\u201cWe settled here very happily,\u201d Gedara said.<\/p>\n
Kuttige eventually ended up having to relocate to Wellington for work during the weekdays and would return to Napier to see his family on weekends.<\/p>\n
As Kuttige worked as a technician, Gedara worked as a housekeeper and looked after the children.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur life followed very happily,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
But that all changed one Friday in June 2024.<\/p>\n
Kuttige returned from a day of work, enjoyed a meal with his kids and went to bed.<\/p>\n
The couple were in separate beds so they could sleep better. Gedara went to her own bed soon after.<\/p>\n
But in the middle of the night, Kuttige awoke and began to call for Gedara.<\/p>\n
She went to his side and was sitting and talking with him.<\/p>\n
Then he went to the bathroom. Gedara turned around and saw Kuttige suddenly collapse.<\/p>\n
At the house that night was a tenant who worked as a caregiver.<\/p>\n
The tenant tried performing CPR before they put Kuttige in the car and took him to hospital.<\/p>\n
But it was too late.<\/p>\n
He died of a heart attack on June 14, 2024.<\/p>\n
Now Gedara and her daughters\u2019 visas are set to expire in May, meaning they could be forced out of the country they have come to call home.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t go back to Sri Lanka,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Gedara wants to keep her girls at school in New Zealand, saying she fears their education will go backwards if they return to Sri Lanka because the systems are different.<\/p>\n
Every day Gedara\u2019s daughters ask her what their futures hold but she can\u2019t tell them \u2013 she doesn\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
Gedara said she wouldn\u2019t feel safe back in Sri Lanka, where she claimed women can\u2019t leave the house after 6pm.<\/p>\n
Gedara said it was Kuttige\u2019s wish to move to New Zealand so his family could have a good, comfy life. They sold their home in Sri Lanka to relocate.<\/p>\n
All that remains in Sri Lanka for the family is Gedara\u2019s parents, but she claimed they are unable to care for them all.<\/p>\n
She also claimed widows in Sri Lanka faced some discrimination.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is very little bit social issues \u2013 some people look at me and my daughters without father very badly,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s bad thing, you know. It\u2019s cultural thing. Some people don\u2019t like to face a mourning widow.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gerada wants to move her family to Auckland to be with her sister and her children.<\/p>\n
Gedara\u2019s lawyer is assisting the family with a visa application to Immigration NZ. However, she is unsure what will happen.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe told me just relax, she will do something, but she also told me don\u2019t hope,\u201d Gerada claimed.<\/p>\n
Gerada has spent the last six months working as a housekeeper at a Napier hotel. <\/p>\n
\u201cI can work and manage my everything,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
For her, the mission is to secure her children\u2019s futures in New Zealand.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy whole world is now my kids. They want to stay here,\u201d Gerada said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey lost their world, their father. I can\u2019t let them lose another thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Immigration NZ acting operations director Marcelle Foley said where a person holds an accredited employer work visa, their partner and dependent children are typically in New Zealand on visas that are linked to the principal visa holder.<\/p>\n
If the principal visa holder dies, those linked visas do not automatically remain valid under immigration instructions.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no expectation that families depart New\u202fZealand immediately following a death, and such matters are handled with sensitivity while individual circumstances are considered,\u201d Foley said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, family members who wish to remain in New Zealand must ensure they hold a valid visa to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n
In some cases, affected family members may be eligible to apply for alternative visas, depending on eligibility and requirements.<\/p>\n
\u201cEach case is assessed on its own merits, taking into account factors such as the family\u2019s situation and their ties to New Zealand,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Jack Riddell is a multimedia journalist with Hawke\u2019s Bay Today and has worked in radio and media in the UK, Germany, and New Zealand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe settled here very happily,\u201d Gedara said. Kuttige eventually ended up having to relocate to Wellington for work…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252886,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2840,74,9442,634,5033,6119,2109,17150,1976,33018,6044,424,32033,2721,3607,111,43,139,69,193,24994,146581,377],"class_list":["post-252885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-across","tag-after","tag-better","tag-death","tag-deportation","tag-faces","tag-family","tag-fate","tag-hawkes","tag-husbands","tag-ideas","tag-life","tag-moved","tag-mum","tag-napier","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-other","tag-sudden","tag-widowed","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252885\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}