January 30, 2005
In Ghana, you can take your Nokia with you
My friend Gerrit Visser over at Smart Mobs has picked up on one of the stranger accessories for cell phones on the market - at least in our culture -, Nokia brand coffins.
An item available from eShop from Ghana
In the traditional culture of Ghana you are burried in a coffin that reflects how you earned your living and lived your life. It is believed that the dead have the same desires, such as money, food, drink, clothing, so all of these are placed in the coffin or beside the grave.
Related articles on cell phones and divinity/ funeral rituals:
-- Phones have been blessed in a ritual at a Matsu temple - Acting on that religious fervor, Okwap (a brand released by Inventec Appliances Corp) offers phones that have been blessed in a ritual at a Matsu temple. Matsu, the Chinese goddess of the sea, is a popular religious icon in Taiwan. Thousands of people make the pilgrimage to a Matsu temple in the South every year.
-- Dead people in Slovakia are buried with their mobile phones and it is not unusual, that while a priest performs the funeral rites, ring tones will echo around the church from within a casket. Slovakians have been buried with an object of value for generations. (cf article in Ananova dated October 31st, 2001).
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