TE KARAKA Archives - Page 17 of 77 - Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu

He Whakaaro
Tragedy strikes Samoa

A sombre centenary is being marked in Samoa presently as the small Pacific country grapples with the enormity of the measles epidemic sweeping its shores. It’s just over 100 years since the island trader steamship Talune docked in Apia, with six seriously ill passengers who came ashore, bringing with them influenza. Within a week the flu had spread through Upolu and over to Savai’i, and consequently 8,500 Samoan people died – around one-fifth of the population.

Growing Future Leaders

Te Pōkai Ao is an initiative by Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu to grow new generations of innovative leaders who are in touch with our history and prepared for our future. Each year, successful applicants attend noho marae in Te Waipounamu, before travelling to Silicon Valley in San Francisco or O’ahu in Hawai’i – opportunities that allow them to connect to their Ngāi Tahutanga and learn more about career pathways in STEAM-related fields. Three years in, the far-reaching impact of these haerenga are beginning to be felt.

Ka Tū Te Tītī

The Te Atakura Kapa Haka Festival at this year’s Hui-ā-Iwi 2019 in Murihiku took kapa haka to a new level. Like the theme of the iwi festival – Ka Tū Te Tītī, our whānau were indeed the tītī, flying from all over the country and the world, to share waiata and haka on the stage. Teams adorned their performers with an array of colours, to match the vivacious waiata and haka numbers.

Making it big in London’s West End

Aotearoa may be small in size, but we have always punched above our weight on the global stage. From Maruawai to the bright lights of London, James Buchanan is living the dream of a small town boy making it big

Ensuring our tomorrow today

As we look ahead to the dawn of a new decade, Ngāi Tahu must consider the best way to cultivate a new generation of leaders to steer the waka in the years to come. ‘Succession planning’ is the much-touted phrase used to describe the process of identifying and developing tomorrow’s leaders today – but what does it mean within Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu?

Essential Healing

For Tremane (Ngāi Tahu) and Jytte, the move to buy Zurma was a good fit with their values. Jytte had been buying Zurma oils for more than 20 years in her work as a massage therapist, and Tremane has long been interested in organic gardening.
But just two weeks after purchasing Zurma, Tremane was diagnosed with a rare form of pancreatic cancer. He was told that his cancer was untreatable, and terminal.

Tuia250 – Encounters

The Tuia250 – Encounters national commemoration was organised by the Ministry of Culture and Heritage to celebrate Aotearoa New Zealand’s Pacific voyaging heritage and acknowledge the first onshore encounters between Māori and Pākehā in 1769–70.

A treasure house for future generations

On 6 December 1978, a small group of Ngāi Tahu representatives gathered in the Library Committee Room at the University of Canterbury. Ngaitahu Māori Trust Board representative for Te Ika-a-Māui and inaugural Ngaitahu Research Fellow, Tipene O’Regan, addressed the room.
“My motive in taking some steps towards this day and towards this archive are that primarily our people should have a secured and protected treasure house for future generations.”

A Natural Fix

At just 24, Lucas Smith has packed a lot of life experience into the six years since he left high school. Kaituhi Rob Tipa caught up with Lucas recently to learn more about his latest venture creating natural wool wound products.
A born entrepreneur, Lucas created and invested his life savings into Walk On, a start-up company using the finest merino wool in Aotearoa for blister protection pads. This led him to establish Wool Aid, a business producing a merino wool, completely biodegradable sticking plaster, thought to be a world first.

Leading change in education

In Japan, when something precious breaks, they repair it using glue with powdered gold mixed in. That way, when the object is put back together it honours the piece it was before, and makes something more beautiful of the new item. It’s known as kintsugi –
golden repair.
This is how it is with Christchurch, but the gold in our repairs is an increasing acknowledgement of Māori culture and tikanga. As the city regenerates post-quake, organisations and businesses, government agencies and policy makers, architects and landscape designers are all taking the opportunity to layer in Māori history, language, and practices that have been largely ignored in 150-odd years of colonisation. It is giving a voice to Māori, and acknowledging and embedding Ngāi Tahu as mana whenua.