pioneers in this country. The Chinese cemetery in San Jose is one of these
memorials. As Chinese were not allowed to be buried in Caucasian cemeteries
at the time, the Chinese organizations deeded the land for their own cemetery
in 1900. The cemetery in San Jose contains about 300 unmarked graves, an
altar made of crumbling marble and brick, and a funerary burner for paper
offerings.
San Jose, CA
paper and cardboard facsimiles of money, clothing, possessions,
and houses, for example, are to serve the deceased in the afterlife.
Burning these simulacra passes them to the spirit realm.
For more information, see Roderick Cave's Chinese Paper
Offerings (Hong Kong; New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
http://www.uidaho.edu/special-collections/papers/burners.htm
comfortable and he allowed me to take the picture without
bombing me.
I thanked him, closed the door and went my way. I was elated
not because I could have stunk to high heaven for a month, but
because I felt so lucky to have been close to such a pretty and
gentle creature. I feel privileged of such an encounter.
