Im going to share an observation. Tell me if you’ve seen this regardless of the country. Got a relative who came back to the states to bury his wife who passed away overseas. He noted after the funeral everyone went back to their lives. Upon returning to India where he’s been only a 1.5 yrs, he was swarmed with comfort and condolences by ppl he just met. He is not Indian. Example 2, when my father mom passed years back, we went down to see him. We were the only ones that showed up at that point and they know a lot of people. He said, if he was in haiti, his house would be swarmed. But in the states, its empty. Anyone else seen this phenomenon of how different cultures respond to the grieving? (serious replies only please)
Maybe it’s partially that the dead live on in other cultures - shrines to ancestors, belief in reincarnation -and also generations stay in the same area. Whereas in the US, we are constantly reinventing ourselves, moving across the country from where we grew up, etc. There is more of an emphasis on new vs old since the country as we know it now is a relatively new one.