Pictures: Eva Bradley, Rachel Burt.
As Cyclone Gabrielle was beginning to rage outside her Hawke’s Bay bedroom window two years ago, Alice Sip put down her laptop and decided to call it a night.
With three little kids, five businesses to run and regular performances as a violist with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, the 33-year-old was feeling a bit run down and hoped she’d get some sleep, despite the wild weather.
Just a few hours later, though, Alice woke to excruciating pain in her left ear. She didn’t know it at the time, but her eardrum had burst. Doctors think it happened because of the barometric pressure of the cyclone. In the days that followed, infection ravaged both ears, leaving her deaf and unable to walk straight or talk without slurring.
Alice’s little girl Harriet was three at the time, twins Millie and Fletcher were just 10 months and her husband Kris, 36, a Minnesotan she met while studying classical orchestra in North America, was stuck out of the region because of the state of the roads. Alice’s parents arrived to help with the kids and get her to a doctor.
“I went to the health centre in the morning. However, none of their systems were working because they didn’t have power and were waiting for a generator,” recalls Alice. “We had no idea how bad it was out there at this stage.”
Alice also had no idea how the sore ear she’d woken up with was about to impact her life forever.
“On the way home, I said to Mum, ‘I think you need to pull over,’ because all of a sudden, the road was starting to spin. Then I was vomiting and couldn’t even walk. I didn’t know what was going on.”
Still, Alice, who describes herself as “obsessed with being busy”, felt confident the antibiotics would kick in soon. So, she set her mind on using her resources to help the ravaged region. One of Alice’s many businesses is a luxury styling and furniture hire company, Flock Events, and she was able to put her staff and vehicle to work while the wedding season ground to a halt.
“Our truck was going to Waipatu Marae every day. I was in bed, unable to hear and feeling dizzy, but I was online, working out what they needed down there,” says Alice. “It was really intense. Because I was so busy, I didn’t have the chance to think about the seriousness of my condition.”
Still completely deaf in both ears, Alice got an appointment with a specialist at the hospital a week after the cyclone. The news he delivered wasn’t good.
“He said it’s the worst kind of blown eardrum and worst kind of infection. He’d only seen it twice in his career,” she tells. “It was just this absolutely freak situation.”
A couple of weeks later, he broke the news to Alice that he thought the damage was so bad, she’d never be able to play in an orchestra again.
“I remember sitting there in his office, thinking my entire life has been about doing what people tell me I can’t and showing them I can do it,” reflects Alice.
The thought of not playing her beloved viola in the orchestra again could have left her leaving upset that day. But instead, she knew she’d do the work needed to get there.
The family moved in with Alice’s parents, where she was learning to lipread. Then one day, her right ear felt like it popped and some hearing returned. Determined to get started on her goal of returning to the orchestra, Alice turned to social media to ask her musical connections around the world for advice.
“Because I play the viola, it’s under my left ear. Now I can’t hear my own instrument or anything left of it when I play,” she explains.
Sure enough, a musician friend came through with knowledge of hearing aids that have a microphone in one ear that transmits sound to the other. Alice quickly bought them and returned to her local orchestra to try them out, thinking that would be the day she ticked off her goal.
“I remember putting them in and it was just this wash of sound,” she tells. “I realised, ‘Oh, this is what it means to not be able to play in the orchestra’. Because how can I possibly pull out all the sounds? It just felt pointless.”
For the first time since the cyclone, tears started to fall as the other musicians played around her.
Over the next month, Alice sat in the orchestra with her eyes closed. She focused on one instrument at a time until she could pull it out. Each time, she’d have to take a nap from the exhaustion of it.
Soon she was back rehearsing with the local orchestra and ready to do her first performance. However, she was still relying heavily on the conductor’s stick during practices.
“It was all going well until it got to a dress rehearsal and they lit up the stage,” she recalls. “I was blinded. I was still wearing sunglasses all day to deal with light. The first half was okay, but when I got to the green room, I knew I couldn’t do the second half. I just had to remind myself I’d got to the middle of a concert and that was massive progress.”
Months more of intense practice followed, before she returned to the NZSO for a concert in Wellington. Again, she was hoping it was the moment she’d feel like she’d made it back. But once again, it was looking like she’d pushed herself too far.
“My brain couldn’t map out the Michael Fowler Centre acoustics and I couldn’t hear anything. It took me back to that first rehearsal. I was thinking I was an idiot for trying to do it until 15 minutes into it. My mind connected all the dots and it was like, ‘Boom!’ All of a sudden, I could hear everything.”
As the two-year anniversary of Cyclone Gabrielle nears, Alice is still completely deaf in her left ear. She forces herself to go without hearing aids in day-to-day life as she wants to keep her right ear sharp.
As well as owning a café and co-working space, Alice’s other businesses see her travel to China every six weeks to source furniture, tableware and décor for the event industry, cafés and residential clients. She’s just about to start selling umbrellas and luxury beanbags with the launch of her latest venture, Nala Outdoor, with her dad.
Despite her hearing loss, Alice has also learnt enough Mandarin to make connections and navigate factories. “China feels like my second home now,” she says.
Most people she comes across would have no idea of the effort she’s had to put in since Cyclone Gabrielle, except for the odd occasion she has to ask someone to speak louder.
“There are moments when I still grieve what I’ve lost, but I’m just going to keep pushing,” enthuses Alice. “I’ve got lots to get on with.”
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