Portrait - 45

Tamaki Maori Village

Rotorua

May 2010 Ajr

Village Life Re-Enacted

Tamaki Maori Village near Rotorua is an excellent place to see how a traditional Maori village may have looked hundreds of years ago. The night tour takes you south of the city and into the brooding darkness of a small forested site, where the Tamaki brothers have re-created a traditional village, complete with contemporary lighting and local Maori dressed as they would have been in the old days. The local people reenact the various traditional tribal roles including the arts of tattoo, weaving, song and dance and story telling.I was amused by the number of international tourists on the night I visited, who thought this was a real village and that the 'actors' always dressed this way.

Portrait - 42

Maori Performer

Whakarewarewa Thermal Village

Rotorua

2009 Ajr

www.whakarewarewa.com

A Portrait - 35

A Performer

Tamaki Maori Village

Rotorua

June 2010, Ajr

Te Pouwairua a Tuhourangi

In former times during the Tangihanga (funeral) for a chief, his waka (canoe) would be placed on its end, standing upright and semi-buried in the ground. This would signify the homage and gratitude rendered to the great man, the warrior, the great chief. To the already carved waka, the addition of more carved or painted designs - kowhaiwhai - would show tribal connection. In this Pouwairua, standing tall above Lake Tarawera, the Te Arawa people of Rotorua honour and respect their great leader, Tuhourangi, who once occupied the surrounding lands with his people.
In 1886, Mount Tarawera erupted fiercely - that's it in the rear right of the photograph above - flat-topped now. In the ensuring devastation that followed, the Maori village of Te Wairoa, home to the Tuhourangi people, was completely buried in volcanic ash.

The Tuhourangi owned the famous Pink & White Terraces - Otukapuarangi and Te Tarata -which were a major tourist attraction in the late 1880s. Members of the tribe acted as guides for people wanting to explore the terraces. Along with the loss of Te Wairoa, the terraces and several surrounding villages, the Tuhourangi also lost all their cultivated land that had provided social, cultural and economic sustenance for the hapu for generations.

A War Memorial

We miss out on a lot in life when we don't take the time to look carefully at everything around us. It seems to be the modern way - to whizz through life without a minute to spare for the sheer enjoyment of observation. I've been guilty of it myself - which is why I had never really noticed this particular war memorial in Rotorua's Government Gardens before. Always in a hurry for a meeting at adjacent Rotorua Museum & Art Gallery, I had driven straight past it many times.

Unveiled by the Duke of York in 1927 it is a memorial to the Te Arawa soldiers who died in the Great War. It is extravagant in its detail - following both the English and the Maori traditions. I've only represented a tiny portion of that here in the interests of conserving space. I particularly loved the little waka with its miniature paddlers set into the concrete memorial.

A Ngati Pikiao Marae

It was late afternoon on a grey winter's day when I pulled off the highway 14 kilometres north of Rotorua at the tiny village of Mourea. I'd spotted the sign to Te Takinga Marae and I was keen to get a closer look.

I drove down beside a slow moving river and parked my car for a while to take in the pretty buildings - the cute-as-a-button Maori church, complete with urupa (Motutawa) and the marae complex itself, set back from the road against a backdrop of thunderous grey clouds.

Te Takinga (Hohowai) Marae is home to the hapu Ngati Te Takinga of the iwi, Ngati Pikiao, which in turn is an affiliated member of the Te Arawa confederation of tribes. Ngati Pikiao occupies the land of the Okere and Rotoiti Lakes near Rotorua and Te Takinga, is on the western shores of Lake Rotoiti. there was no one about on the marae itself; in fact the only person I saw in all of Mourea, was a man fishing on the side of the river.

It's a Sign

Tribal Lands

Rotorua

June 2010, Ajr

A Portrait - 25

Maori Performer

Tamaki Maori Village

Rotorua

June 2010. Ajr

A Portrait - 24

Maori Performer
Tamaki Maori Village
Rotorua
June 2010, Ajr

A Portrait - 23

A Performer

Tamaki Maori Village

Rotorua

June 2010, Ajr

A Portrait - 22

Kapa Haka Performer

@ Te Puia

Rotorua

May 2009. Ajr

www.tepuia.com

Village Whare

Ohinemutu Maori Village on Rotorua's steaming lakefront, is one of my favourite places. I love wandering about the skinny streets, watching natural geothermal steaqm hissing up through gardens and gutters, the mud bubbling in nearby pools, the marae and the magnificent St Faith's Church. In among it all is this cute-as-a-button carved whare (house). I've always assumed it was part of one of the marae but on a recent visit, talking with one of the locals, they told me it is a private house that has been lovingly restored with a carved front and that someone does in fact live in it. It's such a lovely visual surprise, snuggled there among all the modern Western-stye housing. Wouldn't it be nice if more modern Maori considered doing this? How much more interesting our modern streets would look.

A Portrait - 21

Tamaki Maori Village

Rotorua

June 2010, Ajr

To Market, To Market

The Rotorua Farmers' Market at Kuirau Park in Rotorua is somehow 'quintessential Rotorua.' Get down there early on a Saturday morning (in winter in this case) and the geothermal mist is rising, the smell of sulphur hangs in the air and an early guitar is strumming a few warm-up chords.

It's not a Maori market per se, but you'll find a wide range of traditional Maori kai favourites - puha, Rewena bread, steamed puddings, fresh kina, whitebait fritters, mussel patties and watercress bundled into big leafy bunches.

There are stalls selling Maori handcrafts (and a few imitations) and on the morning I went, back in June, there was a woman making korowai (cloaks), her fingers seemingly impervious to the cold as she wove feathers into her garment. The market has a wide range of fresh vegetables and a great atmosphere - definitely a must-visit if you're in town on a Saturday morning.

Maori Place Names - 59

Ruapeka Marae,

Fitzgerald Glade

Near Rotorua, North Island

May 2009,Ajr

Maori Place Names - 58

Tarukenga Marae,

Rotorua Outskirts

May 2009, Ajr

An Eye on the Detail

Viewed from afar, these carvings, at the entrance to Whakarewarewa Thermal Village in Rotorua have an undeniable strength and power; up close, they exude and even greater sense of history, spirit and character. They are some of my favourite examples of traditional carving and I photographed them from every angle, focussing in on the detail of carving technique, the symbols and the patterns. I'm a little disappointed my collage has reduced down to such a small size, but it will hopefully give you an idea of the beautiful craftsmanship involved in these works. www.whakarewarewa.com

Maori Place Names - 56

Ohinemutu

Rotorua, North island

May 2009, Ajr

A Poi Collage

I've been playing about with assorted photo-shopping programmes to see which one will produce the best collages and panoramas. This is one result - poi dancers performing at Whakarewarewa Thermal Village when I visited Rotorua last year. There is room for improvement though, so expect to see a few more experiments in the coming weeks. In the meantime, if you'd like to know more about Whakarewarewa, either click on their name in the label line below this post for other things I've written, or check their website: www.whakarewarewa.com