When she was 8-years-old, she attended a neighbour’s funeral and instead of sitting with her age mates outside the house, she went straight into the kitchen and sat right next to the coffin, leaving all mourners shocked. She once ‘talked’ to the dead, pleading with them for a safe trip after the hearse developed a mysterious fault. Today she is a proud mortician, a career she believes is her calling. To know more about these stories, MUNYARADZI BLESSING DOMA (MBD) interviewed OPPAR KADUNGURE (OK) as the latter opened up on her journey of becoming a mortician and experiences.
MBD: When and where were you born?
OK: I was born on 3 July 1995 at Trojan Mine in Bindura.
MBD: Tell me any childhood memories you still remember, that may be relevant to your career today?
OK: When I was 8-years-old doing Grade 3, our neighbour died and we then went to the funeral. Instead of just going where other kids were, I went inside the house and I sat next to the coffin leaving mourners stunned. My mum who was also attending the funeral was then told and was equally shocked and she called me outside. She asked me what I had just done but to her surprise, I saw nothing wrong with it. And when she tried to scare me even with the help of other mourners I was not moved. I think that is when I just started to feel that I was not afraid of the dead…hahahaha (she laughs).
MBD: Why did you decide you wanted to be a mortician?
OK: When I wanted to write my ‘O’ levels, my father used to tell me to get a drivers licence, saying he used to see some young female morticians. And he just thought I could do the same. But I was not concerned at the time, because I looked down upon the job. When I divorced my husband, I then seriously thought about becoming a mortician and my sister-in-law told me about an opportunity that had arisen somewhere. The following day I then went there and I trained and during the training I then gained more courage. I asked a lot of questions because I really wanted to know and that was in 2019.
MBD: How did your family react when you told them you were now taking this as a career?
OK: My dad didn’t say anything negative since he used to encourage me, but my mum was a bit skeptical.
MBD: Tell me a bit about the training.
OK: It was for one month and in that one month, we had theory and practical. For the theory, we would write notes and study them on issues like what is a mortician, what are the duties, what should you wear, how should you treat the dead, even those who would have lost a loved one. Then we also got to learn about burial; what is it all about, what do you do, how do you use the machines, what you use etc. The training also included how to do paper work for the deceased because there are times when you have to help the family of the deceased with paper work. Like let’s say someone dies at the hospital ward or at home, we were taught all those processes. We were also taught that our work goes hand in hand with culture, we should treat the dead with respect. Then we got to be practical, we got to do all the things we had learnt in theory, putting it into practice.
MBD: How was your first day doing practical work?
OK: I remember we were cleaning the mortuary then my boss said please take something from there. He didn’t mention where he meant exactly but I remember he just pointed to the mortuary door. Confidently I went to where he was pointing and I opened and saw the body and I stood there asked him what he wanted me to do. He was impressed. He told me that he thought I was going to be afraid and he then started making jokes about the dead as he was still assessing if I was brave and indeed I passed that test. I just think I was already brave because even when I went home, I never had any nightmares or any fear of what I had experienced. Hence I strongly believe that for me, this is really a calling.
MBD: Tell me any of your experiences working as a mortician?
OK: I remember driving a hearse to Murewa in the evening when the car developed a mechanical fault. What surprised me was that prior to this journey, I had checked everything and nothing was amiss. So I called my boss who then sent a mechanic who was close to where I had the break down. The mechanic came but he said he did not see anything wrong with the car. Then I remembered what I had been taught in training about some strange things that could happen. We were told that sometimes the dead could ‘cause’ strange things to happen such that to correct this, ‘talk’ to the deceased. I remember it was around 10 pm and I went to the coffin, opened it and ‘spoke’ to the deceased. I explained that maybe he didn’t want to be buried in the rural areas but I was just doing my job and wanted us to travel safely. After ‘speaking’ to him, I closed the coffin and I started the car and drove off, and arrived safely in Murewa. When I explained to some close relatives that we had developed some mechanical fault along the way, I was then told how the guy never liked his rural area, so I guess even in death, he was expressing that wish. Then I also have another experience when I handled the funeral of a tout, yaah that funeral was something else. His colleagues asked me politely that they wanted to the coffin taken to Park Lane in Harare, where he used operate from. Little did I know that they had other plans. They asked me to open the back doors of the hearse and I obliged, as I thought this was just a way of honouring their dearly departed. In split second, four of them quickly took hold of the coffin and placed it on top a Honda Fit which sped off, as the driver went on to perform some daring stunts whilst his colleagues were holding the coffin. I was left stunned to say the least, because I was afraid that they would drop the coffin but they never did. They took the coffin to where the funeral was being held and even at the burial, they said they would take over, haaa that is another day I will never forget.
MBD: What are some of the myths you can share?
OK: Ummmm what can I say…well I have heard some people claim that someone can rise from the dead, but I have never seen that or heard it from any of my colleagues. Guess that’s what I can say.
MBD: How does your fiancé feel about your career?
OK: I feel he understands it so well and he is okay with it; we are yet to have any issue about it. So I don’t think he has any issue about it. Even his relatives support me by linking me with some other recruiting companies.
MBD: Do you have any relative(s) who is also a mortician?
OK: I have a sister who is also a mortician and we encourage each other in our work, we try to make each other strong.
MBD: What would be your advice to other women who may want to choose this career?
OK: My advice is simple, follow your heart, and don’t be worried or discouraged by anything.
MBD: Tell me a bit about your day at work?
OK: Well when I get to work, I get to the cold room and see which bodies are there so that I know what I will be doing that day. I do that because if let’s say I have a burial that day, I have to make sure that all is prepared for the day. There are other issues that may also need my attention, let’s say there’s body removal. There are a lot of processes, like there’s also body washing, then dressing, till the time of burial, the process are quite a lot and in all this, you have to practice due diligence. One thing I may also add which can also work as advice is that, at a funeral parlour, you have to know all the processes. So you can’t say I just want to be a driver, you have to be well aware of the processes. You have to be ready for all processes so you need to be aware.
MBD: I know you have gotten used to this job but is there a time when you felt really scared?
OK: Yes, there is; a body had been in the mortuary for two months because of some family squabbles and I can tell you that when we were finally assigned for the burial, what I saw was something else. The body had turned black, I mean really black, I had never seen a body like that, like it was disfigured such that it was really scary, I can never compare it to anything I have ever witnessed. Up to now that’s one experience I will mention as scary.
MBD: What would be your advice to other morticians?
OK: I believe you should really love your work, like I really love my work and one thing I can also say is you really need to be prayerful. Like you can experience some things that can really shake you, like the incident I told you about a break down I once had. So it is in such circumstances that surely prayer will help you to conquer and be strong. Sometimes you get to a funeral where there are feuding families, so even despite being a service provider, you can be also be caught in crossfire and get attacked so you need to be very careful about that. So for me spiritual guidance is key in this work, you need to seek God’s intervention all the time.
MBD: Have you ever been treated differently just because you are a female mortician?
OK: Yeah, I remember there was a funeral which I once serviced and the burial was in Mutare. When some relatives of the deceased were introduced to me as their driver and funeral director, they were really skeptical. I remember one of the men kept on asking, “so you are the driver we are going with”, as he shook his head. He could not believe that I was able to handle their funeral let alone drive to Mutare. But I’m happy to say as the funeral progressed, they all changed their attitudes and started respecting me because they saw how I was handling all the processes. The whole funeral ended with the family praising me for the job well done because I had proved them wrong. So you will find out that there are some people who may look down upon female funeral directors but then as long as one knows their job, it is not an issue of male or female, the job just needs to be done properly.
MBD: Away from funerals, what do you do in your spare time?
OK: I just love to relax while listening to gospel music because like I said, you need to be spiritually uplifted to do this kind of work, you need all the guidance you need.
MBD: Thank you for your time Oppar and all the best in your work.
OK: Thank you too Munya.
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