Today is the first day of the Chinese New Year. It is the year of the rooster and I am a rooster. Jody, Dave and I went for a walk on the beach. On our way out, we notice a sign at our hotel advertising happy hour. We decide to walk to one end of the beach and then come back for a drink. On the way back, we walk past the hotel. Jody notices and tells us we have gone too far. Instead of continuing to walk down the beach, we turn back. Even though the happy hour drink comes in a glass, they allow us to have it poolside. Just working out in my mind how these circumstances came together to put the three of us in the right place at the right time. Strangely, there is no one at the pool. I am at the outdoor shower rinsing the sand off my feet. As I am walking to where Dave is sitting, he yells to me, "Bea, you better help that little girl, I think she's in trouble." I see 2 girls in the pool and I look at the one closest to me. He says, not that one, the other one. It looks like she is standing vertically in the water and I can just see just her mouth and nose out of the water, but I'm pretty sure she's not taking a breath. Then she slips under the water. I race closer to where she is, ripping my cover up and sunglasses off at the same time. Strange, how so many things go through your mind at once. I am thinking that I better jump instead of dive because I don't know how deep the water is, she's not going to drown in front of me. Dave said he's never seen me jump so far, my legs peddling on top of the water. I grab this little girl and heave her out of the water, right over my head. She is lifeless and frothing at the mouth, but her eyes are open. I am trying to get her to the side of the pool as fast as I can. Dave said once her face came out of the water she quietly said in Mandarin, "save my life, save my life." Dave thinks that may be the Mandarin version of saying help. She looks odd because she has sunscreen all over her face, but it's not rubbed in. She is feather light and not moving or making a sound. I lift her out of the pool. She's trying to get her leg on to the edge, but she can't do it. I push her onto the decking, climb out of the pool and carry her over to the lawn chair beside Dave. He is patting her back and telling her she's ok now and she vomits a bunch of water. Now I see Jody has a struggle of her own going on. I see the one I pulled out is breathing, so I leave her with Dave and rush over to help Jody. Dave said she weakly said to him in Mandarin several times, "I do not wish to die, I do not wish to die!" Dave reassured her that she wasn't going to die, that she's ok now. She's asking Dave where her big sister is, and is she ok. I hear Jody yell, HEY, HEY to the staff that's chatting at the bar, oblivious to what's going on. So I yell, we need some help over here. They finally come dashing over, but are no help.
In the meantime, Jody comes strolling back from the bathroom and notices me run into the pool and isn't sure what's going on. Dave says "You better go get her." At first Jody thought the other girl in the pool was playing a game because she was just floating under the water and not moving. She said "Is she okay?" And Dave said "No, she's in trouble." Then Dave said she whipped her clothes off in a second and was suddenly in the water. Jody said when she jumped in the little girl was just sitting on the bottom of the pool, unconscious. So she yanked her under the arms and ran up the steps of the pool carrying her. She said she couldn't believe how light the little girl felt - I guess that's what adrenaline does to you. As she was hoisting her out of the pool the little girl threw up all over her a few times, lots of water and frothing at the mouth. We both started calling for help and Jody laid her down on the side of the pool. She was white as a ghost and limp, and wasn't breathing. So Jody started to do CPR on her and after a few seconds the little girl threw up again and started to breathe a bit on her own. So Jody rolled her onto her side and patted her on the back while we waited for help. This little girl was so weak, she couldn't move a muscle. She just laid where Jody had put her. I dragged a couple of lawn chairs over so these 2 sisters could see each other. I carried the younger one over and laid her on the lawn chair. We decided not to move the older one, just leave her to try and breathe. Jody is trying to get the staff to bring some towels. Incredibly, 1 or 2 of the staff members from the bar kept on being in the way with his cell phone, videotaping this little girl. I think the girls were about 6 or 7 and the older one, 9 or 10 years old. Eventually a staff member comes over with 1 towel! I used it to wrap the little one in it, she was cold. Bring.....MORE.......towels!
Eventually someone from the hotel showed up with a bucket of first aid supplies and started trying to put a mask on the girl's face to breathe for her. Jody said you don't need to do that, she's already breathing. The woman kept trying to do it until Dave told her Jody is a doctor, at which point she backed off. Eventually the parents showed up, but no one seemed to understand how grave the situation had been. Jody kept trying to emphasize how important it was that they take the older one to the hospital but we aren't sure if they're actually going to do that. Incredibly, it took about 15 minutes for the parents to show up. They weren't panicked, even when they saw one daughter in a towel laying on a lawn chair and the other one on the ground. The father came over as he was leaving carrying his daughter and said thank you.
Jody says she has been a doctor for a few years now and has never felt like she saved anyone the way she did today. She always comes into the picture after the initial rescuing is done, but never actually pulled anyone out of trouble in the first place.
Dave said he felt like he was watching a movie in slow motion. The three of us had a role in this movie and it turned out to have a happy ending.
How do I feel now that it's all over? Strangely, particularly close to this little girl whose name I don't even know. Disgusted with the idiots at the bar for videotaping what could have been a tragedy. Annoyed at the parents for not understanding that they almost lost both of their little girls today. Fortunate for the privilege to have saved someone's life.
After all that, they still made us pay for our drinks.