Flashback: The first modern burial option for New Zealand was completely traditional
Thursday, 24 May 2018
An 'avant-garde' idea for a natural burial site in Wellington paved the way for New Zealand's tree-lined cemeteries, finds Jessica Long.
In 1999 Mark Blackham and his wife prepared to say goodbye to their newborn daughter.
She was named Ceitein, after the spring.
They wanted her to forever rest in peaceful, native bushland. But the choice was not theirs.
Ceitein had a 'traditional' funeral and Blackham vowed he would help others to take control of death.
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* Taking control of the funeral
He opened Aotearoa up to natural burials, a concept only explored in the United Kingdom at the time.
It wasn't easy. 'Everyone, apart from Wellington, said 'no'.'
After years of research, money and push-backs the Natural Cemetery inside Makara, on Wellington's west coast, became a reality on June 3, 2008.
The Wellington City Council and Natural Burials partnership marked the first significant change in funeral practice for New Zealand in 150 years.
In as little as a decade, trees marking people's natural burial plots have rooted themselves in North and South Island soils, springing up after the capital's living memorial.
Away from the bustling streets there's a track inside Makara that leads to a farm gate. A gravel track stretches 200 metres beyond to a point by a gully.
The limbs of tall, native trees wave in the breeze as people walk toward them. They are what's left of the people who were laid beneath them.
Now, 168 people nourish the small, dense forest. Their wooden markers dot the tree-lines which will one day perish like the cycle of life.
Everything about the cemetery is as 'natural' as possible.
To the left of the forest a half hectare of pasture has been set aside where the Natural Cemetery will eventually grow to become the biggest site in the southern hemisphere.
Gradually, the whole Wellington Natural Cemetery will become native bush, a park and 'living memorial' that families 'want to visit', Blackham says. 'It's a revolution in funeral practice, a breaking down of rules.'
The concept had spread because people wanted something different, something simpler that related to them.
It may be 'new' in modern terms but a natural burial is really about going back to a true tradition, Blackham says.
The choice has given people freedom. His natural burial spot will be under a mānuka tree.
While there's no longer a need to convince authorities natural burial sites worked, Blackham suspects it will take at least another 150 years for society to fully embrace it as freely as cremation.
No-one had a good enough reason why a natural burial could not be done, that's what spurred Blackham on.
A time when natural burial grounds did not exist seems like an age ago for Wellington City Council cemeteries manager Jeff Paris.
'We were basically writing the rulebook. No-one else in New Zealand had one.'
Now it's just part of the way things can be done at Makara, and it caught on, prompting a movement throughout the country.
New Zealand has five certified natural cemeteries in Wellington, Kāpiti, Carterton, Marlborough and New Plymouth. Others have formed in Thames, Nelson, Motueka, Dunedin, Auckland and Invercargill.
A natural burial is free of chemicals and a person is buried only 50 centimetres to one metre deep, the best depth for a body to decompose. The body is not embalmed, but is kept refrigerated or treated with oils.
A natural casket, cardboard or shroud is used and a tree, instead of a headstone or plaque, is planted above where the body is buried.
In the early 2000s, however, natural burial sites were seen 'as a bit avant-garde'. They took a few years to catch on, Paris says.
People were cautious of what was new, worried about how they would find their loved ones as the landscape changed.
GPS and map co-ordinates relayed a lot of fears, he says.
He has watched momentum build, popularise and generate discussion among the community. The plot numbers subsequently grew.
Since the Wellington Natural Cemetery opened 10 years ago about 12 per cent of people have chosen the simpler option. The number of people opting for cremation has also slightly dropped.