Maori Place Names - 81

Torere, East Cape

Eastland, North Island

June 2009, Ajr

Maori Place Names - 70

East Cape

North Island

May 2009 Ajr

Maori Place Names - 68

Near Te Kopua

East Cape, North Island

May 2009. Ajr

Maori Place Names - 67

Potaka Marae

Eastland

2009 Ajr

A Sign of the Times

Te Kaha

East Cape, North Island

May 2009. Ajr

Administering Maori Land

When I travelled around New Zealand last year updating Frommers New Zealand 6th Edition, I spent a couple of hours driving and walking around the small eastern Bay of Plenty town, Opotiki, which I always see as the start of one of my favourite driving adventures - the magnificent East Cape road. The town may be small but it is richly decorated with traditional and contempoary Maori art - everything from colourful street murals to school gateways embellished with amazing traditional carvings, modern Maori carvings and Maori-owned buildings like this one - home to Te Whakatohea Maori Trust Board.

The Trust was established in 1952 and now administers the properties of Te Whakatohea iwi (tribe) - buildings and farms - and also provides school and health services and training across a wide range of occupations and trades.

As I roamed the streets, I also came upon this Maori Arts Gallery - closed unfortunately, and a little hard to tell in fact, if it was even currently operating - also established by Te Whakatohea.

www.whakatohea.co.nz

Overlooking an East Coast Bay

Today I thought I'd bring you a small photo parade from Omarumutu Marae on the North Island's sunny East Coast. I arrived there at 11.30am almost exactly a year ago, at the beginning of my journey around East Cape. I saw the sign on the main road, just 10 kilometres north of Opotiki in the Bay of Plenty and decided to make a short detour.

The marae has a perfect location, sitting a top of small hill overlooking a pretty sand-swept bay (see below). It is home to the Ngati Ruatakena Hapu (Ngati Rua) of the Te Whakatohea iwi (tribe).

Te Whakatohea territory runs along a 35-km stretch of coastline from Ohiwa Harbour, near Ohope, to Opape just further along the cape road from Omarumutu; and inland through remote, mountainous country to Matawai

And this the Urupa (cemetery) down by the sea below the marae.

The memorial monument within the marae grounds.

Te Whakatohea is made up of six hapu (sub-tribes): Ngati Ruatakena, Ngati Patumoana, Ngari Ngahere, Ngati Tamahaua, Ngati Ira and Te Upokorehe.

www.whakatohea.co.nz

Te Kaha - An East Coast Marae

The skies were putting on a show the afternoon I rolled into the little east Coast town of Te Kaha - home to around 350 people, who live in homes gathered around the Te Kaha Marae - sometimes also called Tukaki Marae

The main coast road curves around the small hill that offers the marae a commanding outlook up and down the coast. Across the road, in total contrast, sits the new Te Kaha Hotel, which clings to the cliffs above a wide sweep of East Coast beach.

There wasn't a soul about the day I drove through and, with an eye on the clock and due in Hicks Bay later that afternoon, I only had time for a brief stop. But it was nice to sit there and reflect on how the marae scene might have looked back in 2007, when locals staged a massive powhiri (welcome), for Corporal Willie Apiata to celebrate his being awarded the Victoria Cross. Apiata - like New Zealand filmmaker, Taika Waititi, calls this marae home. I suspect the little community hadn't seen so much action for decades, as then-Prime Minister Helen Clark, Defence Force chiefs and Maori dignitaries arrived to congratulate Willie Apiata in the traditional Maori way. Also in the traditional Maori way, the crowd of over 3,000 visitors was treated to a traditional hangi feast - crayfish, mussels, oysters, titi (mutton bird) and more - prepared by the Te Kaha locals. All of that required tractors to help burrow out hangi pits big enough to cope with the numbers.

Te Kaha Marae sits within the rohe (tribal area) of Te Whanau-a-Apanui.

www.apanui.co.nz

School Time in Gisborne

After you've spent a couple of days driving around the North Island's East Cape, stopping at the dozens and dozens of marae you pass along the way, you begin to feel like you're in another world - and in a way you are....a Maori world for sure. East Cape's population has always been predominantly Maori and it it is still perhaps, New Zealand's richest area for seeing Maori culture within a 'real' (as opposed to tourism) context.

So after throwing yourself wholeheartedly into that mix for a couple of days, entering the region's largest town, Gisborne, is like driving into a contemporary oasis....at one level at least. For there's no doubt that Gisborne is the main centre in this part of the world and the population is still predominantly Maori. Here though, you see Maori design with a more contemporary influence - the graffiti, the murals, the contemporary carvings. I had hardly entered the town boundary when I slammed on my brakes outside Kaiti Primary School to photograph a whole line of colourful murals that ran the length of a walkway beside the school. I didn't linger too long because I was also opposite the Kaiti Community Police Centre and a uniformed member of staff seemed to be keeping an eye on my activities from the window - not that I was doing anything wrong of course, but some people do seem to get a bit fidgety when they see you brandishing a camera. In a way though, murals like these sum up my lasting impressions of Gisborne - sure it's remote and sure it's not exactly 'fashionable and trendy' but its colourful and completely unique; and its inhabitants seem to be almost encouraged to embellish the town with interesting artistic expressions. I like that about a place.

More from Omaio, East Cape

The small community of Omaio, near the mouth of the Motu River, 56km from Opotiki on East Cape, is home to all things Te Whanau a Apanui.

If you swing sharp right of the main highway near the store here, as I did last year, you'll be on the Old Coast Road heading for Hoani Waititi Reserve. But just after the turnoff, you'll find the stunning Omaio marae, which I've written about here before. (Click on Omaio in label line below to read previous post).

Back on the main coast road, just a short distance further on, you'll also find this beautiful marae (above), which I have been unable to identify. I was particularly taken with its huge and elaborately carved waharoa (gateway), which featured motifs (like the sun), that I hadn't previously seen on Maori carvings.

Every time I look back on the hundreds of photographs I took during my two-day jaunt around East Cape, I think again how much I would like to re-do the journey over a week. There's nothing I'd like better than to linger longer in these small seaside communities, meeting the locals, learning about the history and day-to-day life and veering off down the side roads that lead to who knows where and what. That's the beauty of a slow journey for me.

And this old abandoned church in an Omaio field, is just one building I would like to know more about - and given time and permission, perhaps a look inside. It undoubtedly 'harbours' all sorts of interesting tales - moments in time on the verge of being forgotten unless they are recorded. But it's the same old story - so much to do, so little time!

East Cape Marae Detail

I've featured the Whitianga Marae on East Cape here before (click on the name in the label line below to see previous post), but it was one of my favourite stops on last year's East Cape trip, so I'm highlighting one of the carvings again. I particularly like the juxtaposition of this top carving against the corrugated iron backdrop. It's something of a statement about the coming together of two cultures in bicultural New Zealand. I spent a lot of time outside this marae. Perched on a hill overlooking Whitianga Bay, 51km from Opotiki, it had a prime spot - close to fishing resources, yet unseen from the road. I took dozens of photographs of their magnificent carved waharoa (gateway), which you can see in my previous post, etched in shadow across their grassy forecourt. Like most East Cape marae, it is heavily embellished with carving and painted detail - old and contemporary.

East Cape Church

It was late afternoon when I finally drove into the tiny East Cape settlement of Raukokore. The sun was shifting seaward and the wind was blowing a gale. But I was determined to stop at this cute little historic church - the well known Raukokore Anglican Church that has become something of a landmark on the Cape.

I had seen the church a decade before but had not been able to get inside. Unfortunately that was the case on last year's trip too. It was solidly locked. The church sits on a small elbow of land that juts out into Papatea Bay, just up from the shore on a grassy rise; and if it wasn't for its somewhat remote location, it would probably be one of the most photographed churches in New Zealand. It's just across the road from the Catholic Church, which was once marked by a huge whalebone arch - a relic of the old whaling days, which saw much of this area settled. The whalebone arch is now housed for safe-keeping in Whakatane Museum.

Visiting the Cape

One of the great pleasures for me as a New Zealand travel guide writer, is the ability it affords me to travel the length and breadth of my own country, discovering many out of the way places that many New Zealanders never get to see. The remote East Cape of the North Island is a case in point. This stunning coastal landscape (against a backdrop of often forbidding native bush) is a Maori stronghold from start to finish; and even though it has become somewhat refined in terms of sealed roads etc over the last decade, it is still a seldom-visited place with a thriving, 'living' Maori culture.

Last year, I took two days to travel the cape from Opotiki to Gisborne. I thought that would be enough. It wasn't. While I managed to get hundreds of photographs of stunning, carved marae, like this one at the tiny settlement of Raukokore, 99km from Opotiki, it was rushed and I could happily have taken a week to do the same trip. Raukokore is perhaps best known for its historic church - which I will feature here tomorrow - but it is also to home to sandy beaches, a school, a second (Catholic) Church and this marae - where, I might add, I was ever-so-slightly unnerved by the fact that the carvings seemed to be watching me. I had a very strong sense of 'a presence' here, that I never felt anywhere else. This especially from the carving on top of the wharenui, 'Hinemahuru.'

East Cape Carving

Stunning Carvings at Te Manawa Pouri Marae

Tokomaru Bay, East Cape

North Island

May 2009, Ajr

Maori Place Names - 47

Whitianga Marae

East Cape, North Island

May 2009. Ajr