Twenty Years as a Gravedigger: A Chance Choice That Became a Lifelong Career

Armands Ancāns never planned to become a gravedigger. Twenty years ago, at age 19, he was looking for work in Jēkabpils but didn't want to work in construction or at a sawmill. His mother jokingly suggested he try a funeral home. He gave it a try, and it turned out to be a good decision.

Now he has been doing this job for 20 years – nearly half his life. Being a gravedigger is not just about digging a hole and lowering a coffin. It starts the moment a person calls to say a relative has died. The gravedigger must go pick up the deceased and take them to the morgue or the State Forensic Medicine Centre. Only then does the burial process begin.

Ancāns admits the job requires nerves of steel, but he has been doing it for two decades and seems to have found his calling.