ROTORUA VILLAGES

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 301, 15 September 1933, Page 13

ROTORUA VILLAGES

Improvements by Maoris FUNDS FOR NEW WORK By Telegraph.—Press Association. Rotorua, September 14. The growth of the community spirit has been strikingly exemplified during the past few months among the Natives at the Whakarewarewa and Ohinemutu villages, where comprehensive improvement schemes are being undertaken and carried out by Native residents with the support of the Borough Council and the Tourist Department. At Whakarewarewa a fund has been accumulated to finance the work, and this will be further increased during the holiday months, when Maori guides will pay a levy on each guiding fee collected. A number of buildings in the Whaka Pa have been repainted and renovated, walks and paths have been tidied up, and planting has been carried out with native shrubs. The old wooden bridge at the Spout Baths has been replaced by a pathway edged with rocks, and the diving pool has been edged with a rock wall. Carved fences are also to be erected throughout the pa, and it is hoped in a number of directions to give the villages a more typically Maori appearance. Similar plans are proposed at Ohinemutu, where the same amount of work will not require to be done, as this village has been better cared for in the past than Whakarewarewa. It has been felLfor some time that the appearance of Whaka particularly was not in keeping with the best traditions of the Maori race, and that a bad impression was created upon tourists by the condition of the pa.