Author: Marcey Deiner
Kia Ora! After a rainy day on the Abel Tasman, the sunshine finally came out for a perfect day for Waka adventures. Today was a really amazing and a day full of cultural experiences. This morning we were able to go onto two Wakas and paddle them ourselves. It was truly amazing to see our teams come together to work towards a common goal. We even had an unofficial, intense race. Learning about the Waka and how it functions was a completely different experience than actually learning about it hands-on. We learned about how each seat in the Waka had a job to do and how each job blended together to make the Waka function. One cool thing we learned is the Waka salute. We were able to do the salute to a passing boat and its passengers. I think that so far, my favorite memory of this trip is seeing both teams of Wakas becoming one to race against each other. Even though the two Wakas were racing against each other, it was astonishing to see the two teams come together and to see the positive energy overflowing and huge smiles on everyone’s faces. In my Waka we were full of support for each other and we cheered each other on until the very end. Neither of the Wakas knew how long this race was going to last but we told each other to “keep going,” or that “we got this.” It felt amazing and empowering to paddle the Waka as one unit.
After our Waka adventure, we sadly had to say goodbye to our Abel Tasman home base. We then arrived at our next base, the Marae of the Kakati. The secondary school students from the Whenua Iti program welcomed us onto their sacred land with a ceremony called a powhiri. At first it was intimidating but then after going through the welcoming ceremony and our waiata, I felt welcomed and ready to learn. To represent ourselves we chose our waiata, “Somewhere of the Rainbow.” It felt really good to represent ourselves with a song from home and to have a musical accompaniment from Hope on Dave’s ukulele. After going through the ceremony, I realized how amazing it was to see a real powhiri in action and how accurate places like the Polynesian Cultrual Center present these ceremonies. I felt proud and honored to be a part of an actual powhiri and not something as a part of a tourist destination. It was cool to meet all of these kids and adults working with this program. These students are amazing for sharing their culture with us and at such a young age too. I feel honored to be here in this place working with these Maori and I can’t wait to see what they share with us about their culture and I’m looking forward to finding similarities and differences between the Maori and Hawaiian culture.
P.S. Love and miss you Mom, Dad, Matt, and Loki. I can’t wait to share my stories with you. See you soon!