Making money from the dead

Preparing the dead for burial is a job many people do not want to do, much more making a career out of it. SAMUEL OKEOWO and MOYOSORE SALAMI write that while most people avoid the job those who make it their source of income are not complaining. In fact they are as comfortable doing it just like any other business.

MOST human beings are afraid of death. In fact researchers have discovered that the number one fear of human beings is the fear of death, yet, ironically death is a necessity. Famous reggae musician, Peter tosh once said “everyone wants to go to heaven, but no one wants to die,” lyrics which underscore man’s morbid fear of death.

Such fear of death is even extended to coffin, a wooden piece of furniture, so to say, in which a corpse is buried. In this part of the world, most people do not want to have anything to do with it, no matter how beautifully designed it may be. In many cases people read meanings into an accidental contact or meeting with a coffin whether a corpse is inside or not. Any dream involving a coffin often unsettles the ‘dreamer.’

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However, there is a set of people whose main preoccupation is making coffins and carrying dead bodies ceremonially to their final resting places.  For this set of people a coffin is just another piece of furniture and corpses are the subject of their occupation.

Adewole Niyi Ademola is one of them. He is a graduate of Kwara State Polytechnic, Ilorin, Kwara State and the last born in his family. While still in school, nothing could have given him the premonition that him that he would end up in the business of making coffins and being an undertaker.

“I was introduced to this job when it was hard to get employment,” he told Sunday Tribune when asked how he got into the business. Continuing, he said: “This job involves deep thinking and I have been doing it for about 10 years now. I’m very comfortable being an undertaker and a coffin maker because I don’t have any negative thoughts against anyone. It is fun being an undertaker because it makes me feel happy.”

Speaking more on the business Ademola said doesn’t feel scared doing the job and being an undertaker and that anyone who is into the job must keep to time so as not to disappoint his customers, noting that he often gets busy from Wednesdays through Fridays to meet up with business commitments.

Though people die on a daily basis, are times that business is not moving? Ademola said such times often happen but he doesn’t grumble or complain for lack of patronage. Obviously doing so would sound like wishing somebody was dead.

“I don’t grumble (when business is slow) or blame God for not sending me enough customers. I pray to God to provide and preserve the lives of the young ones. All I pray for, and that makes me happy, is that only the elderly ones from the age of 100 and above would be our ‘customers.

“It takes a week and two days to carve and make an elaborate coffin. During the rainy season, we find it difficult to carve a coffin because the wood has to be dry to make it shine after spraying it. If not, the work won’t come out well. To work on a coffin during the rainy season, one must be able to predict the weather before starting the work.

“I have my favourite coffin designs and I do most of my work on request because tomorrow I can come up with a new pattern that will beat the one I have already made. A coffin usually goes bad when not used, that’s why we don’t paint immediately after carving,” he explained.

Has the business been profitable to him? Adewale said it has, but he would not want to disclose the extent. Again, his progress on the job is evident in the fact that initially he did not have a hearse, but after some years on the job he bought one by himself which has added to his income because before now, his customers often go elsewhere to get the hearse.

Being a creative person Adewale works with his clients on the design they wanted in terms of taste and aesthetics. He also supplies other coffin makers if they need a coffin urgently. Some of Adewale’s signature designs include bible shape, kolobo (small size) and figure eight, among others.

Experience as they say cannot be bought in the market place. That seems to be case of Mr Suraju Jimoh who has been a carpenter and an undertaker for about 40 years. He is basically a furniture maker but has added other things as long as they are made of wood. For him also, there are no misgivings about being a coffin maker and dealing with corpses.

According to him, preparing a corpse for burial could be taxing as the embalmment must be done step by step to maintain the natural colour and shape of the corpse. Apart from making caskets he makes money from embalmment too and his clientele is spread across cities outside Ibadan.

“I collect N20,000 for a day and N40,000 or above for two days; if the job is outside Ibadan we take more than that. We get jobs often, mostly from hospitals like UCH, among others,” he told Sunday Tribune adding that designs, size and the financial capability of customers determine what they buy.

Explaining the normal dimensions of a coffin Jimoh said it is 84inches long, 28 inches wide and 23inches high, but if the deceased was very fat, then a special casket, an extra large one, would be made, or if the deceased was a tall, then the length of the casket would have to be increased.

According to him learning how to make a casket is just like learning to be a furniture maker. He noted that his customers are mostly Christians, who often fix the burial of their relations for sometime after death while Muslims bury their relations immediately after death. He added that Muslims also do not habitually bury their dead in a coffin.

Some people believe that undertakers must be a set of supernatural beings to be able to comfortably carry caskets and even display some dance steps with it during burial rites. Some people even suggest that undertakers use juju to be able to carry the casket without getting tired.

Mr Jimoh does not believe so. According to him it is part of the job to learn how to be comfortable with carrying a corpse in a coffin and not be tired, no matter how long the funeral ceremony lasts.

Another casket maker, Dada Ola, has seen it all. He is now as comfortable as anyone could be with corpses and carrying them. After his secondary school education he could not go further, so he decided that his profession as a coffin maker was already cut out for him. He learnt the job for about five years and since he has been on his own, it has been a success story. For him, as a young man, having a piece of land and a car is a pointer to how good the profession has been to him so far.

Explaining the different aspects involved in casket making, Ola said it involves including tailoring (which has to do with the interior of the casket), the marketing side, undertaking and painting, among others.

“I just want to thank God Almighty, because in this business, the story, so far, is so good. I haven’t faced any challenges and I am not praying for it. In this business one must be able to assure his client; give them strong, good quality jobs that will convince them that we make good durable coffins. I am not limited to a particular design. I can make any design my client wants,” Jimoh said smiling.

Though the business of making coffins paints pictures of death and dying, the fact is that the dead deserve a befitting burial and there must be people who handle that morbid job. And once a service is provided there must be remuneration for it and that is why some people are smiling to the bank today, because they take care of the dead. If anyone is in doubt, he or she should ask the big guns in the industry.