Cemetery Vultures: Losing Your Head (and your money) Over Ancestor Worship

If you cherish your deceased loved ones, you might want to encase your loved ones in cement in Vietnam.

If you cherish your deceased loved ones, you might want to encase them in cement in Vietnam.


I am not one to kick the religious beliefs of others —hell, I once did a drunken rain dance in hopes of quitting smoking— but if your thing is ancestor worship, as it is in much of Asia, then you might want to be careful how you bury your loved ones in Vietnam.

This from an article about “cemetery vultures” at Vietnam.net news service:

Some people saw a small piece of paper sticking on the grave. They picked up the paper to read and all of them were appalled. “Your grandfather’s head is in our hands. If you want to get it back for reburial, you must redeem with VND50 million ($2,500). Preparing the money, we will call to tell you the place and time,” the piece of paper wrote. Some family members jumped into the grave in a hurry to check and they did not find the head.

Well, there you have it. Grave desecration and beheading for profit. It would seem that some Vietnamese are taking their recent transformation to capitalism to the fullest extent.