Rows of coffins line a university classroom in the South Korean port city of Busan, ready to be used to train future funeral directors in the rapidly aging nation.
South Korea is undergoing massive demographic change, with one of the lowest birth rates in the world and nearly half of the population aged 50 and over, with more and more people finding work in death.
Students at the Busan Institute of Science and Technology carefully wrapped the mannequin in a traditional Korean burial cloth, smoothing the cloth as if it were real skin, before gently lowering it into the coffin.
“As our population ages, I thought the demand for this kind of work would only increase,” said Jang Jin-yeong, 27, a funeral administration student.
Another student, Im Sae-jin, 23, decided to enter the field after his grandmother passed away.
“At her funeral, I saw how beautifully the directors prepared her for her final farewell,” he said.
– I felt deeply grateful.
– “Like portraits” –
More and more South Koreans are also living and dying alone.
One-person households now account for about 42 percent of all homes in Asia’s fourth-largest economy.
A new profession has sprung up to reflect that statistic: cleaners, who are called in to clean up homes after their residents, most of whom lived alone, have died.
Cho Eun-seok, a former classical musician, cleaned many houses where people were found dead, sometimes months after their deaths.
Their home is “like their portraits,” Cho, 47, told AFP.
He described the heartbreaking trail: hundreds of neatly capped soy bottles and dusty gift boxes that had never been opened.
South Korea has the highest suicide rate among developed countries, and these “lonely deaths” include those who died alone by their own hands.
Cho recently started getting calls from used car leasing companies about clean vehicles that turned out to be where customers ended their lives.
He’s also developing a device to detect signs of unattended deaths, which he says could wreak havoc on the environment, lead to an influx of pests and force entire households to throw out their belongings.
In the summer, the smell spreads quickly: “within three days it penetrates everything – the refrigerator, the TV – and nothing can be saved.”
The home of the recently deceased woman, who was in her 70s, still contained traces of her life when AFP visited – an old air conditioner, bottles of cosmetics and a portable toilet, and a few sticks by the door.
– “Everything must be removed” –
Work sometimes requires more than just cleaning.
Kim Seok-jung once cleaned out the late lyricist’s house and found a collection of songs that she didn’t share with her relatives. He turned them into a song for a bereaved family.
Cho recalled a high school girl who lived alone in a gosiwon — a cramped room usually less than five square meters — after escaping domestic violence.
He visited once a month to clean. A depressed teenage girl was unable to cope.
Piles of belongings and rotting food covered the bed and the air was thick with flies.
However, she carefully guarded the small box, insisting that Cho never throw it away.
A year later, she took her own life in that small room.
When Cho came back to clean up, he saw that a hamster had been living in the box all along.
Next to her sat her guitar – she dreamed of becoming a musician.
“The moment I saw the hamster, all I could think about was to save it and keep it alive,” Cho said.
Kim Doo-nyeon, a veteran of the funeral business, said he has an increasing number of recruits in their twenties.
“When people live together, they share things … even if one person dies, those things remain,” he said.
“But when someone dies alone, everything has to be removed.”
After returning to class in Busan, I admitted to being a bit nervous about my chosen career path.
“I’m afraid,” he said.
“No matter how much you prepare, facing a dead person is terrifying.
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