personally don't like viewing the bodies of someone who is clearly no longer there, either. But it can be necessary and I understand it better after watching my children (then 12 and 6, now 18 and 12) grieve the loss of their dad. It helped their understanding for them to see his body, even though it was really hard. There might be a lot of ideas of what I think are ideal in the case of my death. But really, that is not important, it's more important what works for those you leave behind. They generally want to honor you and will do so but they need to grieve as well. Sometimes, i think our desires for what happens to our physical body go too far. You aren't there, what does it matter? But it matters to those left behind. A friend of mine, her father was unwell, but not expected to die. Except one day, he just did. His wishes were for nothing. No memorial, no celebration, no party with food, no service, no nothing. It was very hard on his family to not be able to honor his life in any way.
Worst thing I ever witnessed in this regard -- I had an uncle who committed suicide by placing a full can of gasoline in the front seat of his car, then driving fast down a hill and smashing into a huge tree. Of course, the gas exploded and he burned to death. Okay, that's bad enough. But my crazy aunt made his 3 daughters kiss the burned corpse at the funeral.
I would like a Viking style burial where you float out on an old boat and they shoot fire arrows at it. The local council probably wouldn't allow it though, they have by-laws against everything these days!
I think it is interesting how strongly felt and yet difficult to articulate, the different views are with what to do with our vehicle after it stops working.
From my stand point, I would like my vehicle to not take up more time or energy or space than is necessary to offer back to life whatever it might be able to return to it.
No jokes about Soylent green please!
Yum!
Doesn't sound like a bad idea. Unfortunately won't be allowed in most parts of the US, because there are stacks of laws about burial, where and how you get to stick someone in the ground, and additional rules you're forced to follow at the cemetery. Talk about over-regulation. Once you're cremated it's pretty much anything goes. But a body?
We have green funerals available here in rural park like settings with no embalming and where the body is buried in a simple shroud.
but legal.....just to differentiate it from the more common criminal variety.
Not "Shallow Graves R Us" ey?
I think it's nuts how much we regulate death in the US. Oil companies pollute the ground and water constantly and don't even have to tell anyone, but putting a body in the ground to allow natural processes to take place is a no-go. You aren't even supposed to bury your pets. We do, lol. But we live in a rural area.
@silver
I suspect a plethera of outgoing currents into the deep Pacific means local wet workers do not even need to do that.
Aw shucks, @how, I like Soylent Green...jokes! I'm thinking maybe about the only thing my ex and I had in common was a deep appreciation for dark humor.
I get how human burial should have some regulations but what is the reason behind not allowing the burying pets?
I am contemplating an IPhone burial. Basically it is a modern version of premature burial anxiety. However I think of it more as a burial meditation with options to pull out . . .
Failing that building myself into a stupa sounds as if it might be a good way of developing brick laying meditation . . .
For a variety of reasons I was once talking with a very helpful undertaker about Masonic burials for dogs. Apparently these are available. Not sure about cructaceans. The undertaker was also instrumental in cardboard coffins which are cheap, can not remember if just for corpse barbecues but a great option rather than corpse presentation caskets.
Too many choices. I feel spoiled . . .
@how sanitary reasons, supposedly. I doubt anyone will throw a fit about burying a hamster but dogs and cats are specifically not allowed in most areas per ordinance if you are within city limits. There are some regulations by the state for cities that do not have their own, but they want you to dig like 8 feet down and you have to know the water tables and so on.
Aren't there tribes of indigenous Americans who do 'sky burials'? Or is this from somewhere else in the world (we Americans think everything starts with us, please forgive).
I will refrain from posting any images . . . unless you are fond of vultures. Google 'sky burial' for details you don't want to know
Aside from my disgust and horror, being devoured by vultures, rodents, possums, raccoons, dogs, blow flies, ravens and crows is a lot more fulfilling to me than being devoured by invisible microscopic anaerobic bacteria . . . can't even see the little shits!
If it weren't for the torture it would cause my descendants, I'd take a sky burial because I love the 'critters' I can see a lot more than the ones I can't. Is that something I should get over?
Tibatans perform sky burials, because frankly, trying to bury anyone in rocky mountainous regions, at high altitudes, with no woods for hundreds of miles, is the only practical way of disposing of dead bodies.
I think the Chinese Government tried to stamp it out, so i don't know if it is a continued or acceptable practice....
I've actually put it as a first choice of body-disposal in my will.
The one death ritual I can't get past is in India (maybe? I keep thinking the Ganges but I might be wrong) where they put burning bodies in the same river everyone ritually bathes in. A yoga teacher I follow was just in India and was at the Ganges doing a ritual bath and all I could think of was a scene in my head from Baraka where they were burning a body at what appeared to be the same location.
My sister wants what she calls a gypsy burial, but much the same. Wrapped in cloth, put on a wood raft and lit up. I'm not sure the locals would like corpses lit up on their beach though, lol.