At the relatively tender age of 18, Lydia Amsterdam said her aunt took her to watch how bodies were prepared for burial. To her, it was a fascinating experience, one that she took a keen interest in because not many women in her time were practicing morticians. It was a male dominated profession because women were seen as too afraid of being around the dead, she related. And from then, she vowed to play a hand in changing that bias. Ms. Amsterdam is now 82-years-old, a mother of three, a grandmother of 20 and New Amsterdam’s oldest mortician. When she is not working, Ms. Amsterdam is tending to her garden. And on International Women’s Day 2022, the News Room recognises her over six decades of work in the mortuary. Shikema Dey caught up with her at Arokium Funeral Home in Berbice.
