The Date: April 13, 1985 New Zealand death of Raymond Tekorako Ruka, and who died again December 27, 2024
As the Custodian of Stories, there is a humble thanksgiving I embrace for the privilege to post this piece written by my brother Raymond Tekorako Ruka, MedicineSinging Board Member who died and crossed over to his relatives December 27, 2024. He is now where he has been before, a sacred place where he went when he died once before in this life time. It was April 13, 1985, as the result of a terrible accident. I cannot imagine the challenge to one’s spirit when leave-taking, and then choosing to return to this life. But always greatful to have known him in this lifetime as brother, Waitaha priest, voice for peace and justice, and the most elegent speaker and writer I have ever met. He spent the next 40 years in a wheel chair always needing to address the many factors of paraplegia. In all the years I have known him, never a word was said of complaint or resentment.
Raymond would often speak of the geneology of trees, and the geneology of water. I am thankful that now he has put the wheelchair aside and slipped into the waters of his homeland with grace and fellowship. I am sure he is at peace with all the world, and its trees and waters, and all of his relatives, and mine. Be sure to read many of his stories on RaymondRuka.com. I can imagine it was quite a celebration when he returned once again to be within their graces.
I love you Raymond Tekorako Ruka.
Tipene
Stephen W. Emerick Ph.D. Chairman of the Board, MedicineSinging
April 13, 1985. Sacred Journey
On April 13, 1985, a few days after I had turned 34, I suffered a catastrophic work-related injury, falling from the top of a 120ft petroleum storage tank at the Marsden Point Oil Refinery in New Zealand where I was employed by a private contractor that resulted in my death…
(There is chaos at the accident site for at least 25 – 30 minutes before calm is restored)
Silence – Everything in this world I find myself in, appears in a stare of deep respectful silence. The landscape is filled with a lapis-blue fog covering everything. I know it was just moments after the incident that I observed myself swimming naked, in an unfamiliar river in the foothills of the Brynderwyn ranges.
Brynderwyn, how bitter, sweet that name rolls across the tongue of a childhood memory. I was born in the heart of one of its valleys. My beloved father Te Toti put to ground my placenta there in accordance with our customary lore. Brynderwyn, the Welsh name given for the ranges overlooking Marsden Bay where this accident occurred, situated in the province of Taitokerau, Northland, Aotearoa, New Zealand. There are Maori and Waitaha names for the area as well, but that’s another story, waiting for another more appropriate time.
Even though I was observing from afar and confirmed to myself it was indeed I who was swimming, I became overwhelmed with this incredible feeling of love. As well, there was a pity for the “self” of me that was out there by himself in the water all alone in the numbing silence, because I looked so fragile, helpless. I wondered why I wasn’t out there with me. Why had I become separated from myself? Why had I abandoned myself at such a critical time? Me here, me over there, this surreal place, the realization struck me, I must be dead, dying, or going to die, or something! I began to feel guilty about who I was for deserting me. I was heartbroken and started to wail.
Remorsefully, I rejoined myself, that part of me I’d left behind to the river and a united force was awoken. My body felt different, but new clothes always do. We were happy. I had a new sense I wasn’t alone in that river, or that world of silence was silent, or neither empty nor full. I began to listen, and I began to remember.
It felt strange to glide through the water without too much effort. In fact, when I began to “move into it” to relax, it took no effort whatsoever, even swimming against the current as I was. Like dew on a leaf, leaves on a tree or petals on a flower, some other power mightier than the self, like the rain or the wind, or in my case the river began to dance its greater dance around me. Embracing me. Penetrating the very pores of me, transcendent.
And as the current of the river begins to change its rhythm and becomes more forceful the invisible power that had so lovingly imbued me, sets me free amongst It’s tempest. It is then that I come upon the majestic waterfall that had been hidden from my view by the thick stand of trees. In any other world I would have heard the roaring of this cascading wonder. Even so, a fierce urgency overcomes me, urges me forward. For some unfathomable reason, I am moved to take myself under its silent falling waters to bathe.
I am being tossed and turned in the maelstrom emanating from the rapids and currents of the tumbling fury as I attempt to slowly swim forward through the chaotic waters to reach nirvana. From above, a ray of sunlight slices through the seemingly impenetrable canopy of lapis-blue fog that has blanketed this entire nightmare, or has it been, in reality, a spiritual baptismal and my beloved sons’ cries come echoing through on this piercing shaft of light, shattering that veil of silence and I finally hear for the very first time the magnificent song…of the waterfall.
Or was it…the first beat…of a heart being…reawakened…?
RTR
Uenuku mai Tawhiti; Elder and Tohunga, a Priest, from the Matriarchal Peace Nation of Waitaha, in Aotearoa, New Zealand.
My name is Raymond TeKorako Ruka. I belong to a matriarchal peace nation from Aotearoa, New Zealand called Waitaha, the water carriers. I am an Elder and Tohunga (priest), and I speak on peace and love.
Waitaha has a past that was prophesized in the following beautiful African proverb:
Until the lions have historians of their own,
the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.
Waitaha’s incredible history was desecrated by the “hunter” yet lived on quietly in an oral-only tradition of their people. Only recently were these ancient stories put into the written word by their own historians so that Waitaha could re-establish their rightful place in the hearts and minds of those who need to hear the songs of peace and love.
Raymond TeKorako Ruka has dedicated his life to the peace teachings of his beloved Grandmother Teachers. These women were direct descendants of the original navigators that left the shores of northern Africa millennia ago to map the world and finally settle the entire pacific basin region.
Raymond TeKorako Ruka lived in Yellow Springs, Ohio with his beloved wife Jenny and passed over on December 28, 2024, at the age of 73. Raymond’s body has been buried in Yellow Springs Ohio in a green cemetery.
