Visiting Murihiku

A few weeks ago, I flew down to Invercargill to interview one of the kaumatua at Murihiku Marae.

It was a perfect day and the marae looked a picture, perched on its rise, overlooking the surrounding countryside on the outskirts of Invercargill city.

For a long time, there was no marae here, but in 1983, local Maori were delighted to open their new Whare Kai, Hine o te Iwi. A few years later, in 1990, they opened their new Wharenui, Te Rakitauneke, which features beautiful carvings inside and out.

The marae sits on ten acres of land.

Meet the People - 17

Another in the Series Meet the People – Contemporary Maori Doing Ordinary and Extraordinary Things – Nathan Jerry (Tainui) is a long way from his Kawhia (Waikato) roots – he’s lived in Invercargill all his life and it’s there that he’s made a career for himself as a carver. Nathan, 38, was bundled up against the cold the day I found him at the Queenstown Saturday Market selling his wares. I had to talk him into a photograph but he talked freely about his passion for carving and especially for pounamu (jade). “I did my training in traditional wood carving in Invercargill and while I’ve carved in wood, bone, stone, shell, I prefer pounamu above anything else. It’s as if all my years of carving have led me to pounamu. I have a huge respect for it. It’s such a beautiful stone with incredible colour variation. Some pieces just carve themselves. It’s an awesome medium,” he says.

Nathan, who has been carving commercially for eight years, carved the Potuku Manawa (centre post) at Invercargill’s Murihiku Marae. He took those traditional skills with wood and applied them to pounamu. “I’m self taught when it comes to stone but after three and a half years of working with jade, I’ve found my niche.”

All images. Queenstown. May 2009 Ajr.

Nathan also works as a commercial paua diver in the cold southern oceans from Oamaru south, around Stewart Island and into Milford Sound. “I love pounamu and I love the ocean so it’s a happy marriage for me. Most of my designs are quite traditional and I work around several ocean themes – wave forms, whales, hei matau (fish hook).” He was also the lucky recipient of a gift of the sought-after pounamu called Tangiwai (actually Bowenite) – the rarest form of all from Milford Sound. It’s much lighter in colour and is now fully protected. “I was very lucky to know a man who collected it over 60 years ago and he gave me some to work with. It’s a privilege to be able to work with it.”

Encouraging the Next Generation

Murihiku Marae,Invercargill 2008 Ajr

Murihiku Marae sits on a rise on the outskirts of Invercargill city, overlooking a spread of yellow-green fields. It's a large complex complete with kitchens, meeting house (wharenui), offices, social rooms and, next door, the kohanga reo (maori language pre-school). Like most marae it is rich in carving (whakaairo). And in an inspired move, drawings from the tiny tots of the kohanga reo decorate the marae interior with almost as much importance as the wooden equivalents carved by master carvers. It's a lovely juxtaposition and it's good to know the next generation of Maori artists are being encouraged.

Tidal Gathering

Oreti Beach, Invercargill, South Island. 2008. Ajr

And so to toheroa gathering - that magnificent big shellfish now only gathered in patches off the Southland coast - and only then by Maori customary fishing rights. Our mission: to write about toheroa, photograph toheroa, cook toheroa, eat toheroa - but not necessarily in that order - for Ngai Tahu's magazine, TE KARAKA. We bundled three kaumatua (tribal elders) of Murihiku Marae into our saucy blue car and headed for Oreti Beach. In a wide expanse of endless white sand beach, they knew exactly where to look, exactly where the toheroa beds lay and within minutes we had dug a handful from the wet sand. Half the pleasure of eating toheroa is in the digging," they laughed. "And there's nothing better than eating them fresh and raw, straight from the sand, with juice running down your wrists. It's the joy of the hunt." www.ngaitahu.iwi.nz