JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Tuesday, July 22, 2025

Unwilling goodbyes for baby Matai

by

20140612

Na­tion­al foot­baller Mar­vin Phillip knelt in the church where his son was chris­tened four months ago, hold­ing on­to the in­fant's small cof­fin, un­will­ing to say good­bye to the child de­scribed by many as lov­ing and mis­chie­vous.

Phillip's ten-month-old son, Matai Phillip, who died on June 6 from po­si­tion­al as­phyx­i­a­tion af­ter be­ing placed in a car seat at his day care, was laid to rest yes­ter­day af­ter a ser­vice at the Sa­cred Heart Ro­man Catholic Church, Gas­par­il­lo.

The child was dropped off at the Anoint­ed An­gels day care at Ed­in­burgh 500, Ch­agua­nas, at around 6.15 am last Fri­day.

About an hour lat­er, the fam­i­ly was told the in­fant had been tak­en to the Ch­agua­nas Dis­trict Hos­pi­tal. When the fam­i­ly got to the hos­pi­tal, the child was al­ready dead.

At one point dur­ing the ser­vice, rel­a­tives had to re­strain Phillip, who tried to pick up the child from the cof­fin. The child's moth­er, Leslie Hall, could be heard through­out the ser­vice cry­ing out for her on­ly child.

"My ba­by! Oh god, not Tai, why my ba­by?" she asked.

When the tiny white cof­fin bear­ing Matai's body was car­ried out of the church and to the ceme­tery op­po­site, Hall al­so had to be re­strained as she at­tempt­ed to run af­ter the cof­fin. Lit­tle could be done to con­sole her as she held on­to her fa­ther and plead­ed: "Dad­dy, please don't let them take my ba­by."

A white and or­ange foot­ball T-shirt Phillip had bought for his son be­fore he left for Ar­genti­na to play a friend­ly with the host na­tion on June 4 was placed in the cof­fin along­side the child's tiny body.

In the eu­lo­gy giv­en by two of ba­by Matai's aunts – Krys­tal Jack and Sharon San­tana – he was de­scribed as ad­ven­tur­ous, lov­ing and the light of his fam­i­ly. They said that the on­ly thing that both­ered the child was when he was hun­gry.

"Matai was the most qui­et child. You would on­ly know it have a ba­by in the house if he was hun­gry," said his aunts. "Matai was what the old folks re­ferred to as a sweet­bread."

They added that even though Matai's life was short-lived, he ful­filled his pur­pose in bring­ing hap­pi­ness to the lives of those who loved him.

"He was the light of his par­ents' lives and he touched the lives of every­one who knew him with his sweet­ness and in­no­cence," they said.

Fr Al­lan Hall, parish priest of Tor­tu­ga, told the child's par­ents Matai was mak­ing his mis­chief in heav­en.

He praised the child's moth­er for giv­ing her child a strong foun­da­tion in the church as she would at­tend ser­vice with the ba­by every Sun­day, de­spite his age.

Hall said a strong re­li­gious foun­da­tion was what most youths in to­day's so­ci­ety were lack­ing. He urged par­ents to try to bring their chil­dren back from delin­quen­cy as, he added, T&T's youths had al­ready gone astray.


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored