When Zachary, Louisiana, was the curator of a ritual museum, sometimes your neighbor would call and ask when they saw a car in the parking lot: “Who is dead?”
Zachary is a suburb of Baton Rouge with a population of approximately 18,000.
George Joseph “GJ” Chalet III and his three siblings own one of Zachary’s two ceremonial halls. During the coronavirus pandemic, they found their business was like fun ceremonies in many other small towns across the United States and witnessed the approach of the disaster.
Since their grandfather and his brother opened in the 1
Because he grew up in in Yiguan, Xia Le knows how to prepare for the worst. In case of death due to a drunk driving accident, he was taught at a very young age to refuel the hearse before the local high school dance.
However, even Charlet was not prepared for the Covid-19 pandemic. He said: “In the first few months, it was really scary because there was not much guidance on what we should do.” The shortage of body bags meant that some bodies had to be wrapped in sheets.


This worries Chalet because he is not sure about the risk of catching Covid-19 from the body. Charlet and other staff did their best to protect herself by wearing surgical gowns everywhere. Since then, the CDC stated that the risk of being infected by the dead body is very low because the dead body does not exhale.
Initially, the Charlet fun ceremonial hall did not allow internal services and only held tombs. They tried to limit the funeral to 10 people. But it is not easy to get the mourning family members to follow the rules.
He said: “Without failure, people just… they did what they wanted to do.” “We have no way to keep people away from the funeral.”
The Yiguan now allows indoor services for 75 people or less. Charlet is worried about catching the virus from the funeral, and the funeral may have been in close contact with the deceased before the deceased.
“There are very few connection meter services where we don’t know someone or have a connection with them. It’s a very social atmosphere,” he said. “These days, I let people enter the building, then go back to the office, and close the door. And I try my best not to interact with people like I used to.”


According to data from the Louisiana Department of Health, there were 552 Covid deaths in the Diocese of East Baton Rouge where Zachary is located. In the past six weeks, the parish’s average positive rate was 10%. During the same period, an average of 13% of the two census tracts that make up Zachary tested positive for Covid-19.
Charlet said that because of Covid, more people in the community were killed, but the ritual hall was not flooded. Usually, they handle about five services per week. He said that since Thanksgiving, the number of Covid deaths has increased. The eral ceremonial hall provides services for some deaths in the Louisiana prison in Angola. 16 inmates died in the Covid-19 prison.
Charlet printed a paper in Deirdre Sullivan’s paper folder, which he kept in the newspaper clippings he wanted to read at the funeral. He said: “Humans need that kind of farewell ceremony.” “You have to admit someone’s death.”
But his 80-year-old uncle recently caught Covid and was very sick. If he died, Charlet didn’t want his mother to go to the funeral. He said: “I just want people to pay more attention and take advantage of the opportunity to write condolences.” “For me, this is a very strange place. This is contrary to my livelihood.”
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