Two-and-a-half years after my mother died I took her to India. Not all of her--just enough to fill one quarter of a sandwich-size zip-lock bag. Any more than that and I feared getting stopped at airport security, accused of carrying gunpowder in my carry-on. Just in case, I brought along the official crematorium certificate.
My mother wanted to be cremated. But even though she had strong opinions about almost everything, she said she didn't care what we did with her ashes. Lacking instructions, I put Mom's "cremains" on a shelf in my office, which is where they stayed until I joined my partner in December 2006 on a business trip to New Delhi and a three-week tour of Northern India's major cities and cultural sites. My mom would be going with us to Varanasi--the Hindu city of the dead.
