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TRADITIONAL FUNERALS & MEMORY JUGS

I actually loved this idea so much from @mystafied here on wattpad

Funerals in Soulaan culture are more like celebrations instead of mourning ceremonies.
We see someone dying as their time on earth being over and that their soul has returned to its rightful place in the afterlife, free from their physical limitations (their body.) So instead of wearing all black or white and playing this sad music, Soulaans instead wear bright colors (like bright red, yellow, etc) and dance and sing and eat with the casket in the center of the ceremony.

Shoes usually aren't worn during the ceremony but you can wear them. It's just more meaningful to take them off. Before the casket is taken and lowered into the ground or the ocean or wherever, the funeral attendees will open the casket and sing a song of faith, hope, and love to the dead body as a last farewell.

Finally, the family of the deceased will place three red flowers into the casket and if the deceased had a lover (or lovers), they would place one white one. As the casket is lowered down or sent off, the funeral attendees hold hands and hum together. After that's over, all of the attendees turn and walk away in silence, hand-in-hand, until they're at least ten feet away from the casket out of respect. After they're away, that's when they talk and stuff and the ceremony's officially over.

Memory Jugs

The bakonso culture believed that the spirit world was turned upside down, and that they were connected to it by water. therefore they water bearing items such as shells. Pitchers. Jugs or vases, which would heip the deceased through the watery world to the afterlife. they also adorned graves with items such as creckery, empty bottles. cooking pets andor personal belongings of the deceased that he or she may need in the afterlife. items were placed upside down. which Symbolizes the fryerted nature of the spirtt world items were also broken to release the loved one's spirit and enable it to make the journey. the fragmented reconcired in the Memory Jugs, paid homase to and simultaneously appeased the spiritual beings. Encouraging them not to interfere with the lives of the living, the container could be placed on a grave or held in the home to contain the unquiet spirit. it's easy to conclude that memory jugs existed as inexpensive memoriais for poor families who couldn't afford headstones for loved ones. but that explanation too easily overlooks the influence of africa's bakongo culture on slaves brought to America

Examples of a Memory Jug