BEFITTING BURIALS: Is this practice our original custom and traditions?

BEFITTING BURIALS: Is there such a standard in our custom and traditions?

I remember some years back, in 1986, when my aged grand mother passed on. She was 90 years of age.She was buried the same day. The funeral Acts was quite brief and very colourful.

The announcement of her passage to the great beyond started with the cries and bewilderment of her immediate family and escalated with the sounding of the gongs of a town crier, the ekwé at the central village square accentuated with the exclamations of " Ohoóóó" from members of our extended families to further broadcast the news.

Before long, our compound was filled with men and women come to bid her farewell, and to render what help they could to facilitate her Burial.

She was not stowed in a mortuary refrigerator for weeks and months but was buried on that same day.

Though they were contributions made to pay for her casket, and as a respectable woman during her days, her son's and daughters bought her " eku-ukwu"  and some other items to befit a woman of her status. The total amount of money expended to accomplish all this was not up to N500.00 and this amount was shared amongst her immediate and extended family members.

Nowadays, this simple funeral act would seem as foolish and a complete example of stark raving poverty.

To bury any adult now at this time will be costing nothing less than 500,000 Naira whether you have it or not, you must find a way to provide it, hence many corpses are rotting away at the mortuaries around us.

The shortest time limit to bury the dead in most Okunano communities is at least one month. I have seen people who came home to bury their dead and could not make it back to their various stations in the cities. Stranded, they fall as victims of befitting burials.

Some have also defied their late parent's warning not put their corpses in the mortuaries when they are gone due to lack of funds to bury them.

A standard has been established in Okunano now in terms of burials. It has become a show and a fanfare.
But whether you like it or not, whether you know or not, a lot of people are suffering on this account of risking everything to fund  befitting burials.

My question is: What can be done to help? A re-orientation is important but how can this be deployed to enlighten our people? Is this set standard our custom? How do we retrace back our steps to the original way of our custom as regards to funeral Acts?