I woke up in the middle of the night as the neighboors next door were calling for help, as David, on of their sons I presume, was not feeling well.
While listening to the debate weather them calling an ambulance or not, I took a book I’m reading called “Ganesha on the Dashboad” by V. Raghunathan which questions many of Indian traditions, as they lack, what the Indian author describes as “scientific temper“.
Which brought me to the question: Why are people buried when they die?… To my understanding it’s some foolish tradition that happens to be a big business for packing nicely a body that is going to decompose anyway, not to mention the space it unnecessarily occupies in this piece of land called cementery.
What if Hindus were buried instead of cremated? would there be enough space in India for all of them? I wonder if burying is actually cheaper than cremating, or viceversa. or maybe it has to be with a sociological explanation, desguised as a religious one (as usual).
If it’s a sociological explanation, then maybe the Christian view has to do with nature, decomposition and nurturing the land. Maybe this is why bodies were buried… considering, of course, there were no space constraints in ancient times. But where they in India?… I don’t think so, which complicates far more my assumptions.
In any case, I thought it was an interesting topic to investigate on, hopefully I’ll get some answers. And yes, it sucks to be waked up un the middle of the night, but at least I’m almost done with the book.
At the end I don’t think no ambulance came, so in case anyone was worried, Davide is O.K…. and I go back to sleep.