Guest Post - Girl Problems in the Mortuary

    A female mortician and I were talking about mortuary work and the topic of fingernails came up. How she managed to wear glove and perform mortuary duties despite having relatively long and elaborate fingernails. So she has decided to write a post about being a woman in the mortuary. Here it is:

Don't get me wrong it's not all bad, but being a female certainly does have its disadvantages. Allow me to elaborate.

Interview with an Undertaker

    Here's the first interview with someone from the funeral industry.  I feel it went well and the topics discussed were quite interesting, it was good to hear such a frank and open opinion on certain things.

Undertakers & Planning Their Funeral

    A common question certain people ask those in the funeral industry is if they have thought about or prepared for their funeral.  Thinking about it I noticed something interesting and odd.  How those in the funeral industry saw and experienced the inside of the industry yet their attitudes to their own funeral were not what I expected.

Misconceptions & Questions - Part 3

    I thought it was about time I did another misconceptions and questions post.  To fix some errors and answer some questions I have received recently.    Here are 15 short misconceptions and questions I have either come across recently or regularly.

Funeral Fun - The cheese incident

    It was during the WNBull Christmas party that a rather funny and strange incident occurred.  The party was in the company chapel at Newtown, a small but rather nice and cosy place.  We were all seated in little groups around the room with a large buffet table in the centre.  We had all kinds of delicious food, honey ham, potato salad, sandwiches, brad rolls and butter cut into thinnish triangles to put on the rolles and so on.  There was more than enough yummy food to go around.  Everyone was having a great time, both the food and the company were nice.  Nobody was drinking particularly much alcohol as most of us had to drive home.  So nobody was expecting anything too wild or out of the ordinary (at least for funeral directors who are an odd bunch).

    Mid-way through the evening someone came up to me and asked if I had heard about the cheese issue with another co-worker.  I was rather puzzled, how can an incident occur with cheese, especially when nobody is drunk?  He explained that the other co-worker had grabbed a piece of butter from the buffet table and put it in his moth.  Then he complained that the cheese wasn't any good.  He had mistaken the butter for slices of cheese.

    Naturally the news of his adventure with the butter spread, partially because this sort of thing was not out of the ordinary for him.  He once asked "what's this?" while pointing at the spare tire in a car.  Another time I washed the shammy he cleaned his hearse with for him.  He had asked me as I was cleaning mine at the same time so he knew I was cleaning it.  Yet when I handed back he looked at it, paused for a bit and then said it wasn't his shammy, that it was the wrong colour.

    I will say that this co-worker was not stupid or even unpleasant.  With him I never knew when he was serious or joking about this kind of thing.  He would say the strangest stuff, knowing it was a joke but do so with a straight face.  Not someone to play poker with.  The funeral industry is full of people like this, wonderfully strange.  Because of this it makes the whole job and industry so much more fun and interesting.

~~

Funeral Fun - The Gloved Man & Stolen Flowers

    It had been a long day before I encountered a strange person on a strange funeral.  I had just finished working a short job in the city, everything had gone well, on the way to the next job I had to collect and take another staff member with me, not an issue as we had a good chat on the way.  So far it was turning out to be quite a fun little day.  The only problem is that we had not eaten since 7:00 and it was now well after 14:00.

Coffin Costs

    The coffin is an important item to any funeral, after all, when one thinks or googles funeral the first things that come up are usually of people carrying or crying over a coffin in a cemetery.  Yet it is so expensive, disproportionately so.  A mid-range coffin will have well over 100% profit on it.  What is interesting is that people pay this cost and that once they find out about the high profit margine they are offended.  We do not like the idea of a funeral home making profits, all despite it being a business like any other.  Coles sells food, Big W sells products and funeral homes sell the process of dealing with the dead.  But they all use the same models and methods to do so.  So here I intend to examine the prices of coffins, what people get for their money and why they cost so much.

    The coffin is one of the most important items in many ways and to many people.  Coffins carry with them an emotional significance for most people, especially when they think it holds the body of their loved one.  I noticed that people will treat the coffin with reverence and significance.  Naturally this varies from culture to culture and person to  person.  For example ethnic people (such as Greeks, Lebanese, Italians, etc) will often want to 'touch' the coffin in some way or see inside it.  They touch it by either by crowding around madly and emotionally or by quietly and calmly carrying it.  Traditional Catholics on the other hand will sometimes touch the coffin by carrying it, but unless they are part of a religious order they will rarely be physically involved with the coffin and not want to see inside.  However they do gaze on it more, for them it is more visually significant than for other cultures.

Ready and waiting to be sold.

    It is also often the most expensive item at a funeral.  This is because it is all but essential for a funeral.  You have to get the body there somehow and people rarely want to see the body itself being interacted with.  People like the body to be in a box or wrapped up heavily and it is this wrapping or box that is handled.  However, while essential this is not the reason the coffin will cost so much, nor is it the reason "high end" coffins exist.  It is because of the previously mentioned significance that they are so costly.  For a low end coffin one could expect to pay $1,000.  For a midrange model one pays $2,000 to $5,000 and for the top end it would cost $6,000 or more.  

    The value for money is quite interesting.  Firstly coffins are just boxes, usually wooden, and looking at them being made this is quite clear.  Although the end product is actively deceptive of this fact, and idea I will expand in another post at another time.  But for now I will explain that they are usually chipboard, just like furniture.  Yes, until you get to the high midrange prices or higher the inside is just chipboard and it will have shiny plastic handles.  One of InvoCares favourite coffins are what people in the industry refer to as "the ikea coffins" or "the snap-together coffins.  Because they literally snak together, they arrive at the funeral home, fresh from China, as flat separate pieces in a cardboard box.  Staff then take these pieces and "whack them together", not needing any glue, nails, stapes or anything else to fix the pieces together.  Due to being made in China on mass they are very cheap for InvoCare, even after shipping they cost well under the price charged.  However they are considered to be very cheap and low quality by those I talked with in the industry.  There were often gaps of almost an inch between whole sides, exposing the contents within.  There was also an incident or two where a coffin got caught as it was lowered at the grave, quite a common affair, but on a few rare occasions they broke open, quite uncommon.  Another interesting point on the low end models is that this is where LifeArt starts and aims most of its advertising.  LifeArt are basically cardboard coffins which are said to be very cheap compared to others and also very environmental.  Luckily neither of these points are particularly true, not that the truth matters to most.  But they cost more than the basic $1,000 chipboard coffins and are made from trees as are the wooden coffins. 

    Of course this is just the low end coffins, with the midrange the quality often changes quite a bit.  For example midrange models are almost always chipboard (which is actually quite decent for a coffin) and put together in a more complex method than the 'snap together' variety.  These coffins will also sometimes feature actual metal handles rather than plastic and have more details on the body of the coffin.  But they cost $5,000 or more, so one would expect these basic changes.  Yet seeing it from the undertakers angle one wonders if this price is worth it.  People outside the industry assumed that if the coffin cost $5,000 for them then it would cost the funeral home $4,000 or more.  It was always assumed that the profit margin was low or at least modest.  When I informed them that the coffin actually cost $1,000 to $2,000 (after shipping and tax) they were quite surprised and outraged.  But why, what is wrong with a business making money?  Well, quite simply I wont answer this here, it is too long and convoluted a concept to discuss in this post.  So for now I will look at why the funeral home has such a high profit on certain coffins.

    As one conductor said "the expensive coffins are the bread and butter of the industry".  He went on to say that this large profit allows the company to survive, to pay the employee wages and cover unforeseen costs.  One would think that the "service fee" families pay for funeral would cover the cost of the funeral.  But it only covers most of it and for that funeral.  There are others where the service fee did not cover everything.  For example I waited for over an hour at RPA for the body to be released (due to the shocking attitudes and management at RPA).  So who paid for the time we spent there, for two people to just sit around for an hour or so?  Well the coffin did.  It would be wrong and inappropriate to pass this cost directly onto the family, whether they can afford it or not.  But it would be just as wrong not to pay the transfer crew for their time.  Thus instead the cost is taken off the cost of the high profit coffins.  So now you might be thinking that undertakers are basically taking the costs of funerals from those who pay for a high profit coffin.  This is essentially correct; the funeral home is doing a funeral yet charing another family for the costs that the original family would refuse.  Nothing is wrong with this practice, the costs have to be covered and it would be wrong or impossible for the funeral home to pass on these costs.  So if they want to stay in business then they have to find the money somewhere.  This somewhere is high profit coffins, if people are willing to pay this price then the funeral home has every right to charge the price.  A suit salesman once told me that he would charge over 180% profit in some suburbs for his suits to cover the costs of selling suits at a slight loss in other places.  It is simply the same process at work with coffins.

    Actually the whole coffin sale process is quite refined.  Tom Jokinen explains the American coffin sale process in 'Curtains: Adventures if an undertaker in training' (an amusing and true book).  Here he illustrates how where coffins are placed in the "show room" is strictly dictated.  And not just their hight, but their lateral location (as in which is on the right and which is on the left).  They even specifically design the pathway people will walk, working out the direction and pace of travel.  All very American and related to McDonaldization, yet in Australia we do not do things quite the same way.  The sale of coffins is often more relaxed here, although showrooms exist and are thought about they are not thought of in the same detail as in America.  In fact WNBull (a top funeral home in Sydney and one of the most expensive) did not even have a show room of any sort.  One existed in the past but they found it was not used very much or well and as such turned it into a meeting room.  This is interesting in and of itself.  That in America the show room is considered important if not essential for most funeral homes according to Jokinen.  Yet in Australia even a top funeral home did not see a need for a show room and instead thought a staff meeting room would be more effective.  Actually, not many funeral homes in Australia have show rooms.

    Many undertakers who are involved with organising a funeral for a loved one, or themselves, will tend to buy the midrange coffins.  These people will also either inspect the coffin in the trim shop, not in the show room or simply pick it from a book (like most Australians).  However they will always have a pre-determined preference for the coffin.  They know what they want, what they will pay and what they will get and they got for that.  Talking with undertakers who had organised funerals for relatives it was clear they were never sold a coffin so much as bought the coffin.  Yet more interestingly, knowing the value and markup, people with industry experience will either got for the very cheapest of the cheap of upper midrange.  From talking with them I think it is because they know the value of the cheap coffin is decent and they do not see the reasoning for paying more.  After all, these are people who have been to several funerals every day for the past few years which has made it a mundane and common affair.  When they got for the upper midrange it appears to usually be because of the "value" or "quality" that they see in these coffins.  They know what they are getting, know the high profits and yet think of these coffins as quite worth it for themselves and their loved ones. 

    If one wanted to buy and provide a coffin themselves without going through a funeral home then this is quite possible.  Simply contact a coffin manufacturer and see which one will sell a single coffin.  Almost all Australian coffin manufactures would be quite happy and willing to sell one coffin to someone (and have done so in the past, even taking custom orders).  I would recommend 'Beta Caskets' for this as they have good service, are good quality and well priced.  You might pay a lot more than it cost to make, but it would still be cheaper than buying it from a funeral home.  Again, despite knowing this and having contacts with coffin manufacturers funeral directors are still most likely to buy the coffin through the funeral home.  I have never heard of someone with industry experience buying the coffin from the manufacturer.

    Value is an complicated idea when talking about coffins.  One dimension is that they have an emotional value, playing an important role in the funeral service.  On another side they have a financial value, people want quality for paying thousands.  Yet this value decreases as price increases with top range coffins having over 100% profit for the funeral home.  At first many people find this profit avaricious, to be taking advantage of the dead and the grieving to make money.  Upon closer inspection this becomes transparently false as the money does go to covering valid unspoken costs.  Without the top end coffins there would be far fewer funeral homes and far fewer options for families.

~~

Ignoring the Dead & the Consequences

    One of the biggest issues with the funeral industry is a lack of thought or discussion about it.  Not because it is a taboo or inappropriate subject, but for other reasons such as a lack of information and an odd idea that others find it upsetting or taboo.  This lack of discussion leds to serious issues and deregulation.

    Many argue that it is a 'hidden industry' and that most people do not want to know about it.  Either that it is taboo, upsetting or just something to keep quiet.  However I disagree with this entirely.  People are almost always quite happy to talk about it, and actually really interested in the industry.  This is why it started 'The Other Side of Funerals', to feed people the information they crave.

    It was almost surprising the first time I saw the white Toyota van and was told that it was the transfer vehicle.  It was very unexpected to find out that the body is picked up and brought to the funeral home in the back of a Toyota Hiace van.  What was more surprising is how I had never actually thought about this. About how the body is moved about, I knew they would die in hospital then turn up in a coffin at the funeral.  Everything in the middle was an absence, an area I had never avoided because I had never even considered it.  And I think this is the case for most people.  It is not a topic we avoid thinking or talking about, but a topic we never think or talk about.

    When driving families whilst on funerals I never brought up the topic of how the industry worked.  But it was surprising how often and keenly the family asked me about it.  Especially once they realised that I would be open, honest and still quite diplomatic and not graphic about the industry.  One would consider this to be an inappropriate time to discuss these things.  Here they are, in a black car following a hearse containing the body of their loved one.  Yet they always appreciated it, now knowing for sure that their loved one had been treated respectfully and what the basics of the process was.  I never once had a bad reaction from those who asked about the industry.

    A certain mortician at Westmead Hospital once told me about how the hospital had an open day one a year.  And once the heads of the hospital had asked if the mortuary would be appropriate or possible to include in tours.  The mortuary staff agreed, saying they had no issue with showing and explaining to people about the mortuary.  Then the first open day rolled around which would include the mortuary, the staff did not thinking many of the public would be willing or interested.  Yet they had too many people, the day was scheduled to shut at 16:00 and he said they were still letting people inside well after 19:00.  It was a huge success and very popular.  So popular in fact that the hospital then started regular tours, first focusing on bringing people from the military, police, fire brigade and so on, the aim was to let them experience a body and understand the mortuary.  But after a while the mortuary staff put a stop to the tours as they were becoming a 'freak show'.  The hospital even went as far as to invite young boy scouts to see the bodies and mortuary.  So the public is so keen and willing to see a mortuary.

    This defies what I have experienced at most hospitals.  Mortuaries are never labelled on maps or the doors, the only two exceptions I know of being Concorde and Westmead.  Instead the mortuary is down a corridor at the end of a car park and behind doors that look as though they lead to a closet.  Hospitals do their best to hid the fact that they have a mortuary, almost as though admitting its existence would be telling the patients that they will die.  They hide the mortuary as though they are hiding the fact of death within their hospital.  Yet the one time that I know of where they publicised its existence and even held tours it was hugely popular.

    Because we never think of the industry there are a lot of areas and processes which exist, yet are unknown.  They are blankes in how we think.  perhaps the best example in the movement of the body; tehy die in a nursing home and arrive at the funeral already in a coffin.  But how did this happen, how did they make it to the funeral home or into the coffin?  You probably do not know and yet it happens every day.

    There is a lot of misunderstanding about the industry.  Because many do not know much about it they believe the strangest things.  A great one is that gravediggers steal belongings from coffins, a really odd idea.  They barely have time to eat lunch let alone open a whole coffin on the chance that they would get something of value.  Or that undertakers will break a persons legs to fit them in the coffin when breaking legs involves so much work compared to bending them (you bend your legs all the time when you walk or sit, it is not hard), or getting just a bigger coffin.

    But why is it such a hidden and misunderstood industry?  If we are not against talking about it then why do we never actually talk about it?  I have heard many argue that it is a taboo topic, something inappropriate to discuss.  These people then go on to argue how this is changing over time and the industry is now more 'appropriate' to talk about.  While this may have once been true it is no longer the case these days at all.  As I said before, people are really interested in the industry and very rarely take offence to anything said.  There are two reason I believe people do not know about funerals.  The first being that they think others will be offended or find in inappropriate or upsetting.  Discussing how a body is moved and handled could upset someone whose loved one recently died.  And yet this is rarely if ever the case.  People are often more interested as they now have been involved in the process.  Plus they like to know how their loved one was treated.  The second reason is that people have little information about the industry.  How many know someone who works as an undertaker, gravedigger or another similar role?  How many have read a book or seen a movie about the funeral industry and not just one set in the industry?  There is actually rather little information or acknowledgement of the industry.

    So now you might be asking what the result of this lack of knowledge leads to.  Well, it has a direct and serious impact on the industry as a whole.  The first, and most important to many, case is with hospitals.  They hid the morgue for various reasons and this lets the place be mis-managed.  Most hospitals have decent morgues, clean enough and organised well enough.  I have noticed that those with dedicated and full-time staff are by far the best, especially compared to just having casual support staff who take care of the morgue along with many other duties.  Westmead is a good example, with dedicated staff who are responsible for everything they are also proud of everything.  The place is so neat and clean that the blue floors would be more hygienic than your kitchen stove.  With not even a paint chip or scuff mark to be seen then place is actually really nice inside.  At Westmead they also signpost the location of the mortuary, not hiding it from anyone.  However RPA there is no sign to identify it, the mortuary is located in the middle of a service corridor, scuff marks along the walls, rubbish and food processing nearby.  The support staff are always late to arrive, often making funeral staff wait an hour or more, which is then tacked onto the cost of the funeral for the family.  RPA is hated by many in the industry (myself included) and we would never want to have a loved one die in that hospital.  And it use to be worse, much worse.  The old mortuary was even more run-down and mis-managed to the point where they found a dead baby behind a fridge when renovating.  Hiding the mortuary lets problems bread and does not help anyone.

    Another issue from a lack of thought is the deregulation of the industry.  If one wants to become a funeral director all they really need is a briefcase, phone, fax and computer.  Everything else from mortuary to hearse and even staff can be leased out for the day by these "briefcase funeral directors".  The result is that they have little control or influence in the process, allowing for all kinds of misconduct and mistakes.  It was actually rather amusing but when I started in the industry it was discovered that a small catering company who had never organised a funeral got given an important state funeral in Canberra.  Obviously they were the lowest bidder andas such who knows what the funeral was like.  There are no qualifications or credentials needed to join the funeral industry, if you want to join all you should have is a drivers license, and even that is optional.  This deregulation is also having an impact in transfers.  I have heard stories from funeral directors where they have done police transfers, pulling bodies out of cars or taking them from the crime scene to the coroners.  And all they get is a regular suit and a pair of latex gloves.  Appart from the gloves there is little to no protective equipment.  It is not like the movies, or like America, where the coroners has a special and dedicated transfer crew.  Instead in Australia it is just a local funeral home who will take the body from one place to the next.  Yes, just a couple of undertakers working for minimum wage, with no training and no protective equipment are the ones who transfer bodies about.

    Overall the funeral industry is a hidden and unknown one.  But not because it is taboo so much as people do not know about it and some think it will offend people.  This lack of public knowledge lends room for misconduct and deregulation.  No qualifications or training is needed to become a funeral director or transfer bodies from crime scenes or anywhere else.  If the public would look at the industry a little closer regulations which are desperately needed could be introduced.  The public would also find the work and processes to be a lot less upsetting, taboo or grose than thought.

~~

How We View the Undertaker & Why Many Deny the Job

    Funeral directors get a lot of different and often strong reactions when telling people their occupations.  In fact many funeral directors I talked with admitted that they had lied about or avoided the topic of their job at least once.  They are not ashamed of what they do, no, they are actually often quite proud.  However they feel others would likely judge them for doing the work they do.

    This is not an unfounded notion.  For example take a moment to think of 'funeral director' or 'undertaker'.  One will usual conjure an image of a strange guy in a dark suit and oddly wearing a top hat, a person who is odd in nature and a little creepy.  To further this google "undertaker" and you will find, strangely enough, the top images are of a wrestler.  His clothing and appearance is dark, wearing a brimmed black hat and usually shown as dimly lit and with fog.  Search "funeral director" and we find more images of various people in dark suits; many of whom are walking in front of or next to a hearse.  Although many of them are smiling most of them are lacking colour or warmth.  Looking for "embalmer" or "mortician" we get images of people in a mortuary, usually over a steel table, posing with tools or performing a procedure.  All of these images are cold, the tiled walls, the vapid colours and the lack of expression on the persons face.  There is rarely any colour other than hospital green and no smiling in any of these photos.

    It is clear that searching for funeral people or related positions results in almost negative results.  But we might doubt this is representative of the general public.  After all, search for "archaeology" and the top hit is of Indiana Jones swinging his whip.  However I very much doubt this would be the first thought for most people when they think of archaeology.  So it is not much of a leap to assume that the google results for funeral professional images would not be too smilar to what people think of funeral professionals.

    Yet this is not the case, people do think of strange things when thinking of undertakers.  Undertakers have just cause for 'hiding' what they do for a living from others.  A common reaction I and others in the industry have experienced is "I couldn't do that".  This is one of the first things a few have said to me, and something several in the industry said they have heard.  As if the job is for very few and definitely not for them.  In saying this most are referring to what they perceive as a difficult job, both in terms of being dirty and emotional.

    Lets break down this idea of it being a dirty job.  What is strange is that it is usually less dirty a job than what a nurse, doctor or carer would have.  The closest undertakers get to the body is putting the deceased in a bag and then later putting clothes on them.  There is little actual contact with a body, less than for many carers.  Yet it is considered more dirty than other jobs by most people.  But not just dirty, it is also seen as grose and unclean.  A nurse deals with the living, an undertaker deals with the dead and just this fact makes the job more dirty.  I have been questioned about the 'quality' of bodies, how they decompose and how fast they decompose.  A few people have said how the job must be bad at times commenting that bodies decompose fairly fast.  What they do not realise is that the funeral industry is an old and experienced one.  Bodies are preserved in a special fridge.  People have an idea that the job involves dealing with decomposing bodies constantly.  These questions and ideas lead to the notion that the process of touching a body, let alone interacting with 'it' is dirty.  I have also been asked about "the smell of death", which does not exist, the closest thing is the smell of the embalming chemicals.  Their scent would cling to clothing, and some people did comment on the odd smell.  But it is closer to a chemical smell than a 'scent of death'.  The very idea that death can have a smell, and that undertakers would be use or exposed to it is interesting.  Death itself has a presence, which lingers on those who associate themselves with it.  In other words this dirtiness of the body (in this case the smell) clings to those who work with bodies.  It follows them home and stays with them.  Basically to many the act of touching a body is dirty in itself, but also that this dirtiness transfers to those who touch the body.

    The emotional difficulty is also something some raise.  Just recently I had someone say "it must be emotionally hard".  That undertakers have a depressing job in dealing with the depressed living and dealing with the dead.  Many think of a funeral as a sad and fairly depressing affair.  We turn once again to our friend google to look for images of "funeral".  What comes up are pictures, usually void of colour and just black and white of people standing around a coffin in a cemetery.  The people are often crying or looking sadly at the coffin as it is either carried or lowered.  What I found is that many funerals, while sad in a way, are a 'celebration' of the departed.  People did not linger on the negatives of their loss but clung to the positives of their impact on those left behind.  Of the good times they had and the good memories they will keep.  However, to be perfectly honest, most funerals are more an excuse to have lunch while catching up with relative otherwise rarely seen.  I was primarily a 'family car driver', which involved driving around the close family and/or friends of the deceased on the funeral.  These families or friends were rarely depressed or difficult.  Actually most were actually really fun and great people, and we often had a great time together.  So funerals, and those attending, are not really emotionally difficult or draining in most cases.  As for dealing with death and bodies this is not an issue.  Not to sound cold but you will get use to it after a couple of bodies.  Medical professionals who treat and work with patients have more trouble with 'death' or 'bodies than funeral directors.  For example at some nursing homes where the staff focused on or spent a lot of time with patients they were sad to see them die.  These nurses would often be involved in the transfer if they could, wanting to oversee the paperwork and the process.  In doing so they would quietly or silently say their goodbyes to the patient.  However the funeral director did not know the deceased in anyway other than them being deceased.  Thus there is less emotional connection, simply put it is not personal.  Having said that children or babies were different, especially to parents and more so if the deceased reminded them of their own child.  While funerals were rarely a sad event, more often being closer to a family gathering, the children's funerals were different.  They were not 'sad' or 'depressing' but were much more tense.  Everything was more important, everything was more observed and everything had to go perfectly.  Appart from children or infants overall I found being an undertaker was emotionally less difficult than working on a cash register.

    There was once instance that was surprising to me.  I had driven an older man, his wife and their first daughter on a funeral.  The relation they had to the deceased I cannot remember.  Either way the job had gone well and despite the husband and wife's lack of English we had a good time.  We had a good time and everything had gone well.  Then about six weeks later I was sent to an address that appeared familiar. upon arrival I recognised the place.  It turned out that the husband had died and I was now driving his wife and all three daughters.  Overall it was a really enjoyable job, the wife (still lacking English) obviously appreciated me being there again.  We again had a good day, although now it had a slightly sad atmosphere to it.  This was the closest I ever came to an emotional connection.

    So people unreasonably see it as a dirty, emotionally negative job.  But this is not enough for those in the industry to hide their occupation.  The main reason for this is that a few people judge those with the job negatively.  It is rare and I only experienced it once, yet it happens and especially with older or Asian people.  Once they find out that the person is a funeral director they want little to do with that person.  Mainly as they see it as dirty and that not only does this dirtiness follow the undertaker home but it makes the undertaker themselves dirty.  Yes, some believe undertakers to be dirty or contaminated, marked by death and disease.  Look at certain Asian cultures (such as those who are Buddhist, Indian or Chinese) who consider those in the funeral industry to be untouchable and the lowest class possible.  A good example is the movie 'Departures' where a Japanese man discovers his calling in the funeral industry after he is unable to find any other work.  At first he is reluctant and fights the idea of being an undertaker, only doing so as he is desperate for work.  And when his wife finds out she leaves him.  To certain groups being a funeral director is not just dirty but also wrong.

    Many, especially those who are older or Asian, would react badly to the news of one being a funeral director.  Even if they do not react badly, they often react inappropriately or are uneasy with the news.  Thus many undertakes have avoided or actively lied about what they do for a living.  All despite most being proud of what the job and understanding that, while it is not dirty or emotion, that most people will view it this way.

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Misconceptions & Questions - Part 2

This is the second post of misconceptions and questions I have found about the funeral industry.

Misconceptions & Questions - Part 1

Misconceptions & Questions - Part 3

Complete List of misconceptions & questions


- Has anyone ever been buried / cremated alive or woken up in a mortuary?
I do not know for sure, but I doubt it. The body is kept in a fridge which is between 3-5C. Too cold for anyone to survive long, especially on a metal or plastic tray and without clothes. So even if someone did go into a mortuary alive (which I doubt would happen) they would never wake up.

- What is rigor mortise and can you get rid of it?
Rigor mortise is basically a stiffening of the limbs.  The joints become difficult to bend, this does not happen with all bodies, in fact it does not even happen in most. The way it is gotten rid of is through a process called "breaking the rigor mortise". Basically you bend the limbs back and forward a few times and the joints will losen up. This 'breaks' the stiffness and the body is back to normal.

- Is everybody embalmed?
No, in fact very few people are embalmed in Australia (unlike America or New Zealand where it is basically mandatory).  Generally it is only done if needed for interstate or international transfers or if the body is going into a vault.  There are several types of embalming ranging from ‘TP’ which is a temporary embalm used for preservation on long distance transfers.  Then there is the ‘full embalm’ which can preserve a body indefinitely.  Used mainly for those wishing to go in a vault or other special circumstances this is the real embalming dating back at least as far as the Egyptians.



- How long does it take to embalm a body?
There are several types of ‘embalming’ from the temporary ones to transfer them interstate or internationally to the full embalm to preserve the body for a long time.  It will usually take about three hours to fully embalm a person.



- Does it smell in the mortuary and / or do you smell after working in there?
Sometimes, it depends. As with cooking, it sometimes smells, other times it does not, it depends on what you are doing. Some bodies smell, either they have "leaked" out an end or they have decomposed or they just smell. Other times it is due to the chemicals used by the embalmer. It is also the chemical smell which can cling to clothing, not the smell of the body.



- How do you keep bodies?
All mortuary fridges are kept between 3 and 5 degrees celsius.  Any colder and they begin to freeze which damages the body and makes it hard to work with.  Any warmer and there will be obvious side effects (like rotting).  I, and others, have noticed that certain fungi will grow on bodies kept in the fridge for long periods.  It is either orange or white and not found anywhere else.  Not even on similar bodies if they are out of the fridge for a long time, nor on the fridge itself.  This fungi is just something that can only grow on a body when it is kept in a fridge.



- Do you 'reconstruct' the body?
Rarely will we do much more than put on clothes and suture the mouth shut or brush their hair. Funeral homes in Australia avoid delving into makeup and other methods to make the body look life like. This is because it is just so difficult to get right. The person may have worn a lot of makeup, or very little, we do not know. And going by a photo is difficult because colours are not always accurate. Hair styling is something they also shy away from. Getting it 'just right' or at least 'good enough' for families is so difficult. Undertakers are not hairdressers, they are not makeup artists, they are just workers ferrying the dead about. I have never seen a funeral home employ a hairdresser or makeup specialist, nor have I even hear of it. 


- Have you seen 'Six Feet Under'?
This is perhaps the most known TV show about a funeral home. And it is a great show, well written, interesting rounded characters, etc. But it is not accurate of an Australian funeral home. For one we do not embalm many bodies (although it is becoming more common), we very rarely put makeup or anything similar on a body (even if it is for viewing) and we always wear gloves when handeling the deceased or even in the mortuary. On the show they have a lot more focus on 'fixing' the appearance of the deceased. Using special tools and chemicals to make them look like they are sleeping. In Australia we tend to just suture the mouth shut, put some eye-caps under the eyelids and nothing much else. ALso on that show they never wear gloves much. Here we must always put on gloves before we even enter the mortuary.
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What is a Funeral Director?

    What a funeral director or undertaker is may appear to be simple or obvious.  But it is surprising how many people get it wrong.  Unless they have been in or heavily around the industry many are quite wrong about = the industry.  What our roles are, our responsibilities, what happens, who runs things and so on.  Thus I have decided to put together a brief post about what a funeral director actually is.  I will cover some other roles in the industry, but the focus is on funeral directors.

    The public perspective is that the undertaker will organise the funeral, bring the coffin to the funeral, then to the grave or crematorium and that is basically it.  This is fairly wrong.  To start a 'funeral director' can mean and involve many different things.  Once a mortician at a major hospital was telling me about the family of a deceased believing funeral directors were a rip off and un-necessary.  As such they wanted to do everything themselves and save the thousands it costs to hire an undertaker.  However he refused to release the body from the hospital as they did not have an appropriate vehicle.  They had bought a station-wagon just for the job.  But you need more than this, there are actual regulations and laws about what a vehicle needs to transfer a body, which a normal car does not meet.  So they had the car modified specially, now it met the qualifications but he still could not release the body as they had incorrect papers.  Then the family had issues with the cemetery.  Finally they got a funeral director after much expense and waisted time.  So obviously there is more to the role than just filling some forms and carrying a coffin.

I will break down the funeral director's role in order of action from beginning to end.

- Arranging the funeral: The arrangers are often experienced funeral directors who will go to the family's house and organise what they want on the funeral.  From the coffin and flowers to printing the orders of service and buying the grave plot or booking the crematorium.  They will book everyone and everything needed and just make sure it is all organised.

- Collecting the body: Firstly the funeral staff have to actually collect the body (through a process called a transfer).  It could involve collecting the body from a hospital, crime scene, home, nursing home or just about anywhere else you can think of.

- Preparing the body: A lot of people have wishes for what they want done to their body when they die.  And many are not willing or able to carry out these wishes on a loved one.  This may involve just dressing the deceased in certain clothing.  Or it could involve embalming the body for long-distance trips or for a crypt.  The body is placed in the coffin in this stage as well.

- Driving: The hearse is long, big and heavy.  It is best thought of as a small low truck or bus.  And somebody has to drive it, after all, not many funerals do not have a hearse.  While the hearse is almost always essential it is often not the only car used on the funeral.  This is what a lot of people do not realise until they are involved in a funeral.  Funeral directors also supply and often drive 'family/mourning cars' for close family and friends to travel in.  It is basically a hire car driver role, not as much of a job as a real HC driver, but still very similar.

- Working the funeral: Although people see funeral directors at the funeral not many people actually look or remember the undertaker.  The funeral staff often have light-hearted chats or jokes with the public, so it is not due to a 'morbid' or 'taboo' reasoning.  Funeral staff will get people to sign the condolence book, carry the coffin, assist with the ceremony (religious or otherwise), direct people to the facilities such as toilets, help less mobile people in/out, direct people to parking if needed and much more.  There is a lot going on behind the scenes on funerals, and the funeral directors do it all.

- Conducting the funeral: This is separate as it is a separate role and even position.  Conductors get paid more and are responsible for everything on the day of the funeral.  The rest of the funeral staff do not see them much, turning to the hearse driver instead.  This is because the conductor will spend more time with the family or celebrant(s) and be unable to organise things out at the front of the funeral.  But everything that happens on a funeral is ultimately the responsibility of the conductor.

- Carrying the coffin at the cemetery/crematorium: Sometimes people will carry on a funeral, however it is not something I would bet on with most funerals.  Instead the funeral directors will carry the coffin about.  However even if the family and/or friends do carry at the first part of the service they are unlikely to do so at the grave side of crematorium.  They realise how heavy the coffin can be.  How those handels, while pretty, are incredibly awkward and painful to hold.  Then they look at the long, uneven and sometimes narrow distance needed to carry along.  And they decline, falling quietly into the crowed.  So yes, the funeral director will often end up carrying at some part of the service.

    That is about it.  There is more to the role, but nothing important or relevant.  This is basically the job of a funeral director.  Undertakes can however have less roles.  By this I mean they can specialise, such as only doing transfers, or only doing mortuary work, or only driving the hearse.

    There are many odd misconceptions surrounding the role of a funeral director.  The most common is confusing funeral directors with grave diggers or crematorium staff.  I was once told by a very strange man who I was driving on a funeral that he had a lot of ties with funeral directors.  As a doctor he had met a lot, which is usually untrue, we do not meet many of the 'competition' in the health service unless it is in a mortuary.  He also said that although this was the first funeral he had been to he talked with many funeral directors over the years.  And that he knew we buried the bodies after the service at the grave so he would have time for a fe coffees while I buried his brother.  I pictured myself, in my three piece suit, with a shovel in the middle of a grave.  No matter how much I informed him otherwise he was convinced I would be the one to burry his brother.  This is so wrong, the grave diggers burry the coffin.  And they are qualified tradesmen/gardeners.  You will see them at the cemetery with their workers fluro shirts or driving trucks.  They have nothing to do with the body and we have nothing to do with it after the service.

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