Whangārei's Jon Braithwaite, 32, with his son Felix, 2, and wife Dewi, 24, appreciates every day he gets to spend with his family as Dewi battles cancer. Photo / Supplied
Last year was one to remember - or should that be to forget - with a number of challenges facing Northland and New Zealand.
As part of our look back on 2020 the Northern Advocate is catching up with some of those who made the news last year.
They say things come in threes. And nothing could be truer for Whangārei's Jon Braithwaite, who has called Indonesia home for more than nine years.
The 32-year-old experienced the devastating 2018 earthquake in Lombok; he has tried mid pandemic to rescue his livelihood - a hostel and dive business; and now, Braithwaite is supporting his 24-year-old wife's battle with cancer.
His soulmate, Dewi, found out she had Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma last September when Braithwaite was 10,000km away in a New Zealand quarantine facility while trying to find work here. As soon as quarantine was over he was back on a plane to the island of Gili Trawangan to be with Dewi.
The first-time father has dealt with the chain of hardship by focusing on what is good in life.
Two years ago his dual businesses were thriving hubs – one the Broken Compass Hostel & Bar, co-owned with his three older brothers, and a scuba dive centre.
He was also in the throes of love with local barista Dewi, who made Braithwaite his favourite cuppa daily.
"For one of our first dates we got pizza, watched a movie, and we held hands - I was nervous like back in high school days," Braithwaite said.
Their love story became official when they tied the knot in a traditional Buddhist ceremony, followed by Kiwi wedding festivities with Braithwaite's family who visited the island.
On August 5 the family were enjoying a second wedding reception with then 24 weeks pregnant Dewi when the ground beneath the beachside restaurant began to violently shake.
"That night, I swear, it felt like the earth was being ripped apart," Braithwaite said.
They were less than 5km away from the epicentre of deadly 6.9 magnitude earthquake that killed 563 people and injured thousands.
He frantically looked for his wife Dewi who had been inside the main restaurant when the shocks hit.
"I ran in calling her name but I couldn't see her," he said.
Eventually the pair found one another on the beach and fearing a tsunami headed for the island's only hill - 300m high - with Braithwaite's sister and her family. The rest of his family and friends rushed a different way.
Around 3500 other people had the same idea as they swamped the hill in a desperate hunt for safety.
"People were hurrying up the hill with lifejackets ... it felt like the world was coming to an end."
As the ground lightly trembled, Braithwaite left his wife on the safety of the hill and ventured to look for his other family members.
He found them huddled together 200m away in the dark made worse by an island-wide power outage.
"I heard everybody start to scream. It was one of the worst moments of my life. I thought, 'here we go – a tsunami is coming and I'm not even with my wife'," Braithwaite said. "The whole time I was thinking of her and our son."
Eventually they made their way back to Dewi and Braithwaite's sister atop of the hill.
They sat in the dark as waves of aftershocks rocked the island, sat in the dark with only the lights from their phones until midnight when the ground stilled and the tsunami siren subsided.
Braithwaite and his brothers seized the chance to gather essentials for the long night ahead atop of the hill, rushing to the village where they were met with a sight fresh from a zombie apocalypse movie, he said.
"You would come around a corner, shine your light across the street and just see blocks of rubble and destruction with no one around."
Braithwaite made it back to his hostel where he collected food, water, blankets, pillows, and baby formula as there were babies in their group.
At 6am Braithwaite and his family descended to the beach, with the rest of the population, in a desperate bid to get off the island via Lombok's Coastguard boats.
The rescue mission was hindered as the Coastguard had to anchor off the beach while dinghies and tenders ferried passengers to the waiting vessels.
Braithwaite was relieved when he and Dewi were able to wave goodbye to their Kiwi family who managed to get safely off the island, but their village had been completely decimated.
"We lived in a tent for a couple of months. For the first few weeks it was like camping again."
They were crammed into a large communal tent alongside four other families. The makeshift home was pitched in a mango orchard with 30 other families housed in five big tents nearby.
Braithwaite upgraded their living arrangements to a simple three-by-three metre home-built shelter as Dewi's due date and monsoon season neared.
"We needed something to keep the rain off our backs," he said.
The entrepreneur's concerns extended beyond his home life as he feared for his staff – the majority of who were locals from the towns of Lombok that were hit the hardest.
He fundraised more than $20,000 via a Gofundme page to provide staff and their families with food, water, shelter and medical supplies.
Months passed and Braithwaite was able to slightly revitalise business for the Christmas and New Year period but the tourists were still too few and "life was getting tough".
December brought a strong reprieve with the birth of the couple's healthy baby boy, Felix.
Excited by their first child and keen for Kiwi family to meet their bundle, the new parents made a trip home in December 2019.
Their summer in Whangārei was filled with family, friends and a health scare when Dewi discovered a lump in her neck.
"The initial check-up didn't pick up any signs of cancer so we weren't too worried to begin with," Braithwaite said.
They returned to Lombok and Dewi's lump had grown to the size of a golf ball.
They made an appointment with a local surgeon in March which quickly stalled with the global explosion of Covid-19.
"The islands completely shut down, boats stopped running from Bali and people started to panic and there was a mass exodus."
The couple were plagued by health concerns coupled with financial woes as his businesses were forced to close.
"The whole time I could see the lump getting bigger and see her paying attention to it. It was itchy and getting sore," he said.
Eventually in mid-May surgeons removed the cricket ball-sized lump and informed Dewi it was benign and no further treatment was needed.
Their financial situation had become dire and they made the difficult decision to fork out the last of their money with a $5000 flight for Braithwaite to return to New Zealand in July to find alternative work.
As he made his way home, Dewi underwent a biopsy.
Five days into managed isolation Braithwaite was on a video conference with his wife and her oncologist when their world was rocked.
"Hearing the news that her lump was cancer was like being hit in the back with a baseball bat," Braithwaite said. "I grieved for days."
With Dewi needing to undergo intensive chemotherapy, he decided to return to his wife's side immediately.
A Givealittle fundraising page was launched by Braithwaite's family to help fund his return flight to Lombok and Dewi's cancer treatment.
In less than a month family, friends, and strangers had donated a staggering $20,000 towards the young family.
"Just knowing that financial pressure was released was like someone had just picked me up by my shoulders and said you're good to go now," Braithwaite said. "There were several times when I was moved to tears."
Dewi has reached a treatment milestone as January marks the last of six chemotherapy treatments she has received every 21 days in Jarkata, a two-hour flight from their village.
"She's strong and healthy and has a positive attitude about the future, which is all I can hope for," Braithwaite said.
Business is stagnant as no tourists are visiting the island, Braithwaite said. He has planned to fly to New Zealand in March to work for six months as they can no longer withstand their financial drought.
But always the optimist, Braithwaite takes the time, daily, to appreciate what they do have.
"One thing that reminds me to be grateful for what we do have is seeing the poverty we have here," Braithwaite said. "It's a constant reminder, there could be someone just down the road with not even a chance to get the medical care Dewi is getting."
To donate visit Jon and Dewi's Givealittle fundraising page.
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