My father passed away 11 days ago, on July 24, 2024, due to complications from his diabetes. He died alone at home during the night, and was discovered by the social worker who came in the morning to help him with the household chores.
By the time he was found, his body was already cold. He was moved to the university hospital in the city where the medical personnel tried to resuscitate him, but to no avail. My father was then pronounced dead. He was 82.
I was working in the office in Singapore when I received notice of his death from my sister. I immediately booked the plane ticket and took the flight back to Japan the following evening. I was able to get to the undertaker’s in time for the wake.
His body was lying in the bedding on the tatami floor with his mouth wide open. He looked as though he was sleeping. Later, the mortician cleaned him up and gave him make-up before placing him in a coffin. After the clean-up, he looked a bit too proper, quite different from his usual sloppy self.
As was the case with my mother’s passing four years ago, a multitude of memories coursed through my head when I learned of his death, and I couldn’t sleep a wink on the first night. I was too much in a state of shock to cry.
On the evening of my arrival in Japan, the Buddhist monk of our family’s go-to temple conducted the wake, with only my sister and I attending. The monk chanted a long prayer to Amitabha, which was completely unintelligible to me. It seemed to clear the air for the deceased, nonetheless, and I felt peaceful afterward.
We held the funeral the next morning, where we invited around 10 to 12 people, mainly relatives. Once again, the monk said a long chant, and each attendant burned incense in front of the coffin to pay their respects.
We placed a bunch of flowers in different colors inside the coffin so it looked as though my father was sleeping in a flowery bed. Before the lid was finally closed, I kissed his forehead multiple times to bid him farewell. It was then that I was overtaken by emotions and cried for the very first time since his death.
We moved to the nearby crematorium to cremate my father’s body. It took around an hour to reduce his body to ashes, during which time the attendants had lunch and I gave a tearful speech reminiscing about the extremely close relationship between my father and I. If I do say so myself, it was a nice and moving speech, which would have made my father proud.
I was in a daze the following day, and couldn’t get to the administrative tasks until late in the afternoon. In the meanwhile, I engaged in a job that I was good at—cleaning up around the house and sorting through my father’s possessions. With the exception of one T-shirt that I kept as a memento, I placed all of my father’s clothing items in numerous plastic bags and had them collected by the municipality for recycling.
My father was living alone, and as he was a bit of a hoarder, the house he left behind was full of clutter. As I have inherited this house, my overarching tasks for the next year would be to run the probate process and to dispose of almost all his possessions and make the house tidy and livable again.
I have yet to decide whether to sell the house or rent it out, but as I continue to clean up the house over the next few visits to Japan, I believe that the conclusion would naturally present itself in due course.
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