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00:04I've always been fascinated by death.
00:07I've looked at how others have dealt with it and made money out of it.
00:10But I'll be honest with you, when I first started exploring it,
00:13my own demise was the furthest thing from my mind.
00:17There's a kind of conceit in me that is often mistaken for gentleness.
00:24When the doctor said, you're not going to die, when I had the cancer thing,
00:32it kind of shocked me.
00:34I thought, of course I'm not going to die.
00:37You know, I had no intention of dying.
00:40It never crossed my mind that I might die.
00:43Not that I feel infallible or I'm going to last forever,
00:46but it just never crossed my mind as an option.
00:52So I'm not going anywhere any time soon.
00:57All the same, I guess this is now my personal look at death.
01:01How do I want to go?
01:03How will I be remembered?
01:06And what do I think comes next?
01:08And if that's the case, we may as well start where it all began for me,
01:12my home, Glasgow,
01:14in a place where as a kid I would never have dreamt to go on.
01:20How are you doing?
01:22This is a mad place.
01:24Isn't it good?
01:25It's absolutely madness.
01:27I love it.
01:32This is the necropolis in Glasgow.
01:36It's the best cemetery in the world, probably.
01:39I think it's an absolute beauty.
01:41We'll have a wee look about here.
01:42I'll show you some stuff.
01:49It's been a graveyard since 1840.
01:53There's a few sensational people buried in here.
01:58William McGavin, the merchant of Glasgow, author of The Protestant.
02:01I get that faithfully every Friday night.
02:04Read it in my bed.
02:07I always bug my wife.
02:09Has the latest edition of The Protestant arrived?
02:11I wish that I knew what I know now.
02:16The publisher of The Daily Mail.
02:20Oh, aye.
02:22Moving right along.
02:25The can't, can't touch us.
02:27And this is a Victorian graveyard.
02:29The funerals then were good.
02:31Do you know they were preceded by a wake of three days?
02:35And the real reason for it, for having three days,
02:38was to make sure the person was dead.
02:39Because people were terrified of being buried alive.
02:42So they'd keep them for three days in the house,
02:44and they'd sing and dance and get pissed, you know.
02:48And there's all sorts of stories about them coming alive in the middle of the wake,
02:52you know.
02:52They're just folk tales, really.
02:54But my favourite concerns a hunchback.
02:57He was dead, and he was in the coffin.
03:00And his friends, he didn't fit in.
03:03He was kind of sitting up with his hunchback.
03:05So they tied him back.
03:09And they got rope and tied him down.
03:15Of course, they all proceeded to get pissed and dance around the room.
03:18This nicht of awe nicht, this nicht of awe.
03:21Fire and salt and candlelight, and God received us all.
03:23Oh, this nicht of awe nicht, this nicht of awe.
03:26So the room was rocking and shaking.
03:29And the body's shaking in the coffin, wearing the ropes against the side.
03:33And the ropes burst, of course.
03:35And he sat up, farting and shouting,
03:37because corpses release gas.
03:41You know, as the ropes burst, he sat up.
03:43Oh!
03:45And, of course, there was a great rush for the door.
03:48Ah!
03:49They're all running out, and somebody got his coat caught in a nail in the doorpost.
03:54And he thought the corpse had a hold of him.
03:56He says, let me go, let me go, you humpty-backed old bastard.
04:01I've known that since I was about 12, and it always makes me laugh.
04:08Everything here is loaded with meaning.
04:11Draped monuments, triumphant arches, and countless phalluses.
04:18But it's the numbers carved permanently into the granite that finally stick with you.
04:23Look at this.
04:25They're all died really young.
04:29God, I'm 71.
04:30I feel like Father Time when I'm in here.
04:35Ah, didn't get old, son.
04:37Didn't get old.
04:39It's weird.
04:39You wake up in pain when you're older.
04:43Just, oh, God, oh, Jesus.
04:47And then that goes in something else.
04:49Oh, God.
04:50It's a kind of strange thing, getting old.
04:53The pain in the arse.
04:54No, not quite.
04:55The pain in the shoulder for most of the time.
05:02Although the arse does have its moments.
05:14At some point, we all come to terms with the idea that we're going to die.
05:18But for a kid, that's a huge milestone.
05:21We construct tales of pets going to play in the farm, and Grandpa's having a big sleep.
05:27When you're explaining it to children, it's much more convenient to see where Granny has gone if you say she's
05:32away to heaven with the angels, and she's having a lovely time.
05:36You can hardly say to them, well, she's actually decomposing in a box.
05:44But all societies work out a way for kids to get used to the idea of it all ending.
05:49We in the West have Halloween, a night where we remember our dead by dressing up like tarty vampires and
05:55clowns.
05:57And that's okay.
05:58Kids should laugh in the face of it all.
06:00Lord knows what's coming next.
06:02I just believe your time of death, it's written when you're conceived.
06:07So no matter how you die, or where you die, or how old you are, it has already been planned.
06:13I hope it's not painful, and I hope I don't die of a disease like cancer.
06:20My wife's family has a beautiful plot at a cemetery, and there are days when I will go literally sit
06:28on what will someday be my grave.
06:32But the only thing about death is what happens after.
06:37I scare myself, and I don't mean lightning.
06:41I scare myself, it can be...
06:44My grandson came home from school, one of the pets in the class had died.
06:48A mouse or a snake or something had died.
06:51And they had a talk with a teacher, and she explained that everything dies.
06:55And so he got really depressed, and my daughter said to him,
06:58What's wrong with you?
06:59And he said, I'm going to die, and you're going to die, and Barbara's going to die, and that's his
07:04little sister.
07:05And she said, What?
07:07He said, Yeah, everything dies, everything dies.
07:10And she said, Oh, of course everything dies, but it doesn't happen to your very, very, very, very old.
07:17He says, Grandad's very, very, very old.
07:22And with that, he condemned me.
07:38You know you're an adult when you laugh nervously when singing, I hope I die before I get old.
07:47But when I met Keith Moon when he was 32, a long way off from being old in my book.
07:54Nobody introduced Moon and I.
07:56We were in an ice cream place in London, and there was booths that sat about six or eight people.
08:05And he was directly behind me.
08:08So we were talking like this.
08:10There's a photograph somewhere.
08:12My son used to treasure it because he was a mod, and he couldn't believe that I knew Keith Moon.
08:17So we got talking and talking, and he said, What are you doing later?
08:21And I said, I don't know.
08:21He said, Let's have a laugh.
08:22So he and John Hurt and I, we went out on the town, and we were getting pissed.
08:27But he wasn't touching anything.
08:29But John Hurt and I and whoever the other guy was were giving it plenty.
08:34And he was being very funny and chatting away.
08:38And I thought, God, what a nice guy.
08:40What a good new friend to have, you know.
08:43I got up in the morning and flew to Australia.
08:47And I got to my hotel room, and I put the television on, and he was dead.
08:54I was absolutely brokenhearted.
08:56I only knew him for a couple of hours.
09:00But I was devastated because I was really looking forward to having him as a friend, looking to the future
09:05with him.
09:06You know, daft letters and silly contacts and all that that you get when you like somebody.
09:13But he was snatched away.
09:22There's a saying that you only die the last time someone speaks your name.
09:27That's why you've got to love Mexico's Day of the Dead.
09:30A week-long celebration of food, parades and dance that climaxes on All Saints Day, November the 1st.
09:36That's when families congregate in cemeteries to clean graves and eat and drink and make merry with the family members
09:43who are no longer breathing.
09:52What's rather marvellous is how the people in the States have taken this celebration to their hearts.
10:06November 1st is now Memorial Tattoo Day for John Reed's Tattoo Parlor in Austin, Texas.
10:13An annual event that is so popular, people, primarily women, will travel over multiple state lines to get there.
10:24And this is a memorial one?
10:25Yeah, I actually got it for my grandmother.
10:28She had a bunch of wild peacocks roaming around her land.
10:33So every time I would see peacocks, it would remind me of my grandmother.
10:36It was actually after I got that tattoo, I found out that she hated them and shot them all.
10:42Never!
10:43Oh, I love your granny.
10:45She's crazy broad.
10:47Oh, that's splendid.
10:48I fancy her granny.
10:50I love the fact she hated them.
10:52Oh, yeah.
10:53He did.
10:54The pictures tell the story.
10:57Everybody has their own reason for it.
10:59It's not like you can put it in a little box and say, this is the reason why everyone gets
11:03a memorial tattoo.
11:04It doesn't necessarily have to be the death of a person.
11:06It could be the death of a moment in time.
11:09I thought part of it could be that, you know the way when someone dies, you're going to deal with
11:14it your whole life.
11:15It's not going to go away.
11:16Yeah.
11:16So you put it somewhere you can handle it, access it.
11:19Yeah, I can see that.
11:21Well, I think that does that.
11:22Yeah.
11:23You put it there, it's there, it's handy, you can access it when you like.
11:26Yeah.
11:26No, no, that's true.
11:27Well, and also, sometimes you forget, and when you have a tattoo, it's almost like a spark, you know, that
11:35ignites that memory.
11:36Sure you want, Nick, or whatever.
11:38You got a tattoo?
11:39Yeah.
11:39I didn't know that.
11:43Whoa.
11:44It's the day I forgot my wife's birthday.
11:46Oh, that could have led to a memorial tattoo.
11:52Wow.
11:53That's so cool.
11:58There's nothing new about having a memorial tattoo, but the way that the middle classes, women and hipsters alike, think
12:06of having a tattoo to mark a death is very much a modern trend.
12:11This is for Mel. He is still alive, but his wife, Jeannie, passed away, and to me, they belong together.
12:20So that's for them, and their marriage, and their life together, and...
12:24That's a beautiful thing to do.
12:27Unlike everything else in this world, it's literally the only thing you can take to your grave. You know what
12:31I mean? When I'm in my grave, I will still have these tattoos.
12:35It's funny, I met a guy who had a tattoo of me on him.
12:38Are you serious, mother?
12:39What does that feel like, to, like, see yourself tattooed? That's lovely.
12:43Is it?
12:44Oh, it's a great feeling.
12:45Oh, nice.
12:46I'm ready.
12:47This is serious.
12:51I think tattoos are marvellous memorials. I like the idea that you invite someone to ask why and who.
12:58Nice.
12:59Now, every time I see a peacock, I'll think of punk girl's granny, and I'll laugh. Isn't that a fantastic
13:05way to be remembered? Laughter.
13:17That's how to celebrate life. Through a joyful noise. That's what they do in New Orleans.
13:23A city where death and music make for the most unexpected bedfellows.
13:27The iconic jazz funerals, once the preserve of musicians, are now impromptu celebrations that march through the city quarters and
13:34graveyards, with no rhyme or reason other than that someone's dead. Let's have a party.
13:40But don't get the wrong idea. This city, blighted by yellow fever, mired in slave trading, and more recently devastated
13:47by Hurricane Katrina, has always walked hand in hand with the Grim Reaper.
13:52But the folks here choose to embrace and own that relationship.
13:56It's a farewell song to y'all.
13:59May the good Lord bless and keep you, whether near or far away.
14:08And just like the jazz that surrounds the French Quarter, no one can pinpoint the exact origins of the memorial
14:14T-shirt.
14:15But everyone agrees it's now a New Orleans thing.
14:21Today I'm wearing a shirt with my dad on it.
14:24Today's his birthday.
14:26I'm wearing a little shirt in remembrance of him.
14:29He's 85 today.
14:31His name is Clifton.
14:32He died of cancer.
14:37R.I.P. Daddy.
14:39Today was the day so many years ago you came into this world.
14:42I didn't get to see you before you left, but to worship you from afar.
14:47You're my dad and my star.
14:49I love you and I miss you so much.
14:51Sleep well and take care of all who went before you.
15:01Sadly, T-shirts are not the only unique memorial found in New Orleans.
15:06There are almost three murders a week here.
15:09And this relentless violence has created an impromptu memorial known locally as the Murder Wall.
15:16This is a very mixed city.
15:18The crime tends to be black on black.
15:21Easily half the murderers are young men under the age of 30.
15:27There are a lot of young children that are murdered.
15:30We've had a mother holding a baby, shot and murdered a few times.
15:37My own daughter died several years ago at the age of 19 to a violent death.
15:44Our mayor, in a speech a couple of years ago, said that children at John McDonough High School,
15:52which is about four blocks down the street, have a higher risk of being shot than a soldier in Afghanistan.
16:01That came from the mayor.
16:04Father Bill keeps a record of every murder in New Orleans on his church wall.
16:08It is a memorial, but it isn't beautiful or stirring or inspiring.
16:12It's shocking, and it just keeps growing.
16:17One phenomenon we know whenever somebody talks about death, we always use numbers.
16:24Numbers are very comfortable.
16:25They're dehumanizing.
16:27We talk about murder rate, but we never hear names because names have power.
16:37I had one priest say, do you really think it does any good?
16:40I have families that come up and ask to see the name of their loved one, usually very poor people.
16:48And quite often they'll say, this is the only public acknowledgement that my baby ever lived.
17:00It's the best memorial I've ever seen.
17:03Just a wall with names on it.
17:05And the thing that makes it outstanding is the way people behave towards it.
17:09You see them caressing the names.
17:12You see them kissing the name and leaving stuff.
17:17That's lovely.
17:31I remember Chick Murray's funeral.
17:34It was one of the best funerals I've ever been to.
17:37We went outside the crematorium.
17:39In the car park, the tables were all champagne and glasses, all ready for us.
17:45We all dived over to get a glass and David said, don't drink, just hold your glass.
17:52Hold your glass.
17:53And everybody's going, what are you talking about holding the glass?
17:55And he kept looking to the door of the crematorium.
17:59And eventually a wee man in overalls appears at the door from inside.
18:07And David went, right, just a second.
18:09And he looked up and smoke came out of the chimney.
18:13And he went, Chick Murray.
18:16And we went, Chick.
18:17And believe it or not, the smoke came out and went, whoosh.
18:20And come down and swirled among us.
18:23It was the most moving thing.
18:29I think we in the West forget the value of a good send-off.
18:34In Ghana, families put themselves in debt for the rest of their lives to cover the course of elaborate coffins.
18:40Like this giant coconut made to honour the dead coconut farmer inside.
18:45In fact, they love a funeral so much, there's now a demand for a four-day week so people can
18:51get over the funeral hangover.
18:57Few funerals, however, could match a Balinese cremation.
19:03This one is for a member of the royal family, who's been placed inside this giant bull and cremated alongside
19:0968 working-class commoners.
19:13The fires release the spirits of the dead, enabling them to go to heaven or to be reincarnated.
19:22Funerals are amazingly therapeutic.
19:25There's a point when the person goes into the ground or into the oven and you know it's over.
19:32There's an instant change comes over everybody.
19:35Nobody's crying anymore.
19:37Even the widow or the partner who's left.
19:41Stops crying.
19:42There's an end comes to it.
19:44An exclamation mark goes, ba-dum!
19:47And they instantly start to get better.
19:49I love the way that's constructed.
19:58Did you know that when people are reminded they're going to die, they are twice as likely to believe in
20:03life after death?
20:04For most it's religion, but there are those who claim that science has the answer to eternal life.
20:12Sort of.
20:14And that's brought me to an unremarkable looking parking lot on the outskirts of San Francisco.
20:47How would you like to live till you're a thousand?
20:48A friend of mine and his team of scientists believe that ageing is a disease and therefore curable.
20:53It may sound like science fiction, but millions of dollars are being invested in this work from all over the
20:59world.
21:00And here's the real mind bender.
21:02Aubrey thinks that people have already been born that will live to a thousand.
21:08You'll have to explain everything to me.
21:10First of all, SENS, S-E-N-S, what's that?
21:13You really want to know what it stands for?
21:14Yeah.
21:15Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence.
21:17Now do you really want to know what it stands for?
21:19I don't know what senescence means.
21:20It just means getting old.
21:21It's the bad parts of ageing.
21:25The basic philosophy is really simple.
21:28All we're pointing out is that there's no difference between ageing and the diseases of old age.
21:36You can't cure Alzheimer's or cardiovascular disease in the same way that you can cure tuberculosis or something.
21:45Because Alzheimer's and so on are side effects of being alive in the first place.
21:49But that doesn't mean that they're inevitable.
21:51It just means that you have to attack them with different types of medicine.
21:58Well, I'm a rapidly ageing man with Parkinson's disease.
22:03Is there anything you could do for me?
22:04Parkinson's disease is actually one of the easier things.
22:06And I think we're in a pretty good state there.
22:09So, as I'm sure you know, Parkinson's disease is basically caused by the death of cells in a very specific
22:15part of the brain called the substantia nigra.
22:17So everyone loses cells in that part of the brain at a respectable rate.
22:21Some people lose those cells a bit faster than average, and those are the people that get Parkinson's disease.
22:26So what we want to do to fix that is to put those cells back.
22:30And, of course, that's exactly what stem cell therapy is.
22:33Now, at the moment, it's relatively early stage.
22:35Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't work.
22:37But when it does work, it works spectacularly.
22:39There are people who received stem cell transplants 10, 20 years ago now who have since then had absolutely no
22:47symptoms.
22:51It all sounds too good to be true, and maybe it is, but it's a good dream to chase.
22:56And who knows what miracles may come of it.
22:58Some of these cells have been modified.
23:01Unfortunately, I doubt it will be my or your life extended to 1,000 years.
23:05Not just yet, anyway.
23:06But what if I told you there is a way that you could live on after you die?
23:11Just up the road from Aubrey in Oakland, California, lives the delightful science writer Mary Roach, author of Stiff, The
23:18Secret Life of Cadavers.
23:22How would I describe the dead?
23:24They're kind of endearing in their helpless clumsiness, which is why I love the notion of something useful being done
23:32with you.
23:32If you give yourself to science, your head might be in one lab and you've got your hand in some
23:37automatic window test and your legs over here, so you get to be in three places at once.
23:41And it's like, it's a super power.
23:45The world of science always needs dead folk.
23:49These crash test dummies are built using data gathered from real human bodies being tossed off buildings and crashed into
23:55walls.
23:56And Mary thinks if we want to leave a mark on the world once we're dead, donating your body to
24:01science is the way to go.
24:03When I was working on the crash test dummy lab and they had the guy in the blue leotard.
24:11And it was kind of comical because they had to get him in driving posture, you know, and the dead,
24:18they don't follow orders.
24:21They don't respond well.
24:22They don't respond well.
24:23So they get, and he had this great comic timing.
24:25They get him all set up and then you'd see him kind of go.
24:30And they'd be like, get the winch.
24:32And then they're like, get the duct tape.
24:34That really appeals to me because that's kind of the way I behave.
24:38Yeah.
24:38It was like he was messing with them.
24:42They took the moonlight out of the skies and put the moonlight right in your eyes like a June night.
24:55I'm still not sure if body donation is for me.
24:58I don't want people looking at my bits on parade even if I am dead.
25:03Mary, however, is having none of it and has helped arrange some extraordinary access into a world that I, and
25:08I suspect you, have never seen.
25:09There are 40 dead people in this room, and each one of them, over the course of the next year,
25:15will change, help, and save countless lives in the future.
25:22I'm outside the anatomy lab at the University of California, San Francisco.
25:27If you're ever thinking on donating your body to science, you'd be encouraged by this board over here.
25:33These are letters to the dead people, to the donors of the bodies, from the students, after they've worked on
25:40them.
25:41It's a totally unique thing commemorating the help they gave them.
25:45Look, for instance, dearest Jerry, that's the dead guy.
25:49We are deeply grateful to have had the opportunity to learn from you.
25:54We greatly appreciate your contribution to our incredible and unique anatomy lab experience.
26:00The three of us are forever bonded.
26:03Trisha and Siobhan, love.
26:06P.S. Your tattoos are badass.
26:11In your 91 years, I'm sure you gave many gifts, but I can only thank you for your last.
26:16I'll never be able to repay you in full, but I know that any life I change in my future
26:20career,
26:21any grace my patients may see in my hands, will be in your debt.
26:27How about that?
26:27See, I thought they just sawed people up and laughed.
26:32And some dead guys.
26:36Hello.
26:37Hello, how are you?
26:38It's good.
26:38Excited.
26:39Who's this?
26:40The least you can do is say hello to each other.
26:44One of our teaching friends.
26:46Yes.
26:47Well, I was just reading those cards outside.
26:50It's extraordinary.
26:51It is, yeah.
26:52It's totally shattered my illusion of what it would be.
26:55You know, I thought they were cutting bits off and throwing them across the room.
26:58No, no.
26:59Exactly the idea.
27:00Because a guy once told me in Glasgow the testicles were flying across the room.
27:05Well, that's Glasgow.
27:06I mean, this is San Francisco.
27:10Whoa!
27:11No, it's a little bit different there.
27:14Our view is this is their first patient.
27:17So you treat it with respect.
27:21The donors' bodies are meticulously stripped back, each layer revealing more and more to the trainee doctors.
27:28Finally, after a full academic year, families, friends and the young doctors gather for a memorial service over the few
27:36remains that are left.
27:37These are cremated and scattered at sea.
27:40It's a selfless way to go.
27:42A truly noble death.
27:44Does everybody get over their initial horror of this?
27:47Because I was reading in Mary Roach's book, there was a lovely part where one student was cutting off the
27:53arm of the cadaver.
27:55And the other student was patting the remaining arm and saying, there, there, it's okay.
28:00But it gets stuck in your mind that there's a sort of horror involved.
28:04You know, I've never been exposed to the beauty involved.
28:07Right, yes.
28:08Which has taken me aback.
28:10Yes.
28:11And the impressiveness of the body.
28:13Periodically, we will have cadavers that are 98 years old.
28:18They're in great shape.
28:19Well, Mente, I ask you that.
28:21How old do you need to be?
28:22How young do you need to be?
28:24The oldest person we have here is 101 years old.
28:28I find myself kind of going off the idea as I get closer to the finisher.
28:36As I become uglier and uglier.
28:39I don't want anybody to see my saggy old tits.
28:43Right.
28:44You don't view it like that.
28:46You'll be okay.
28:47The idea is that the reason that you're doing anatomy is to learn the inside of the body
28:53so you can be a better physician.
28:55I think this whole process is this interesting thing about this interface between life and
29:01death that, you know, even though the cadavers, the donors are dead, we're thinking more about
29:07the living and how we can inform the living and help the living.
29:12Where do I sign up?
29:14Well, yes.
29:15Yes, you do.
29:16We're happy to have your Instagram.
29:17I'm completely sold.
29:18Sold to the mind of the glasses.
29:20You can join me.
29:22We'll lie together.
29:26Baby, you are a heavenly thing.
29:37See, I learned Buddhist meditation some years ago, and there's part of it, Buddhist meditation,
29:44and it would do people a lot good to know this, to take away fear of death, is when you
29:50see a bit of roadkill, a rabbit, a dead rabbit or a dead bird on the road or a cat
29:56or a dog
29:56or something, you say to yourself, that is the way of all things, and it'll be the way
30:03with me, that all things pass, and it takes away that fear of death.
30:11For me, I'm not scared to die.
30:23Throughout the course of making this documentary, I've seen a city of graveyards, a drive-thru
30:29funeral parlour, a vegan voodoo ceremony, and countless tokens of love.
30:35But I think this small nine-and-a-half-acre plot of land in Texas is the most beautiful
30:40place I've visited.
30:44This is Eloise Woods.
30:47It was opened two-and-a-half years ago by Ellen MacDonald, who was a neuroscientist, a bloody
30:54neuroscientist.
30:55It's a green burial ground.
30:58You can be buried here without all the chemicals and all the nonsense that pollutes the earth.
31:03Plus, you can be buried with your pets.
31:06It's got a lot going for it.
31:08Nice to meet you.
31:09I'm Ellen.
31:09Hello, Ellen.
31:10This is Sarah.
31:11I'm Sarah.
31:11Hello, Sarah.
31:12Nice to meet you, Billy.
31:13Oh, Hank Williams, my hero.
31:15Oh, is he?
31:16Oh, yeah.
31:17You're in the right place.
31:18Yeah.
31:22You can mark your grave with, like, a flat, natural stone, but we don't have anything upright
31:27or no crosses, no decorations.
31:30You know, the idea is that you can just be standing in the middle of the woods and look
31:33around and you can't tell that people are buried here.
31:35It just looks like woods.
31:36That's wonderful.
31:39If you want to feel good about yourself, go green.
31:43God knows the five million gallons of embalming fluid poured into the ground each year isn't
31:47doing the planet any good.
31:49But the thing I love about this place is that as long as everything that goes in the ground
31:53is biodegradable, there's no rules.
31:58I've had about eight families bring the body up here themselves in the back of a truck or
32:03a van and...
32:05Do?
32:05Yeah.
32:05Is it in a sitting position or is it lying?
32:07Well, they're usually laid flat.
32:10It's not joined in...
32:11No.
32:12They're not sitting there.
32:14Scrunched in.
32:16Families can actually do everything they want here.
32:18Yes.
32:18They can dig the grave themselves.
32:20And we've had a family.
32:21Well, the husband said when he found out that it was an option to dig the grave, it was no
32:24longer an option for him.
32:26He had to do it.
32:27It was very therapeutic.
32:28He brought a lot of his friends up and they all spent the whole day digging and all his
32:32sisters came up with food.
32:34And when they finished digging the grave, they all stepped inside of it and put their arms
32:38around each other in this little huddle and said a little prayer.
32:42They feel very good to be involved.
32:44Yeah.
32:45Yeah.
32:45But the older I get, the more I'm drawn towards your kind of thing or the spectacular...
32:51Go to the moon.
32:51...we've been shot into the air.
32:53Fireworks.
32:54Yeah.
32:55It's just sort of a different idea than lying in a casket with makeup all over your face
32:59or anything.
33:00Yeah.
33:00There's something very well weird about that.
33:03You put lipstick on men.
33:04The whole idea is just to make the person look alive, which strikes me as just really
33:08creepy and weird because they're not alive.
33:11Yeah.
33:11And it's just this whole denial of death that we have in our culture.
33:15They don't have it so much in other places, but in our country we don't like to think
33:18of people as being dead.
33:20We'd rather they look, you know, like they're sleeping and...
33:24They even put it on the stones, asleep.
33:26Yeah.
33:27For children that can be really perplexing because they have magical thinking and if they
33:31don't know where the person went, then their person might still be around somewhere.
33:38A simple shroud, a wooden box and a shallow grave, that's it.
33:43No drama.
33:44Just love giving way to the nature of all things.
33:46It's not a bad way to go, is it?
33:49Which I guess leaves one more question.
33:52What, if anything, happens next?
33:56I believe that when you die, some people are offered the opportunity to reincarnate and
34:02they can choose to reincarnate or not.
34:04Some people are offered the chance to be like spirit guides, to stay in the earthly realm.
34:09And then other people just boom, cross over.
34:13You cannot do nothing about death, but you can do a lot about life.
34:20The morning he died, he told me that the only thing that's real is love.
34:26It was wisdom that he had gained the instant he died.
34:29Is there somewhere else?
34:32If I die, will I see my dad again?
34:36I don't know.
34:38Have you found yourself thinking more about it as you've got older?
34:42Yeah.
34:44And the conclusion I've come to is I don't know.
34:47I have absolutely no idea.
34:49But I'm completely open.
34:51For instance, I have no idea what a black hole is.
34:56But I believe they exist.
34:58You know?
35:00No one's ever seen one.
35:02Well, the post-life experience may be...
35:06There may be some grand plan, but I have no idea what it is or whose plan it is.
35:13And I am but a welder.
35:17Leave me alone.
35:18You know?
35:19Ask me something I know.
35:26In the end, the only certainty we know is that death is coming.
35:31It's not easy to accept, especially when, like Californian artist Richard Wood,
35:35you know you only have weeks, maybe days, left to live.
35:39Richard is being eaten inside out by chronic ulcerative colitis.
35:43And the reason I want to meet him is that his hospice carers say
35:46that the way he has embraced death is a very special thing to witness firsthand.
35:52Hi, you.
35:53Billy Conley.
35:54I know you.
35:56Have you ever had a hard hump?
35:58No.
36:03I've been waiting a long time to do this.
36:08How was that?
36:09Thank you very much.
36:09It was lovely.
36:11I'm a changed man.
36:12Oh, I would hope so.
36:15I weigh about 90 pounds.
36:17I'm six feet one.
36:19So how much longer can I, how much weight can I lose?
36:23Yeah.
36:24You look great to me though, I must say.
36:26You don't look like a 90 pound man.
36:29Well, I'll show you like here.
36:33Charles Atlas.
36:34That's a leg, eh?
36:36Huh?
36:38Well, I guess I used to have a 16 inch arm.
36:41Look at this.
36:43My God, you're hardly with us at all.
36:45Do you ever get angry?
36:47Do you know, do you find yourself grieving for yourself?
36:49No.
36:50I'm not angry about that.
36:52I can get irritated about a little shit.
36:54Yeah.
36:55You know, that, you know, but about the big thing, no.
36:59I'm, I accept it.
37:02You know, I embrace it.
37:03I've come to accept the isness of it.
37:07Yeah.
37:08And to make the sweet surrender.
37:11So do you know where he'll die?
37:13Right here in this bed.
37:14Right here in the bed.
37:15Yeah.
37:16With a smile.
37:17When I go out in style with a smile, be right here.
37:23That's brilliant.
37:24I have no baggage when I leave.
37:27Uh, not packing a bag.
37:30And as far as the other kind of baggage that we have about having, you know,
37:38forgiven myself for all the dastardy deeds that I have, you know, committed through time.
37:46Richard, as you've probably already guessed, has led an interesting life.
37:51Before becoming a sixties radical and a prolific artist of the cosmos, he was an armed robber.
37:56In my twenties, I was a very dangerous person.
38:02And I was lucky on occasions I didn't, um, kill anyone.
38:09But I could have.
38:11And I've been in situations where, to survive, you better have the tombstones in your eyes.
38:18I'm waiting to die now.
38:21How about you?
38:22Yes.
38:24I eventually wound up doing a ten-year sentence for, uh, armed robbery.
38:31And then I had this epiphany.
38:33And in the next seven years in prison were wonderful.
38:39I began to discover I had a mind.
38:42I began to practice yoga.
38:45Yes.
38:46And getting rid of the baggage by forgiveness.
38:49You know, so...
38:50Forgiveness is a massively powerful thing.
38:53Yes.
38:53In your quieter moments, what do you think comes next?
38:58Um, well, you know, it's idle speculation.
39:01My personal philosophy leans a little to the East, uh, Buddhist.
39:08And I don't know about the afterlife or what's next.
39:14My disclaimer is I believe in everything.
39:17That way I can't be wrong.
39:24And I think it's time to be heading back now.
39:29Back into the black now.
39:33You can chalk it up to a false start.
39:37Are you okay?
39:39Oh...
39:39I'll have to stop.
39:42Yeah, just stop then.
39:43In a moment and get my breath.
39:46Yeah, no rush.
39:52Out of breath.
39:56Dying is an expensive business.
39:58And as most artists tend to be, Richard is cash poor.
40:02So to cover the cost of his funeral,
40:04Richard is inviting people for a dollar
40:06to try out his personalised coffin.
40:08I'll have a little rehearsal.
40:11You probably need to help him a little bit, somebody,
40:15to help him get up out of there.
40:17It's not easy.
40:19All right, put the lid on and let him...
40:27We're not afraid to die.
40:30We're not afraid to die.
40:34We're not afraid to die.
40:35We're not afraid to die.
40:35Just the stuff between.
40:37Start in the other side.
40:41Hey!
40:42I have seen the future and it works.
40:45He's alive!
40:47It's alive!
40:49I shall lay my contribution down.
40:54Thank you very much.
40:55Thank you, sir.
40:57Thanks for your time.
40:58I know how precious it is.
41:00It is precious.
41:09I feel so enriched by his company.
41:13He's completely different from what I imagined.
41:18He's ready to go.
41:20It's a lovely, lovely thing to see.
41:22Well, keep on performing and making people laugh.
41:25Oh, thank you very much indeed.
41:27You certainly warmed my heart.
41:30So human, so humane, you know.
41:33His attitude to the life, to the afterlife, to the cosmos.
41:37It's just brilliant.
41:39I know I sound like a weary-willy old hippie,
41:42but he's got it right.
41:44Goodbye and thank you very, very much.
41:47It's a pleasure.
41:49Bon voyage.
41:50Bon voyage.
41:52A lesson to us all.
42:08I've been in the company of people who died, and it doesn't seem all that bad a thing to me.
42:13They've slipped away.
42:16They didn't seem to be.
42:17And even people who were in pain some time before that,
42:20when it came to the time of dying, there was an acceptance and they just slipped off.
42:26Even in the case of my father, who they took him off the life support machine,
42:30and his eyes were all, the whites of his eyes were kind of yellow with the morphine.
42:37And the doctors had given him to take away his pain.
42:43And he was breathing that chesty, congested way for the pneumonia.
42:47And then his breathing suddenly changed to a very calm, quiet breathing.
42:56And he looked at my sister and he looked at me.
42:59And the whites of his eyes were white again.
43:03And he just slid away.
43:07It just seemed a very comfortable thing.
43:21And do you want to be remembered?
43:24As we've established, it's a long way away.
43:26So, but how do you want to be remembered?
43:29A good laugh.
43:30He likes Billy Connolly, a good laugh.
43:33Instead of having a stone somewhere to commemorate my life,
43:36I would rather have it made into a table on an island in Loch Lomond
43:40for fisher guys to have their tea at.
43:44You know, to put the cup on.
43:47It's like picnics are uncomfortable things
43:49because your arse is on the same level as your cup.
43:53You can sit like that all the time.
43:56And eventually you'll knock your cup over
43:58and spill it all over your sandwiches.
44:01So I think have a wee table for a fisherman.
44:16.
44:16.
44:16.
44:16.
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