Yuan Cheng-yi, 44, is a make-up artist. But her clients are neither celebrities nor models and her workplace is not a fancy make-up studio - but a morgue.
The soft-spoken mother of two sons belongs to a rare breed of mortuary make-up artists who are entrusted with the task of helping the dead depart with dignity. There are only about 30 of them in Taiwan.
The work is tough, said Yuan.
"Our job is a perpetual race against time, before the bodies start to decompose," she said.
"It's hard work. You're on your feet for 10 to 20 hours for each case."
The work is also never over.
"We are always on stand-by - one call and it's off to work," she added.
She recalled handling the case of two crew members of a helicopter that had crashed during a rescue mission after Typhoon Morakot devastated southern Taiwan in August 2009.
"One of them had a large chunk of his head sliced off. As for the other, his legs had broken into several pieces," she said.
It took her 13 hours - minus about five minutes to gulp down some food - to make the two men presentable enough to don funeral robes.
Yuan was a professional make-up artist before she switched to tending to the dead, a job she has been doing for more than six years.
She works for Lung Yen, a leading funeral service company, and handles up to 20 cases a month.
In Taiwan, servicing the dead is a thriving NT$60 billion a year industry that is built on tradition and, increasingly, on corporate management and novel services.
Deeply ingrained with the traditional Chinese reverence for the dead, Taiwanese families spend an average of NT$380,000 on complex funeral and burial rites for their loved ones - a small fortune considering that the average monthly salary is NT$40,000.
The funeral process - from the mortuary to the wake, and then cremation - can last between 10 and 14 days, considerably longer than that in other Chinese- speaking regions.
It can even stretch up to 49 days in cases where, for instance, the person had lived to a ripe old age.
But perhaps the most striking aspect of the industry is modernisation and the rise of big corporations.
About 15 out of the nearly 2,000 registered funeral companies in Taiwan hold almost 50 per cent of the market, according to Mr Lee Shao-cheng, who heads an umbrella body for the numerous associations of funeral service companies across the island.
Lung Yen, which employs 3,000 staff, is the best known among the big players. It was the first such company to be listed on the Taiwanese bourse in February last year, racking up NT$4.5 billion in sales.
The 19-year-old company runs a sprawling columbarium-cum-cemetery in New Taipei City and has offices in nearly every one of Taiwan's 22 counties and cities.
"The trade used to be dominated by small companies with links to triads, and whose staff had little education," said Cheng Ying-hung, an inspector with the Interior Ministry's civil affairs department which regulates the industry.
"In the past 10 years, corporations like Lung Yen which are big on branding and image have move into the mainstream. Their employees are younger and better- educated. That's why they are more popular," he added.
Liu Jui-hsiang, 36, exemplifies the current breed of funeral service professionals.
The 'consultant funeral director' with Lung Yen used to work as a geological surveyor for the government of Taichung, in central Taiwan, before joining the funeral industry nine years ago.
The trigger, he said, was the funeral of his wife's grandmother.
"There were many rituals and we were not allowed to ask why,'\" he explained.
'Old-school funeral companies dictated funeral rites and the bereaved could only take it or leave it,' he said.
"At Lung Yen, we put the initiative back in the hands of the family of the deceased. The funeral director is more like a tour guide who works round the clock to ensure everything runs smoothly."
Cheng attributes the makeover of the industry to regulation.
In 2002, the government introduced the Mortuary Service Administration Act, which puts funeral services and facilities under the jurisdiction of local governments, and also requires all such companies to join local trade associations.
Lee, the trade federation chief who has been in the business for more than 20 years, says the Act has boosted the number of registered funeral companies by about a third compared to 10 years ago.
One innovation has also helped in the transformation. Called a 'living contract', it is an insurance policy-style product that contracts buyers to funeral companies years or even decades before their death.
Prices start at about NT$220,000 for each contract, which stipulates in detail how the funeral should be conducted, and the choice of burial. The contract can be paid in instalments, but at least 75 per cent of the money must be put in a trust with a government-approved bank.
"This serves to protect the consumer, in case the company goes bust before the customer dies," said Cheng, the Interior Ministry official.
Only about 20 sizeable, profitable companies with at least NT$30 million in capital have been licensed to offer the contracts. As of last year, about 65,000 living contracts have been signed, putting a total of NT$2.3 billion in trust.
Morgue beauticians like Madam Yuan can earn between NT$60,000 and NT$100,00 a month, including bonuses.
But the most rewarding part of her job, she said, is seeing bereaved family members and loved ones bid goodbye to the deceased one by one for the last time.
"It's a touching moment... for many people, seeing their loved one look nice and comfortable is when they finally find release for their grief and feel comforted," she said.
