MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 September 1938, Page 2

MAORI MEMORIES

HAERENGA (THE DEPARTURE). (Recorded by J.H.S. for '‘Times-Age.’’) In every tradition it is agreed that the origin of the Maori was Hawaiiki. The early historians connect it with Savaii in the Navigator Islands, Hawaii in Sandwich Islands, Habai in Tonga and other places en route. Since then evidence originating in Japan shows that these were merely places of call named after Little Java, known to the Sumatran and the Maori tongue to this day as Hawa Iki. The dogs and rats seen here by Captain Cook on arrival were precisely the same as those found in Navigator Islands and Rarotonga. The residents of those places say these animals and they -themselves came from Hawaiiki. The name “Maori” gives us no clue to their origin. It means “native” or “natural.” Dissected, the words Ma and ori may be translated as “by the storm.” The name Pakeha, on the other hand, refers to their white-faced legendary fairy folks. The causes of the migration are said by some to have been land and women, others say that an adventurer named Ngahue (fruits or fishes) returned to Hawaiiki, bringing precious greenstone and the bones of a giant Moa, killed by him near Tauranga, as proof of his marvellous tales of a fertile land, where great eels were in the rivers and lakes, and birds without wings everywhere. Other stories are that Kupe was the Columbus who first found Aotearoa. The original Maori was “a man who made quick decisions, and was sometimes right.” In an hour they made up their minds to build eight Wakarua )double canoes) and to store each with seeds of taro, kumara, karaka, and gourds, also rats, parrots, pukeko, and dogs. As thej r pushed off, the oldest chief cried aloud: “Depart in peace and dwell in peace; leave war and strife behind you.”