POINT HILL, St Catherine - The family of Esmin Green - the Jamaican woman who collapsed and died in the waiting room of a New York hospital last month - had a tearful reunion yesterday as they gathered at the Duxes Seventh-day Adventist Church in this rural Jamaican community to bid farewell to her.

Esmin Green's sister Patricia Green is comforted as she weeps openly after viewing her sister's body yesterday before the start of the funeral service at the Duxes Seventh-day Adventist Church in Point Hill, St Catherine. (Photo: Joseph Wellington)

A number of the family members were seeing Green's face for the first time since she left Jamaica eight years ago, but it was painful that they had to look at her lying in a casket.

"Whoa, mi sista!" Patricia Green screamed as she caught sight of her sister in the blue casket at the front of the church before the service began.

It appeared that the grief was unbearable as she toppled off the chair she was sitting on outside the church's front door and had to be comforted by family members. But even in her grief-stricken state, she insisted on viewing the body of her sister one last time.

"Me want to see her," she said. Barefooted and apparently disoriented, she was led to the casket by two women as she took another look at her sister, clothed in a white dress, lying in the casket. "Whoa mi sista, mi sista," Patricia moaned.

None of Green's children could hold back their tears as they viewed the body one by one, each turning away as the tears welled-up in their eyes.

Green, 49, was left to die on the waiting room floor of the psychiatric ward of the Kings County Hospital in New York where she had gone to seek medical assistance. Surveillance video showed her falling to the floor in the hospital's waiting room and hitting her head on a chair on June 19. None of the hospital staff, including security guards, attempted to help Green until an hour later when it was too late.

Darion Harrison, Green's second child from her first marriage, said her mother was an inspiration to her children and likened her smile to a rose that had the power to "light up anything". She also reminisced about the close relationship she had with her mother.

"My mother was my inspiration, I admire her so much. I am so proud to be the offspring of Esmin Elizabeth Green," she told the packed church. "My mother is not dead, she is alive in our hearts."

However, she said she was saddened by the fact that Green will never get a chance to watch her nine grandchildren grow up.

"[My daughter] Brittany had a conversation with her (my mother), she said 'grandma, I want to see your face, can I see you'? Her reply, 'my granddaughter, soon", but that soon never came," said Harrison, as the congregation gave out a collective sigh. "Death has robbed us of our rare and precious rose."

Green had six children, including Darion. The others are Tecia, Susan, Tanya, Darryl and Travanis. She had seven sisters and six brothers.

One of her sisters, Pauline Green, in a tribute that was read by her daughter, Itesha Robinson, said Green protected her siblings, was a 'prayer warrior' and the family's 'torch'.

"She had a smile that could light up a dark room and her positive personality shone through," Robinson said.

Brenda James, another of Green's sisters, in the eulogy said her sister was a trained dressmaker who moved to the Jamaican capital, Kingston, from Point Hill in St Catherine, after her marriage went sour.

"She was always looking to improve her standard of living," James said, adding that Green travelled to New York in 1995 for the first time, returned two years later and then finally emigrated in 2000.

Pastor Romone Phoenix hailed Green as an evangelist, but described as "careless" the circumstance leading to her death.

"When I saw what the surveillance camera recorded in the news I said to myself 'hat is carelessness'," he said. "I said to myself, 'this should not have been. It could have been me. It could have been anyone'."

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