Teoti Rupi Wawatai TE KUIA O WAIHIRERE

Kaea, Issue 4, 1 September 1980, Page 10

Teoti Rupi Wawatai TE KUIA O WAIHIRERE

Patsy Jeory

“He iti, he iti kahikatoa.” This whakatauki seems most appropriate when describing Teoti Rupi Wawatai, kuia of Waihirere .... “Although small, one is small like the tea tree which is also very, very strong”.

And although she is small in physical stature (four feet nine inches tall) Rupi has a deeply devout Christian faith which is very, very strong. So in fact, that throughout a lifetime of mission work she has brought hundreds into the Catholic church, and has long since lost count of her god-children. Let’s take a memory at random. Early morning on the marae at Hato Petera... a misty, moisty winter morning, chill and damp with a light drizzle falling ... the tangata whenua waiting to receive the manuhiri who have travelled through the night from Waihirere ... sleepy people rousing themselves in the steamy warm vehicle... the old lady had recently been sick with bronchitis will she stay on the bus, perhaps? No, she won’t, not for anything. And so once again she leads her party on to the marae, seemingly oblivious to the cold and the rain.

It’s wonderful to see, this total disregard of personal comfort. Like so many other elders, she will sit patiently, still as a statue, intently listening to the speeches for hours at a time. Blazing hot sun without any shade, freezing cold winds, lashing rain, drizzling damp she seems to be impervious to the weather. When offered a rug, a coat, or an umbrella, she accepts with a smile and a nod, but you don’t find her requesting such a thing for herself.

And although she is more frail these days, she has kept remarkably good health in the past. It’s as though she was tempered by the elements, toughened by the many many miles of walking, horseriding and bicycling, and the years of hard work. And always, she was sustained by her greatest strength of all her faith.

It was nothing for her to walk the eight miles from her home at Waihirere to the heart of Gisborne if there were no means of transport available when she needed it. There she’d go, quietly tacking her way along the straights on the Back Ormond Road being passed by cars who assumed she lived close by. For what little old lady dressed all in black would be walking any distance, particularly on a boiling hot Gisborne summer day, with the bitumen bubbling, and mirages of heat sheen wobbling across the road in the distance? Nobody, of course, except our Rupi; there has been no end to her determination to get there for a mass, a rosary, a tangi, an unveiling, a baptism indeed for any sort of hui where a devotion was involved.

She was born on 31 August 1895 at Parihimanihi, which she says is the original name for Waihirere, and spent her early years there on her parents’ farm. Her father was

Rewi Haapu, of Ngati Konohi (Whangara) and her mother was Peti Taihuka, of Aitanga-a-Mahaaki. Their family home stood where you now see the cemetery, and the present St Peter’s Church was built by her mother who was a chieftainess of the Waihirere pa. She died when Rupi was very young.

“Father was both father and mother to us. I’ll never forget the first bit of sewing he did for me; he bought some red material and made me bloomers and was I proud of them!”

Eldest in her family was Marangai (George), followed by Te Kohaki Tu (Tu), Karauria (Papa), Tiria (Julia) and lastly herself, Teoti Rupi. Now she is the only one living in this world.

Her first schooling was at Waerenga-a-hika and then, when Whangara School desperately needed pupils to keep it open, the family heeded the call and attended there en masse. The five children helped to swell the numbers and keep the school alive, and stayed at what used to be the last house by the wharenui, the place of Paddy Hinaki. They would go home for weekends, travelling on their father’s buggy, and this was the young Rupi’s life until she went to live in Gisborne for a while with Hariata Nihoniho, daughter of Tuta Nihoniho, in Ormond Road.

Rewi Haapu was a firm believer in educating girls as highly as boys, so after gaining proficiency examinations at Whangara, the sisters went on to St Joseph’s College. It was there that Rupi then the longest-term pupil and reared an Anglican became a Catholic and began to aim towards a career of missionary work. She enjoyed the life there, and received the good grounding in music that was to stand her in good stead in later life when she taught piano and trained choirs.

She was secretary of the headquarters branch of the Old Girls’ Assocation from its formation in 1945. In 1965 she made a New Zealand-wide quest for old girls to attend the school’s centenary in 1967.

Years of school teaching and missionary work on the Coast followed, including a stint of housekeeping for Father Gerard van Beck, first Catholic Maori missioner in the area. When he first asked her for help as housekeeper, Rupi was dismayed. “But I can’t cook, Father, I can’t even make bread!” “Never mind, then, we’ll cook between us.”

And that is how they managed very harmoniously for several years. Father van Beck a familiar figure in those days with his pipe, cap and beard also taught her to drive a car. Later, when her first child was born, she named him Kereti in honour of the kindly, dedicated priest. While living at Tolaga Bay, Rupi helped at the

policeman’s home, housekeeping for Constable Power and his wife as well as teaching piano in pupils’ homes and giving catechism lessons. During this period a certain pleasant handsome young man from Rangitukia used to catch her horse for her and accompany her on long rides to Tauwhareparae and all over...their friendship deepened, he became a member of the Catholic church with the guidance of Father van Beck, and in due course at Waihirere she became the wife of Mohi Mako Wawatai. For some reason, though, she always called him Bernard.

Their early marriage was spent near Murupara where Mohi worked in forestry and Rupi continued her mission work as well as trying to improve her cooking not only for her husband but for Father van Beck, who had been posted to the district and lived in the back of the church.

Kereti (Gerry) is the oldest of the family, followed by Adrienne, Patrick (Frank) and Bernadine (Pani).

Unhappily, Mohi died not many years after they went to make their home at Waihirere, and from then onwards Rupi has always dressed entirely in black. Saddened as she was, there was no let-up in her missionary zeal and it was not long after that she travelled to Australia for further knowledge of church doctrine.

“Ko Manaia turanga rau.” As manaia once appeared in many places, so did Teoti Rupi Wawatai: Tai Tokerau, Tai Tonga, Tai Rawhiti, Tai Hauauru throughout the whole of the country she is known and warmly greeted. She still has contacts with those she knew during her Australian sojourn, and of course there was the highlight of her life, the world trip in 1973 featuring a trip to Rome to see Pope Paul VI. The only Maori present, she led the party of twenty-eight with Rev. J. Beban and Mrs O’Connor, of Palmerston.

It was on this occasion that the Pope granted her the Apostolic Blessing for the Turanganui Maori Catholic Society which, thanks to her continued encouragement and inspiration, is still active.

On the same journey she spent a while in England as the guest of Jean and Kara Puketapu, then attached to the New Zealand High Commission in London.

Heart of her small, neat home at Waihirere is the sittingroom, where holy pictures, statues, photographs and other mementoes make for a wealth of interest. No matter how often you’ve seen them before, there’s always pleasure in browsing around the old lady’s treasures. It’s as though they warm the little room, whose westward-facing windows look out across the fields of Waihirere towards the sunset hills.

In one corner stands a large statue of the Sacred Heart wearing a kiwi-feather cloak given to Rupi by her old schoolfriend Whina Cooper...there are other statues of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, and Our Lady of Fatima...piupiu are on the wall, and the eye is drawn to a glamorous photograph of Kiri te Kanawa inscribed “To Aunty Ruby with love from Kiri”.

Look further and you will see photographs of Rupi with Pa Henare Tate and carvers Moni Taumaunu and Paul Douglas at the dedication of St Joseph’s carved altar...with the haka party of her Turanganui Maori Catholic Society welcoming Bishop Mackey at Rugby Park, Gisborne...with the same group giving a traditional welcome preceding Mass in Maori at St Mary’s Church and thereby creating a “first” for that parish...and many, many other pictures of god-children, mokopuna, other relations and friends.

On the wall in the passage hangs a pastel portrait of her, not a particularly good likeness, but enough to remind the old lady of a curious incident that happended last year.

One of the family was looking in the window of an Auckland shop when he was amazed to see a large photograph of Rupi with the caption “Dignity; an old Maori kuia” and price-tagged four hundred dollars. Since it was a weekend, and he was leaving for home shortly, he had no chance to find out the hows and whys of it all, but it gave the family considerable amusement. “Gee, Mum, fancy you being worth all that!!!” And there are also numerous souvenirs of trips away to various hui, and probably there are many readers who have shared a bus trip with her in the past. Remember how it was?

Kits and rugs and cake-tins stowed away up on the racks...greetings and jokes...money being collected for the koha or for the last-minute fares for the bus...late-comers hurrying on board to the accompaniment of good-natured grumbling...tidy people folded neatly in their seats, untidy ones still bumbling about storing away this, fishing around for that, even as the bus pulls away from the depot.

A few miles on, chattering and laughter subside as the little old kuia dressed in black rises from her seat near the front and starts the karakia...those with rosary beads and prayer books bring them out, others stub out their smokes and bow their heads, some protesting half-heartedly but all obeying, all paying respect. She leads the prayers with such simple conviction that the occasional unbeliever has even been heard to wonder “maybe there is something in this religion business, after a 11....”

Tottering down the aisle of the swaying bus, grasping the backs of the seats with one hand and her beads in the other, she gives us the full works. Not for her the bare bones of the rosary, but the many prayers accompanying it that few people would say today even if they knew, or could remember, them. A hymn often “Mo Maria” or “Whakaaria Mai” and she returns to her seat. Rosaries are put away, food is produced; and you can sense a real feeling of peace and safety. E Rupi no hui, with the bus trip there and back, is ever the same without you. “He iti, he iti kahikatoa.”