A couple of days before the due date, Rai started having contractions. I was called to their camp and found Rai and Valentine sitting in their little bamboo shelter chatting quietly. It seemed to be pre-labour, with Rai having only light, irregular contractions, and she was coping well with them. In fact, she looked fabulous, rosy cheeked and smiling serenely, like a perfect round-bellied goddess.
That night, I was woken at around two in the morning by a neighbour; Rai was having stronger contractions and wanted me by her side. I grabbed my birth kit and stumbled up the beach in the moonlight, splashing sea water on my face to wake myself up as I went.
I found Rai hanging on her hammock, supported by Valentine. The labour progressed slowly, but Rai was a model mother, coping so well with the contractions, and moving through the different stages as though swimming; I was so impressed by her faith, she was calm and confident where many young, first time mothers would be uncertain or fearful.
At around noon Rai was ready to push, but it was a long time before the baby descended. It seemed something was holding the baby back, and sure enough, as her head was born I could feel the cord tight around the baby's neck. I held the cord off while guiding the baby out - a girl, born at exactly 2 pm, after a twelve hour labour.
The initial excitement was short-lived, I checked the baby and she had no heartbeat and was not breathing. I did infant CPR, massaging her heart and cleared out her mouth and nose, and after a couple of minutes her heart started beating and she breathed a small sigh, followed by a hiccup. I announced, "It's a girl!" and everyone cheered.
I was still a little worried, as she wasn't responding to reflex tests, but her heartbeat was strengthening, and Rai was working on pushing out the placenta. The word of the birth had already spread through the community and a circle of people were making their way up the beach chanting and singing.
Rai worked on suctioning the baby's mouth to clear fluid, while we started to clean up around, but the baby never woke up or cried. I checked the baby's heartbeat and reactions every five minutes or so, but after half an hour of cleaning up, I checked and she had no heartbeat.
My blood went cold. I immediately started CPR, glancing at the clock; I saw that it was exactly one hour after she had been born. The energy changed palpably. Whereas before the light was rosy and everyone was smiling and happy, in a mood of celebration, now everything seemed dark and blue.
Fighting panic, my mind screaming, "Noooooo!" I just kept praying, working on saving this tiny life, which barely had time to meet us in this world. I continued breathing air into her cold mouth, even after I knew it was too late. After ten minutes, I looked up, and passed the baby to her parents.
"This is not what I expected," Rai said calmly. We all looked at each other and began to cry. I felt that my whole world was crashing in on me, I couldn't understand why the sun was still shining; everything was too bright.
The body of the child was taken by boat to the local hospital in town, where an autopsy confirmed that she had been born severely brain damaged, and there was nothing that anyone could have done to save her. When I spoke to the doctor the next day, he said that indeed, it was a miracle that she had lived for this one hour at all
Though the hospital had given the body to the local Buddhist temple for burial, the family back in our community decided to make a Rainbow funeral ceremony, a way to honour this beautiful divine spirit that came to touch us for just a moment before passing on her way.
Some women built a large bamboo raft with a big woven basket that looked like a swan-shaped baby-basket on it. It was beautiful, bedecked with candles, flowers and vines from the jungle, hand made by members of our community. Everyone was invited to fill the basket with offerings, gifts, blessings and prayers, and the basket soon filled with shells, crystals, poems, flowers, beads and other special trinkets.
The ceremony began on the second day at 2 pm, at the time the baby was born. Rai and Valentine came up the beach to the ceremony area, and the raft was carried by several people, followed by a procession of the whole community.
It was eerily quiet as we made the procession three times around the main fire, but as we passed out onto the beach, a few voices started chanting with a refrain of,
"Through your eyes shines the light,
Mash Allah Mash Allah
Wonder of God in you."
Quickly the song spread through the procession, as a kind of cathartic celebration, and though many people were crying, many began to smile through their tears as we made our way up the beach. The raft was put down opposite Rai and Valentine's camp, halfway between their hut and the shore, and we held hands in a big circle around it.
The song continued a while longer, until it seemed that we had, as a group, moved through grieving and into a celebration of this tiny life that had graced us for a few brief moments. It occurred to me that this girl child must have been a very powerful spirit to cause two hundred people to sing spontaneously; to bring those people together, each individual in the circle a reflection of a part of her being.
We sang until our voices slowly attuned into chanting the sound AUM, a beautiful harmonic that rose and fell as the waves crashed behind us, sending our prayers into the heavens.
As the raft was lifted again, I cut off a lock of my hair to add to the basket, and a group of people, all dressed in white, carried the raft into the sea, swimming with it until it was far out of sight before lighting the candles and leaving it to catch fire and burn.
Valentine announced that they had decided to call the baby Felice, meaning happiness, as she had never known sadness in her life, and I realised that even though the death of Felice was a tragedy, this was the life path for that little beautiful spirit, and she was a truly blessed being to be able to have touched so many people and completed her life's karma in just one short hour.
I understood that it was a blessing to have met this soul, and to have helped her to transition into this world where she could complete her tikkun quickly before leaving again. This hour we spent with her was a most wonderful gift from the Great Spirit.