Main cases of embalmers
Just after the Qingming Festival, during the season of remembering the deceased, those engaged in funeral work will also come into people's sight. How to let people leave with more dignity at the end of life, how to overcome all kinds of inner fears and discomforts, and how to find a sense of existence and value in this job? Our reporter visited a school with a funeral major and met several graduates of the funeral major. From them, you may realize that vocational education makes people's lives better.
“Many students who apply for the exam are out of curiosity”
A movie changed the ambition of an 18-year-old girl from Weifang, Shandong.
Chen Yixuan has always liked watching historical science fiction films and documentaries. After watching a movie, she always analyzes the film from an objective perspective, understanding the director's script conception and how to portray a character through pictures, language and lenses. , highlight the theme.
But on a quiet afternoon, while watching the Japanese film "The Embalmer" alone, she was shocked and developed a strong interest in a special industry.
"On the day when I applied for the exam and filled in my application, I was already far beyond the second line and did not continue to fill in the major I wanted to study before. The plot of the movie "The Embalmer" appeared in front of my eyes over and over again. There seemed to be something A magical power dominated me." Chen looked up this "sacred" major online and entered Changsha Civil Affairs Vocational and Technical College.
Wang Ziqi, a 19-year-old girl from Shaoguan, Guangdong, came up with the idea of becoming a forensic doctor after watching the American TV series "Crime Scene". However, after failing the college entrance examination, she began to search schools online, hoping to study a similar major in anti-corrosion and plastic surgery.
“Many students who apply for the exam are out of curiosity, and TV reports can easily arouse their sense of mystery.” On March 24, Zhong Qishun, associate professor at the Funeral School of Changsha Vocational and Technical College of Civil Affairs, told reporters that a considerable number of students came to take the exam. Students majoring in "Modern Funeral Technology and Management" at school do not come here for employment and high salaries.
As the first vocational school to offer funeral majors in the country, its funeral college currently has nearly 800 students. "The ratio of applications to admissions is often 3:1, sometimes reaching 4:1." said Su Lihui, secretary of the party branch of the funeral college.
Zhong Qishun introduced that this major in the school was founded by Professor Wang Fuzhi in 1995. Since then, four universities across the country have successively established the same major. Since then, the domestic funeral industry has undergone completely different changes. "At that time, workers in this industry couldn't even write their names, and they relied on stamps to get paid. Many of them were migrant workers who came to the city to obtain household registration or orphans in the city to work in this industry. They equated funerals with burning corpses. ."
After the new century, more college graduates began to join this "disliked" industry.
Take this college in Changsha as an example. The sources of students are divided into three categories. Among them, many have inherited their father's business or have relatives who have been in this industry. There is an employee surnamed Lin from the Northeast in Changsha Funeral Home. After working for a period of time, his two sisters came to Changsha from their hometown to join the industry.
The rest are those who are influenced by media reports or TV programs, as well as those who hope to find a safe job in the fierce competition and long for a higher salary.
"The scariest class schedule"
"Funeral burial, corpse collection, flower arrangement on Monday; bone burning, elegiac couplets, Feng Shui on Tuesday..."
The eve of Qingming Festival in 2014 , someone once posted the above-mentioned course schedule online, which shocked countless netizens. A person in charge of the Funeral School of Changsha Civil Affairs Vocational and Technical College explained this: This is just a special summary of the knowledge in the course by the students. In fact, the name of the course is not so scary.
Zhong Qishun introduced that the school divides the major of "Modern Funeral Technology and Management" into four parts, namely funeral services, funeral equipment, anti-corrosion and plastic surgery, and cemeteries. The basic courses are basically the same, and students must be familiar with them. Read courses such as "Funeral Culture", "Funeral Service", "Funeral Ethics", and "Modern Funeral and Funeral Practice". Through the above teaching, students can look down upon life and death and develop good professional qualities. In terms of professional skills, the entire process from body transportation, business negotiation, plastic surgery and embalming, funeral rites, cremation, and cemeteries is comprehensively taught.
The college requires students to be proficient in professional skills, and even small details such as tying flowers in the mourning hall must be practiced repeatedly. In order to allow students to feel the real working atmosphere in daily practical operations, the college also introduced simulation cremators and simulation dummies from Taiwan for students to use for practical training.
Su Lihui informed that the school has practical training and practical teaching courses, and students usually go to funeral parlors and cemeteries for internships.
When most students are freshmen, they go to funeral parlors and cemeteries for about 10 days around the Qingming Festival in order to "increase their perceptual understanding." Sophomore students have professional internships. They start practicing in the library and garden for about 40 days before Qingming Festival. All professional positions are rotated through to meet the requirements of adapting to all jobs.
“Last year there was a class studying funeral rites, and their final exams were all held in Changsha Funeral Home, and more than 50 students took the exam on the spot.” Su Lihui said that in their junior years, students began to work as internships, and many of them did well. students signed a contract with the unit.
In Zhong Qishun’s eyes, the success of students is closely related to their inner cognition. "Everyone is afraid of death, but they certainly won't be afraid when facing relatives (remains)."
She believes that without the professionalism of treating the dead as relatives, some positions in the funeral industry will be It cannot be done, such as the embalming and plastic surgery of corpses.
Ji Shuohong, who now works in a funeral parlor in Jiaxing, Zhejiang, understands this firsthand. She said that the reason why she entered school had nothing to do with high salary and employment.
This outstanding student, who left a deep impression on many teachers, said in an interview with CCTV in 2013 that his grandmother died of illness and his cousin was torn apart by a car accident. She couldn't accept the way her two relatives passed away. She thought that the deceased should be allowed to leave in a dignified way.
So, on a workbench in the funeral home, she and another male partner, Zeng Liangliang, often repeated professional tasks: gently shaving, trimming fingernails, applying makeup, and dressing the deceased. Since the body becomes stiff after death, it needs bathing and massage to regain its elasticity. Hours of work are often tiring.
She has served more than a hundred deceased people after joining the company for more than a year. "We call them 'the deceased' because they go to live in another place. You need this kind of mentality to understand your career."
Chen Yixuan, who studied in the same school as Ji Shuohong, learned during the internship The meaning of "comfort messenger" was revealed: When a husband saw his wife who had been in a car accident being "repaired" to life, he thought his wife was still alive and refused to leave for a long time.
“As corpse plastic surgeons, what we do is to create beauty for the lost lives and bring a ray of love’s warmth and comfort to every sad family.” Chen Yixuan wrote in the notebook.
Understanding is as precious as life
However, there are very few people in society who understand the value of these students’ lives, even their relatives.
In the summer of 2012, Chen Yixuan applied for this school in Changsha without consulting her family. When she told her family the truth, she and her family were in a complete cold war stalemate for three days.
Ji Shuohong’s situation was even worse. “Her father warned her in an attitude of severing ties that she should take care of herself from now on.”
Some graduates told that when they were studying, among their classmates in the college, The relationship between them is very good. However, students from other departments did not want to interact with them, and even did not want to meet them when eating in the cafeteria. These students who had not yet joined the profession had a vague understanding of the ups and downs of the undertaker's life.
Teachers are also feeling the pressure.
Su Lihui, who graduated from Hunan Normal University in 2004, mentioned that when he came to work at Changsha Civil Affairs Vocational and Technical College, the Human Resources Department arranged for him to teach at the Funeral College. He responded reflexively: Can you? Change it?
"But in fact, I never changed, and gradually developed a sense of professional identity. Many people start with ideas, accept the reality in two or three years, and finally identify and integrate." Su Lihui said, Before coming here, I thought that most of these students must be old, weak, sick, and disabled. In fact, most of them are handsome boys and beautiful girls, with very bright minds.
It is reported that although students can only find employment in funeral homes and the direction is relatively single, there is a huge demand for talents in the industry. There are nearly 1,200 funeral homes across the country with an annual talent gap of about 8,000 people. Therefore, college graduates are extremely sought after.
Zhong Qishun said that the school’s funeral major has not expanded its enrollment since its inception and has basically maintained a scale of 700 to 800 students each year. This can ensure that each student has more than two job opportunities upon graduation. "There are now more than 300 museums and parks in the country who are in charge of graduates of our school." Zhong Qishun said that the students' treatment is not bad, and it is not uncommon for them to earn tens of thousands of yuan a month if they do well. The real trouble is that the career brings The pressure of life: no one understands, no friends.
Among Ji Shuohong’s classmates in Jiaxing, Niu Jisheng takes a shower every time he finishes work, while Liu Yang goes out shopping to calm down. "Over time, all my friends left, leaving only my colleagues." Ji Shuohong cried.
It is understood that the marriages of students engaged in this industry are mostly within the same unit, while those looking for other careers often go through many twists and turns. Before the Spring Festival in 2014, when a funeral director was discussing marriage with a nurse from a hospital in Changsha, he encountered firm opposition from the girl's parents. In desperation, I had no choice but to turn to the dating column of a Hunan TV station and specially organized a program called "Angels in White Fall in Love with Black and White".
Under the persuasion of the media, the woman’s family finally nodded.
A mortician born in the 1990s said that the social pressure brought by his career made him so annoyed that he habitually checked Weibo every time he finished work. "Netizens often ask if I am out of my mind for doing this. I reply that I am very proud to do this."