You know, I saw that the other day and I was about to get a bit creeped out. And I was. Then I thought about it.
I went to my grandmother's funeral deep in the Philippines in 1996. I showed up at their house and lo and behold, she was lying in a coffin in the house. She was embalmed, like this guy but lying in a coffin. In the outlying countryside, there's not a lot of services/tech. Hence not a lot of refrigeration for those kinds of purposes. And Catholic tradition calls for a lot of ceremony. I was a WAY uncomfortable to say the least but then everybody came by the house for prayers and visits over the course of 3 days. People would sit by her and talk to her and tell stories. After a while it was like she was just hanging out before we actually buried her. When we carried her coffin to the cemetery, per tradition, they opened the house windows so her spirit wouldn't get stuck in the house. Then we took off her shoes so her spirit wouldn't slip when she left the house. It was actually amusing, in an odd way. We even spun the coffin a few times to make sure the spirit was 'unstuck'.
Odd traditions but very interesting to actually experience them first hand.
