Perhaps this is a little far out, but I have visited in Germany many times and also am impressed with their cemeteries. A little history first. When you buy a plot in Germany you buy it only for a certain amount of years 10, 15, 20, 30 or whatever. If you do not renew your lot fee they come and dig you up and throw away the stone. All the plots are surrounded by a stone curb. The curb, etc - all goes. Now for me I almost had a heart attack on learning this. No wonder the people helping me find the cemetery couldn't understand why I was so excited. There was one case for me where they had used 4 sides of the tombstone and kept burying. Now remember they use pine boxes and white shrouds - I don't think any embalming but forgot to ask. Next, all the cemeteries have water spigots, watering cans, hoes, rakes, etc in strategic spots all over the cemetery for the patrons. Any day you visit you will find men and woman (and I mean even when it is misting and cold) out taking very good care of their plot. They weed them, water them, replace flowers with new when they die. They are beautifully taken care of. It is like an extension of their home gardens. The thing I really don't understand is that when I was there last fall I saw more and more of the most beautiful and large black marble stones all fancily cut with Gold lettering. All this for a few years. Oh well.. Reason for the turnover is obvious and that is lack of space. Now I was in Ireland and the older cemeteries are there. In the cities it is now 6 deep and probably happening in other countries. In Czechoslovakia I cam across what they called a bone church. Because of a lack of specie, all the graves were dug up and all the bones deposited in the grotto of the church. I won't go into more details, but interesting what they did. There are two of these in Czech and one I know of in Italy. Napoleon dug them up and they are in individual cubby holes in the catacombs of Paris. No, I am not macabre but with this hobby of genealogy have found the customs very interesting. My husband travels a lot on business and I go with when I can - that is why I travel so much. Not that I don't love it. Hope this is of interest to some of you. Julienne