The church was packed with family and friends and many were in tears. The little white coffin was carried in by the father and laid at the front. The minister spoke movingly of the way the whole church, and many outsiders too, had felt involved with the wee mite's struggles. "No child has ever been more loved than little Sophia", he told us.

Sophia gained hardly any weight after her birth, never spoke, was probably blind and spent all her short life being fed through a tube. She was a beautiful child with a calm and happy disposition in spite of her terrible affliction, and doted over by older sister Lauren. Sonya, her mother, and my niece, was spending almost 24 hours a day caring for her and the love of both father and mother never wavered.

Only one hymn was sung: the children's favourite, 'Jesus loves me! This I know', and new meaning was brought to the words as we gazed on the tiny white coffin at the front. Uncle Colin read a short Bible passage and a written tribute by the parents to a dearly loved and beautiful daughter was read out by the minister.

The minister, the Rev Dr R. Savage, assisted by the Rev W Smart, was obviously just as emotionally involved as the rest of us. He paid tribute to the care and devotion of hospital staff and the many caring neighbours and friends who had felt involved in the baby's struggles. We could see that our interpreter was also deeply moved while doing her best to stay composed and provide a professional service, and we were greatly impressed by the overwhelming spirit of care and love pervading the church.

It was wonderful for Evelyn and me to be able to follow every word spoken at the funeral and gain some insight into the pain and turmoil Sean and Sonya must have been experiencing. A top-class interpreter brings out the heart-warming emotion as well as the words and hymns of a funeral service. We could almost forget our deafness and enter into a closer bond with our family.

As I have said before, interpreters are like gold dust and usually have to be booked months ahead, so we were extremely fortunate in getting one at such short notice. Over the past year several more have passed the strict entrance exams and we now have eleven fully qualified interpreters covering Northern Ireland. They are available for doctor and hospital appointments as well as job interviews and weddings. Funerals, of course, cannot be foreseen, but the RNID interpreter booking office at Wilton House will do their best to juggle things around.


- See Hear, the BBC's Saturday morning programme for deaf people, has been running a competition to discover the woman or man viewers think is the most famous deaf person in history. News has just come through that the title has been won by Francis Maginn, the deaf man from Cork who founded the British Deaf Association in the early days of the 20th century and was first superintendent of the Ulster Institute at College Square.

Maginn lost his hearing at six and apparently was able to speak well in adult life. In the days before professional interpreters Maginn accompanied deaf men to work interviews to help with communication and it seems he was able to arrange jobs in carpentry and sheet-metal work on the ill-fated Titanic.