HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1998-11-25, Page 5International Scene
By Raymond Canon
THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1998. PAGE 5.
A tisket a casket
People say such nice things
about people at their funerals.
It makes me sad I'm going to
miss mine by just a few days.
Garrison Keillor
Is there any spectacle more bizarre than the
average North American funeral? A human
being dies — as all human beings must — and
we powder and paint the mortal remains and
deck the corpse out in its best suit of clothes,
plant it in a shining box of finest polished
wood and silk with satin cushions.
And then we turn around and shove the
whole thing in a hole in the ground.
A spokesman for the Canadian funeral
industry has finally admitted what anyone
with a six-pack of functioning brain cells
knew all along, to wit: funerals cost too
much. 'Way too much.
A recent issue of Canadian Funeral News
contained a column concerning the excessive
prices some funeral homes charge. The
columnist wasn't concerned about the high-
charges per se, you understand, only the fact
that the general public was being made aware
of them.
"The medical and legal professions are
smart enough to retain a degree of mystique,"
wrote the columnist, who went on to warn
members of the industry not to talk publicly
about their 'internal workings'.
Tea and coffee
drinkers
Since I no longer have a home to go to
when I am in St. Gallen, Switzerland, I stay
at nearby Teufen at the hotel of a longtime
friend of mine. I have known him for so
many years that if the hotel is full when I call
to make a reservation, he puts me up in the
family's spare room. He even did the same
for a cousin of mine when I was showing her
around Switzerland.
He also makes a fine cup of coffee.
Breakfast there is a treat and I always look
forward to it.
To be honest, the coffee is good at all the
hotels I stay at in Switzerland, but especially
so in Teufen.
It is not that I drink a lot of coffee but,
when I do have a cup, I like it to be really
tasty like I get at Dave's Bistro in London but
few other places in Southern Ontario.
Instead, I often drink tea, with my current
favourite being Japanese green tea which, so
I am told, does a good job at helping the
immune system.
At any rate, I got to wondering which
countries have a reputation for consuming
more tea than coffee and vice versa. I asked a
number of people and got the same number
of different answers. Nobody, it -seemed, had
Ah, well. Funeral homes aren't entirely to
blame for the situation.
There's something in human nature that
shouts 'money is no object' when it comes
time to bid that last goodbye.
And it's a tendency we've had for some
time.
Two millennia ago, the Roman poet Vergil
spent a great whack of dough to see off one
of his dear friends. He staged a lavish service
at his mansion on the Esquiline Hill of
Rome. A live orchestra was hired for the
occasion. Senators and nobles came in
chariots from far and wide.
At the conclusion, the mortal remains of
Vergil's dearly departed were transported to
a magnificent marble mausoleurti and sealed
within for eternity.
Vergil spared no expense. He spent
800,000 sesterces on the shindig, that works
out to about a quarter of a million bucks,
Canadian.
The kicker to this touching tale of loVe and
devotion beyond the grave is the fact that
Vergil's dear departed was a fly. A common
housefly.
Was Vergil nuts?
Yeah nuts like Conrad Black. He knew that
the Roman authorities were considering new
legislation .that would -allow them to
confiscate the properties of many rich
Romans. The confiscated lands would then
be parcelled out as rewards for returning war
veterans.
a definitive answer.
Economists are persistent and so I dug
around in various sources of information.
until I came up with the necessary details.
First of all, I found that Canadians drink
more coffee per person than do Americans.
Could it be, I wondered, that it was because
of all those donuts eaten at Tim Horton's and
other such places?
We also drink more tea than do our friends
to the south. Our consumption of coffee is
four kg. (about nine pounds) per person per
year. If you don't drink that much, somebody
else must be drinking more.
As far as tea is concerned, our
consumption, is three-quarters of a kilo, or a
bit less than two pounds.
Well, I know you are all waiting to find out
which nation has the biggest coffee drinkers
in the world. Can you guess?
It's Switzerland! Now you know why I
started the article the way I did.
The consumption there is no less than 8.7
kg. (just over 19 pounds) per person a year.
With all that goOd coffee being made there,
why wouldn't they drink so much?
As for tea, they drink slightly less than half
as much as Canadians do.
The Swiss are considerably ahead of the
Swedes, who come in second in the coffee
race. Their consumption is 7 kg. or 15.44
pounds.
Vergil also learned that any land
containing 'burial plots' would be exempt
from the impending legislation. The poet
hastily hired a couple of local contractors to
slap up the Fly Mausoleum in the middle of
one of his orchards.
It worked. The Roman authorities annexed
his neighbours' properties, but Vergil's land
was spared.
Sometimes even the best-laid funeral plans
go badly anyway. There is the case of the up-
and-coming executive in Toronto who
ordered a lavish floral bouquet to display in
the front window of her newly opened
consulting business.
When the florist delivery van arrived with
the bouquet, the woman was pleased — right
up until she bent down to read the inscription
ornately engraved on the base of the vase.
It read: Dearly Beloved, May You Rest In
Peace.
Incensed, she phoned up the florist and
demanded an explanation.
The florist was naturally embarrassed and
offered to compensate her with a more
appropriate arrangement.
Mollified, the customer was just about to
say thank you and goodbye when the florist
added, "Don't feel too bad, it could be worse.
Somewhere in a Toronto funeral home right
now there's a floral arrangement in front of
somebody's casket and the card on that
arrangement reads: Welcome To Your New
Location."
The Austrians are third (did they learn it
from the Swiss?) and the Germans fourth
(same question), Singapore is fifth and
Canada sixth.
As far as India is concerned, forget it!
Now for the tea drinkers. Again, it is no
contest. The Irish win by a considerable
margin over the English and the Egyptians.
Interestingly enough, the consumption is not
nearly as great as coffee, with the Irish
getting by with 3.2 kg.
The Turks and Egyptians are in a virtual
tie. Coffee consumption in both Britain and
Ireland is about half that of tea.
In Japan and Australia, tea and coffee are
drunk in about equal proportions. The French
hardly ever touch tea. The same can be said
about the Indians when it comes to coffee,
while the Swiss are down near the bottom
regarding tea.
However, I was warned, that, for health
reasons, there is a trend today toward
decaffeinated coffee and herbal teas.
That may be the case, but I still love the
coffee I get in Teufen. Hans; keep the pot
perking!
A Final Thought
Let us so live that when we die even the
undertaker will be sorry.
Mark Twain
The
Short
of it
By Bonnie Gropp
Sunk by bureaucracy
Webster defines anarchy as : I. tack of
any political authority. 2. Disorder and
confusion. 3. Absence of any common
purpose or standard.
Clearly a civilized society must have rules
and regulations. Without them there is chaos
and lawlessness.
But how much is too much? Government
seems to be everywhere today. We're taxed
on everything and bound by rules on law and
order.
Virtually every step we take is guided by
legislation. At times even efforts to grow
and develop are so overpowered by the folks
with the rulebooks that frustration is the only
outcome.
A friend recently showed me an amusing
anecdote discovered on the intemet. With
government telling us everything from how
to build to what to learn I thought it might
provide a bittersweet chuckle for anyone
who has come up against the bureaucratic
brickwall. As well as for those who haven't,
because their time is quite likely coming.
Here we go, with some apologies to the
original author.
000H, IF NOAH HAD TO BUILD
HIS ARK TODAY...
And the Lord spoke to Noah and said, "In
six months I'm going to make it rain until the
whole Earth is covered with water and all
the evil people are destroyed.
But I want to save a few good people, and
two of every kind of living thing on the
planet. I am commanding you to build an
ark."
And in a flash of lightning, He delivered
the specifications for an ark.
"Noah," shouted the Lord, "where is the
ark?"
"Lord, please forgive me," begged Noah.
"I did my best. But there were big problems.
Fit6t, I had to get a building permit for the
ark construction project and your plans
didn't meet code. So I had to hire an
engineer to re-draw the plans..
Then I got into a big fight over whether or
not the ark needed a fire sprinkler system.
Then my neighbour objected, claiming I was
violating zoning by building the ark in my
front yard, so I had to get a variance from
the city planning commission.
Then I had problems getting enough wood
for the ark. There was a ban on cutting trees
to save the spotted owl. I had to convince the
Ministry that I need the wood to save the
owls, but they wouldn't let me catch any
owls, so no owls.
The carpenters formed a union and went
out on strike. I had to negotiate a settlement
with the labour relations board before
anyone would pick up a saw or hammer.
Now we have 16 carpenters on the boat and
still no owls.
Then I started., gathering up animals and
got sued by animal rights. They objected to
me taking only two of each kind.
Just when I got the suit dismissed, EPA
notified me that I couldn't complete the Ark
without filing an environmental impact
statement on your proposed food.
Then engineers wanted a map of the
proposed new flood plain. I gave them a
globe.
I really don't think I can finish the Ark for
at least another five years," Noah wailed.
The sky began to clear. the sun began to
shine. A rainbow arched across the sky.
Noah looked up and smiled. "You mean
you're not going to destroy the Earth?" Noah
asked.
, "No," said the Lord sadly. "Government
already has."
Arthur Black