Take your portrait and have it engraved on your grave: in Zimbabwe, a former bank employee is doing well in the funeral business by hiring masons who, on the order of the most far-sighted, fashion a tombstone in their effigy.
“We must remember the names of our loved ones, but also their faces,” funeral director Tafadzwa Machokoto, 35, told AFP.
In the southern African country, it is usually the spouse or relatives who organize everything after the death of the loved one. And rather in a conservative style, respectful of traditions.
“Many people are amazed when they see the portrait on the tombstone,” Machokoto said.
The former employee of one of the largest banks in Zimbabwe had first tried his luck, like millions of compatriots, by going into exile from the country with its dying economy for twenty years, between unemployment, shortages and galloping inflation.
But after living for a year in neighboring South Africa, he resolved to return to settle in Rugare, a poor suburb of the Zimbabwean capital Harare, which has many tombstone factories.
He launched himself in turn, but faced with the competition, he had to innovate: he and an associate offered to anticipate death by designing his own tomb and even the epitaph, then to have a copy of the chosen portrait engraved in the tombstone. for eternity.
“We attract more customers with portraits”, it adds “great sentimental value”, welcomes the young entrepreneur. In addition to saving loved ones funeral costs, he adds.
Word of mouth on social media did the rest. And his business is now thriving, with 20 to 30 sales a month to customers from all over southern Africa and even the UK.
These very personalized tombstones also allow prices to take off. Their average selling price is around $350 – a fortune in a country where the average monthly salary is around $230 – but some can reach several thousand dollars.
The most expensive so far is an order from a diplomat for his mother. A “custom-made structure, in the shape of a dome and three meters long”, paid the trifle of 5,000 dollars.
Bent over a stone, cutting with the precision of a goldsmith with small blows of a hammer, one of the company’s 12 mason artists, Denzel Karombe, is working on a portrait. “I didn’t learn the art the traditional way,” says the 19-year-old.
“It’s art, pure art,” raves the boss.
Most of these stonemasons are young people from the township ravaged by unemployment and drugs, who have left school. Cutting, epitaph inscription, they were formed on the job.
Jessica Magilazi, a Zimbabwean maid living in South Africa, had a grave made for her mother. When she died, Mrs Magilazi was still only a baby, she had forgotten the features of her face. The family had no photos, except for the one affixed to a passport. That was enough.
“When I look at the portrait, it’s as if I saw my mother in real life”, says Jessica Magilazi. From now on, her descendants “will know what she looked like”.
02/05/2023 07:53:19 – Harare (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
