THERE aren't many places in the world where you end up in a cot when you're dead and buried. But in Avalon Cemetery in Soweto there are thousands of cots demarcating graves.

Avalon Cemetery in Soweto

The custom comes from Mpumalanga where traditionally, rocky soil meant that graves could not be dug very deep, and rocks were placed over them to prevent animals from digging up the bodies. To reinforce this effort, metal rectangular cots were positioned over the graves.

So when you drive along the dusty roads of the 172-hectare Avalon Cemetery you'll see thousands of cots across the cemetery that has some 200 000 graves.

The cots pose a problem for the maintenance of the graves. Alan Buff, acting general manager of cemeteries and crematoria at City Parks, says: "The by-laws don't allow for these cots, most of which are rusted and falling to pieces, but their presence means we can't clear out weeds or mow the grass."

This means that the cemetery has a very untidy, unkempt appearance but this will soon change. In the coming weeks the Cemetery will be transformed by the planting of 3 000 4-metre high indigenous trees, and the tarring of the roads.

This is in preparation for tours of the cemetery by World Summit delegates, who will also be given a chance to plant some of those trees.

City Parks is encouraging families in Soweto to use headstones on graves, as the graves are safely dug two metres down. "A traditional marble headstone is too expensive, so we have suggested concrete headstones that are refined and buffed to look like marble. They go at R200-R300," says Buff. Metal markers placed in granite are being used now, and they are "catching on", says Buff.

Avalon is a busy place on weekends, when around 200 funerals take place on Saturdays and Sundays, with hearses and buses entering the Cemetery in a constant stream, bringing coffins and thousands of mourners.

Helen Joseph's grave in Avalon Cemetary

There are long-term plans to create a Heroes Acre at Avalon, taking in some of the freedom struggle heroes who are already buried there - Communist Party leader and Housing Minister in South Africa's first democratic government, Joe Slovo; 1976 Soweto hero Hector Pieterson; human rights stalwart Helen Joseph; Rivonia triallists Elias Motsoaledi and Andrew Mlangeni, and others.

There are also long-term plans to bring back the remains of hundreds of black South Africans who drowned when their ship sank during the First World War. On 21 February 1917, the SS Mendi hit another ship and sank off France, with 823 troops of the South African Native Labour Corps on board. Some 616 of them died. Long-term plans are to bring these men back home, to be buried at Avalon. A memorial to the soldiers has been erected at the cemetery, and will be part of the tour.

Similarly, there is to be an area of high profile created at another of Johannesburg's cemeteries, Westpark, in the northern suburbs. So far several people of high profile have been buried in this section of the cemetery - 11-year-old Aids victim Nkosi Johnson, the victims of the tragic Westdene Dam bus accident, and former Minister of Foreign Affairs Alfred Nzo.

Around 200 funerals take place on Saturdays and Sundays in Avalon Cemetary

The city's cemeteries
The first cemetery in the city was on the corner of Bree and Harrison Streets, laid out in 1886 when gold was discovered on the Witwatersrand. This became overrun as the town grew briskly and land was acquired in Braamfontein for the Braamfontein Cemetery, which received its first burials in 1888. The bodies from the city cemetery were exhumed and removed to Braamfontein in the 1890s.

There were private farm cemeteries at several locations around the city - Alberts Farm, north-west of the city, Bezuidenhout Valley, east of the city, and Klipriviersberg, down south. Most of these are still in place.

In 1912 the Brixton Cemetery was opened, barely a kilometre west of the Braamfontein Cemetery. Both cemeteries reflect the city's history, with Randlords, miners, engineers, soldiers, geologists and mayors finding their final resting place in them.

In 1918 a wood-burning crematorium was built in the Brixton Cemetery, on land organised by Mahatma Gandhi. In 1956 a gas-fired crematorium was built alongside the old crematorium and its chapel, and this will undergo renovation in preparation for the cemeteries tour.

Recently, after a year-long search, Enoch Sontonga's grave was located at Braamfontein Cemetery, and the man who wrote South Africa's anthem is remembered with an impressive granite cube.

The Kliprivierberg Cemetery, south of the city, contains the victims of one of many concentration camps set up during the Anglo Boer War. The Cemetery contains 700 graves. In all, 5 000 men, women and children were interned in a camp at the Turffontein Race Course.

In 1920 the Nancefield Cemetery in Soweto opened, followed by the Doornkop Cemetery in the 1930s. In 1972 the Avalon Cemetery opened, and at its present rate of burials, it has a lifespan of 10 years. In 2001 there were 9 500 burials at the Cemetery, around 800 a month, and 100 hectares have so far been used up.

The City is planning a heritage tour of three cemeteries - Braamfontein, Brixton and Avalon.