[Anchor]
Marking the eighth day since a catastrophic flood, funerals for missing persons whose bodies have yet to be found continued throughout the day. Grieving families burned straw dolls in place of bodies to soothe the sorrow of those who never returned.
Reporter Kim Young-a has the story.
[Reporter]
Shaved-headed men gather along the banks of the Trishuli River.
After placing straw-made dolls atop small funeral pyres, they carefully set them on fire.
This is "Narayan Bali," one of Nepal's traditional funeral rites.
[Ganesh Neupane / Family Member of Missing Person: Today marks the eighth day since he went missing. We have concluded that he is no longer alive, so we are holding a funeral using a symbolic body.]
In Hindu funeral traditions, bodies are cremated as soon as possible after death.
A separate memorial service is then held on the eighth day.
However, when bodies are missing and funerals cannot be performed, dolls are burned in their place on this day to comfort the souls of the deceased.
On the 2nd, the eighth day since the massive disaster,
funerals for dolls took place without a break along the Trishuli River.
In one village, five neighborhood women turned into dolls and drifted away into the smoke together.
All of them had gone out to the paddy fields early in the morning to work and never returned.
Left behind, sons, husbands, and fathers gathered to build a bamboo bier and hold a joint funeral.
[Ram Narayan Sharma / Family Member of Missing Person: I lost six family members in this flood. We are performing the Narayan Bali ritual so that the souls of the victims can find peace on this eighth day.]
Into the river waters that swallowed countless people eight days ago, the bereaved families sent off the lingering attachments and grief of their missing loved ones.
Though the river may still hold them in its embrace, the water rushes on fiercely without a single word of apology.
(Video Editing: Lee Seung-yeol)
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