by
Obododimma Oha
When I die, what text would I like to have on my tombstone? Culturally, not
many people like the idea of death or talking about it, what more predicting
one's death and making plans for one's exit. Many people want to go and claim
the mansions that Jesus Christ has gone to get ready for us, but not many
people want to die first. Didn't Bob Marley say so in one of his revolutionary
songs? We want to go to Heaven with our mortal bodies. We forget that things of
mortality belong to mortality. Even if we have buried millions of people before
-- good-looking and bad-looking -- the reality of dying first does not dawn
upon us. It has to be another person that will die and not me. It is not my
portion! So, culturally, nobody wants to die. We are afraid of dying mainly
because we do not know what awaits us over there. The point then is that death
remains an area of silence in many cultures. You must not talk about it so as
not to attract it, so goes the dominant superstition.
The consequences of the fear and silence are enormous. One of them, and
perhaps the most disturbing, is that many people die ill-prepared. And dying
not well prepared means death occurring suddenly and taking us by surprise. To
use the right language, they die intestate -- without making any will and
leaving battle-fields behind in some cases. But this was not so in the
indigenous Igbo world, for instance, or many indigenous African
traditions. In the indigenous world in
the past, the elder dying or knowing that he or she would die, carried out an
important discursive activity called "ike ekpe" in Igbo which was
essentially an oral discourse in which the dying would utter final desire for
the distribution of property. In that culture, no one should go against the
wishes of this dying person in relation to the distribution of property left
behind. Going against such wishes meant fighting with the supernatural! That
could be very risky! Further, there is
the negative consequence that the dying person fails to put his or her spirit
in order and to prepare for the "journey."
It is in the context of this fear for dying that giving an answer to the
question may attract objections and even anger. If one goes further to arrange
for one's funeral or to ask that one's corpse be cremated, that could be seen
as an abomination, an alu! Cremation? Tụfịakwa! In Igbo culture, a body that can be cremated is that of an ọgbanje, as a
punishment for an evil changeling that thinks it can reincarnate and die
soon, just to punish the unfortunate host. The body of somebody that has made
the self a host to many evil spirits through charms can also be cremated. Certainly
not the corpse of somebody on whom has not been found an offensive
spirituality. I am sure the ancient Igbo people were thinking of the consequences of this burning of the corpse for a reincarnation! What more the shock that a dying person is making cremation a will!
Many would see the question as being
an ill-placed inquiry. But, if not for this attitude, what would I love to have
as epitaph? In all honesty, I would like to see boldly inscribed on my
tombstone: "Here lies a man who lived and died for the living." That
looks a bit ambitious and high-sounding. Many have lived and died for the
living. If that was so, then, one is only queuing up behind them. Exactly that!
One is not claiming to be the first, especially when we limit dying for the
living to family or community. Perhaps one common example is Jesus Christ who
is said to have died on the cross for the living, for a universal human family
we could call "Christian," going beyond the one established by Joseph
the carpenter or the larger one established by the Jews. So, one is happy to
queue up behind him for sacrificing himself for the living, that life could
continue, or be preserved, not death and extermination and sacking of
communities.
Recently, the Igbo maverick artist, Charles Oputa (Charlie Boy), actualized
that strange preparation for death by buying his own casket -- an expensive and
"comfortable" Lamborghini, lying inside it to check it (see
photographs below). Charlie Boy actualized what was on the minds of many but which
consideration of what other people might say prevented them from carrying out.
But what Charlie Boy failed to realize in spite of actualizing the strange
was that the casket was going nowhere and that it belonged to the soil and
would decay and disappear with Charlie Boy the owner and occupant! One's name
even stays in this life world. It belongs to this world. Even if one chooses to
be interred with all of one's money and cars and houses, such burial of things
amounts to a waste of resources and only reminds us about the ancient people
thinking that the dead would need slaves and gold and other stuff in the
afterlife. That is only an additional superstition. Perishable things will
perish. Mortality belongs to mortality. Once one is dead, one is dead. That is
why it is important to focus on the living and to make their lives less
agonizing.
Charlie Boy could be making yet a very important statement about getting
ready if one finds oneself in the "departure lounge." Somebody in his
or her 70s should try to get ready and not deceive self by rejecting death,
saying "it is not my portion." Whose portion, then? Human body has expiry date; it was not built
to last forever. So, if one is near the exit, one does not have to start praying
for longer life. For 2000 years? Does one want to turn to a lizard or to a
fossil? When one gets to the exit point, one should start getting ready, not
retiring from active service only to start looking for another employment
requiring active service! Or arranging for the extermination of young people
who would take over the baton and continue the race. Does one think that this
market place tolerates anyone coming and not going home? Even vultures and mad
people we think own the market still go home! So, Charlie Boy's statement is
loud, symbolic, and clear.
Charlie Boy lying in a casket he hopes to possess 1
Source: The Truest Truism
Source: The Truest Truism
Charlie Boy poses for a photograph with a casket he has chosen for himself. Source: The Truest Truism.
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