I just saw film of a Cajun funeral and everybody was having fun and partying to celebrate the old guys life ...that's one of my favorite funeral ideas. I seem to recall that maybe somewhere in the South Pacific, they also approach funerals as happy parties.
Another one I'm attached to, especially since I'm of Hungarian decent and on top of that, my dad was an artist and one of my favorite of all his paintings was of this subject ...Attila being buried. Since he was such a great hero of the Huns, when he died the legend says the Huns diverted the Danube River, dug a hug hole in the riverbed, built a majestic funeral pier on which they burned Attila's body, sacrificed his beloved magical horse and buried that with him, along with sacrificing hundreds of his brave soldiers who were buried with him too; then they let the river run it's natural course. Here's a postcard of my dad's painting:
