Ashes to Ashes －灰は灰に－

I have a student who had a romantic notion about what should happen to her ashes after she dies. 

“Although I’m Japanese, I wanted my ashes to be scattered into the River Ganges after my death,” she told me. 

She changed her mind after actually visiting India. 

“The river seemed quite dirty.  I’m not sure I would like to spend eternity there.” 

In Britain people are sometimes cremated too, and their ashes are placed in an urn and given to their family. 

Just like my student who had a romantic notion about the River Ganges, Britons sometimes have romantic notions about where their ashes should be placed after their death.  It is not uncommon for fanatical fans of a particular football club to request that their ashes be buried underneath the pitch of their club’s home ground. 

But what if the club moves to another ground? 

This happened at the football club York City recently.  The club sold its old ground, where the team had played for 89 years, to housing developers.  The ashes of 15 fans had been buried under the old ground.  The club called in archaeologists to try to recover the ashes before the houses are built.  In the last article I read about the story, they had recovered 7 sets of ashes.  So 8 sets of ashes have not been recovered. 

I suppose the moral of the story is that this world is for the living, not for the dead.