Codes of Survival -Scripts - a series of short factionalized stories based on historical events in the Subantarctic Islands written by Lloyd Godman to accompany the exhibition and installation - 1993 - © Lloyd Godman

Codes of Survival - Scripts

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1845 - THE PANG  - OF BIRTH  

I should never have left the pa. I should have listened to the Whanau and stayed in the  Whare Kohanga where they are still waiting for me. They must wonder where I am.  But I had to be gone from there, and get some air as it felt stale and stuffy in the confines of the dark Whare Kohanga. It will have been built and burnt for no purpose if the birth is here in the tane. Can I help that?

There are none of our old medicinal plants that they could use for the birth on this island.  No Kotukutuku (Fushsia) or Tararamoa (Bush lawyer) grows here on the land, and the knowledge of the old ways is of little use though the old women try with what they have. They have been using other plants that grow  freely on this island, but they are not effective  and made me feel so unwell, and this is the reason that I wandered off alone. But I had never thought I should walk so far.

So here I am, alone in this Tane to give birth?  It is not a choice I would gladly make.  There is no family, friends, not even a slave to help. There is no shelter except for  the canopy of the forest and the hollows in the ground among the fairy rings of ferns . I am on my own. I shall have to rely upon my own strength.  I am myself. I must be strong.

My waters had broken earlier with a warm rush. Then I knew the excitement of the birth moment had arrived and it was at last my time. It was happening quite suddenly and something I had not prepared for at this time, caught so unawares was I. The waters had run down my legs right to the earth. I could even feel the wetness between my toes mixed with the  humus of the land. I had wandered much further than I had imagined and it would be some  effort to get back to the Pa in time. This  was my second birth and it was all happening much faster than the first, for, the contractions were coming much faster than I would ever  have liked and now they were here I tried to remember all that I had been told about  the event and the experience of the first birth. It was sore, a strange mixture of pain and pleasure, much like the first time. At times I fell to the forest floor  doubled with the pain in an uncontrolled writhe. I felt hot and cold at the same time, dropping my blanket and stripping off the clothing from my body because of the sweat and the ease of  movement I would have. It felt a natural thing to be done. There I lay naked writhing  on the Papa-tu-a-nuku. Ignoring the pain,  with the help of a stout branch I pulled myself up again thinking that I could make my way to the pa in time.

I was mistaken. The mamae came stronger,  I fell to the ground once more with my eyes closed and clenched teeth. I was breathing hard with lips opening and closing with each motion. I grabbed another strong branch of a tree and pulled myself up to a squat. For there was no flax to bind the sick to two trees and I could not contemplate this old tradition. With my eyes closed I sang a birth karakea. Loud and strong. Loud and strong, again and again I cried to the goddess of child birth.  This was as my mother had been when each of us had been born, and all our mothers before. It was the tradition of the  Whanau, it was the sneeze of life.

I had my eyes closed with the pain, but above me, I sensed the rustle of the trees that moved gently in the slight breeze. I was lucky the weather was not in the mood of a storm. I managed to  find a forked tree with a long branch wedged in the fork at the right height to aid my birth. With both hands held high in a tight grasp on the stick, I pushed down hard and felt a warm movement inside. This I worked at for sometime pushing harder and harder, breathing and breathing, push below and pulling on the stick with my hands above. I could feel the stick begin a great bow from my pressure. This life inside me was moving downward out into the world. Beyond my control was the will to bear down but so quickly the progress of the birth was that it will shed all  too soon. When I reached down with one hand, I could feel the form of the small head wet and round now starting to enter the open air. For sometime, I felt round across the warm head.

I pulled harder with my other hand on  the branch and it bowed still further with the pressure. Shortly the head was completely  free and I could assist with my free arm, I gently pulling as the body would  follow to the out side world. The skin felt new and crinkled but I could not tell if the new born was breathing yet or if it  was a boy or girl.

Suddenly with a few last easy pushes and a pull with both hands on the new born there was the new baby warm wet and slippery in my arms.  With one firm slap on the bottom, the cry of the new born filled the air and I feel back on the ground relieved once more panting with the new born clutched to my firm breast. There I lay for some time between exhausted breaths gently chanting a birth song overcome with joy. It  was a new son I held in my arms and Rangi  would be pleased with his new born. As I  chanted and regained my breath I was not even aware of the placenta expulsion, before, there it was on the ground beside me and I realized that the cord was still attached to the baby embraced in my arms.  Tau mahi ra, e te iti kahurangi!

There were few things that were in my fibre kit to cut the umbilical cord but there were some broad slithers of green glass from a broken bottle found on the island and that I had kept  to cut any number of things as it had a very sharp edge. I used this to cut through this line that had tied us together. My stomach that had just been full, fat and round was now withering with lose flaps of skin like that of the baby. As soon as I could gather my thoughts, the new born was at my raised nipple. My breasts were firm and full with the liquid  before the coming of the new milk. They had swollen so that when I looked down  before this birth all I could see was them like large round hills and my stomach even rounder sticking out in  front of me. It had all felt heavy.