Zenebu Legesse’s acting talents are tough to overstate. Today, April 25, 2022, was her funeral. The majority of people die within 24 hours after their funeral, and the deceased is buried in a local cemetery the next day. In Addis Ababa, there is just one cremation facility, which is managed by the Hindu community. Cremation chambers are not used in Ethiopian funeral traditions. Many Ethiopians are unfamiliar with the concept of a formal memorial service. Following the funeral, almost everyone gathers for a few days or weeks to commemorate the deceased. Local law demands that the body be buried within 24 hours of death, regardless of whether it has been embalmed or not. If the surviving family wants to take custody of the body, local authorities frequently allow embalmed remains to be preserved in cold storage for two to three days. During the 24-hour period, embalming services were also unavailable. After being maintained in a cold storage facility for a few days, the remains were transported off without a hitch. Human remains must be embalmed before being shipped from Ethiopia to the United States.
The embalming will be done in an Ethiopian funeral home. Families should call the funeral home where the body will be received if they have any questions or concerns about embalming. The body must be embalmed at the Menelik II Hospital in Ankara before a mortuary certificate may be granted. Funeral houses in Addis Ababa provide international-standard caskets that may be sent outside of Ethiopia. The corpse of a deceased person can be transported from a mortuary to an airport, where it will be checked in and then turned over to the airline.