WAR-CRY FOR KIWIS

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 146, 23 June 1938, Page 23

WAR-CRY FOR KIWIS

MEANING EXPLAINED | New Zealand football teams tour- , ing overseas are expected to have a Maori war-cry, and this applies particularly when the visit is to Australia. The Australians dearly love some Maori given with the expression and action associated with the haka, and because New Zealand teams in the past have obliged in this way, a Maori war-cry has come to be regarded as part of the stock-in-trade of touring teams from these shores. At one of the farewell functions in Auckland to the Kiwis, New Zealand's Rugby League representatives, before they left for Australia, the Rev. W. N. Panapa, of the Maori Rugby League Football Control Board, touched on this subject. "I do hope," he said, "the time is far distant when New Zealand athletic teams will think it beneath their dignity to give a haka as a warcry when venturing far from home." Mr. Panapa said that a singing team was in all probability a winning one, and the haka expressed the Maori point of view. The Maori board had given considerable thought to a war-cry for the Kiwis, because there were hakas and hakas, and it was decided that no better one could be found than that famous old cry of Te Rauparaha: "Ka mate, ka mate." Mr. Panapa, states the "Auckland Rugby League Gazette," explained that once when Te Rauparaha was hiding in a kumera (sweet potato) pit, he gave expression to the cry. " 'Ka mate (Is it death?), Ka mate,' cried the old warrior to himself. Then, raising himself a little, taking on new strength, and thinking of past victorious raids, he exclaimed: 'Kaora' (No, it is life), 'Kaora.' Already, he felt renewed, the will to fight became ! part of him and rose up still further. He looked over the top of the pit and saw some of his own men, and exclaimed loudly: 'Tenei te tangata, pu huru huru' (These are the men—the hairy men). 'Nana i tiki mai whaka whiti te ra' (They maketh the sun to shine again). Then Te Rauparaha began to feel the warmth of the sun after the damp hole in the earth, and shouted: 'Upane, upane' (tip and up); 'Kaupane, kaupane' (Up and Still up); .'Whiti to ra' (The sun shine's again)—and, with that, the old raider stepped out of the kumera hole, defiant, ready to war and raid once more." Mr. Panapa urged the Kiwis to go forth in that spirit. The whole cry, he said, was significant, and he urged the players to let it ring out, not just to i please the Australians, but as an inspiration to' themselves. J i