SVG Funerals

I went to my first St. Vincent funeral on Saturday afternoon/evening. In the US, funerals are often perceived as sad and kind of bleak, but funerals in St. Vincent are really a celebration of the person's life. The whole town is invited to attend and hundreds of people come to pay their last respects. Funerals typically begin with an open-casket viewing, with funeral attendees forming a procession through the church to walk by the casket. The typical funeral service lasts 2 - 3 hours, though I've heard of services pushing toward 4 hours. During the service, family members and friends give testimonies about the person's life and everyone sings, dances and prays. There is some crying, but the ceremony is generally viewed as a moment of celebration both of the life and the after-life of the person. After the ceremony, the coffin is driven to the cemetary and the funeral procession follows on foot or by car (depending on how far the cemetary is from the church). If on foot, the group dances and sings during the journey. At the cemetary, there is more dancing and singing as the person is buried, and then special dances and songs are performed in which participants (mainly family and friends) lay flowers over the gravesite and light candles. The graves are literally heaped with flowers - in SVG, it is customary for people to bring wreaths of flowers to a funeral and ALL the wreaths are piled up on the grave. After finishing at the cemetary, family and friends will usually convene at a nearby house and spend the rest of the evening eating, drinking and remembering the life of the deceased. SVG funerals are truly festive celebrations of a life well lived.