FEATURE: Osaka elderly ensure no one faces a lonely farewell

OSAKA - In an Osaka neighborhood long known as a home for day laborers, elderly residents with no family to rely on are arranging their funerals in advance -- and making sure they are there to see one another off.

"Why did you have to leave us so soon?" a man said to the altar at a funeral in late May, where about 45 people gathered at a community center in the western Japan city's Nishinari Ward.