A Proper Little Devil

Te Ao Hou, September 1968, Page 12

A Proper Little Devil by Riki Eriki The old house stood rotting—dark and crumbling beneath a sprawling entanglement of thickly-entwined hawthorn, which unlike the once proud house, still thrived vigorously, after eighty, or perhaps more years of growth. Small, single-petalled roses of pink, yellow, and white, strung out like Christmas decorations, rambled at ease over the canopy of leaves and spreading limbs. Forcing a path through bramble and overgrown vegetation, I stood before a gaping hole in the germ-infested boards. A shaft of sunlight lit the interior and I was close enough to see and read some of the ‘Weekly News’ pages that papered the storeroom walls, The date on some of the peeling, tattered pages was December 1935. Large black headlines told of the Emperor of Abyssinia protesting to the League of Nations about the Italians' use of poison gas against the Abyssinian soldiers. That was the year I spent my first holiday with my mother's people. It was then that the house rang with the robust laughter of a happy family. There were four bedrooms, a large sitting room in which hung portraits of departed relatives, a big kitchen with a wood-burning stove at one end and an open fire near the centre, a pantry and a storerooom. The rooms were filled with the heavy solid furniture and big iron beds that the country folk fancied. Built of solid kauri, it was roofed with wooden shingles, It stood surrounded by flower gardens, shrubs and bushes, while a well-used path led to a large orchard with various kinds of fruit—peaches, plums, apples, nectarines, quinces, figs, oranges and lemons. By the gate into the orchard grew a big karaka tree, planted by my great-grandmother the first year of her marriage. Behind all this stood a shelter belt of pines planted about the same time. The hawthorn hedge was about 14 feet high then, but was kept at that height, and we young ones would feast on its berries simply for the sake of eating. Uncle Hemi's wife, Miriama, was a kind and loving woman, whose generosity and hospitality were known to all, far and near. Both of them, like my mother and the people in the district, belonged to Te Aupouri of Tai Tokerau. Hemi was the eldest of mother's family, whose members had been converted by the Rev. Samuel Marsden, and had always been pillars of the Anglican Church. When my mother changed her faith to become a Catholic and marry my father, such a rumpus had been raised that I don't think Grandfather ever completely forgave her, until he himself changed to become a Seventh Day Adventist after the Second World War. At that time, the families of the district belonged to three different religious groups—Anglicans, Catholics and Ratanas. The Anglicans and the Catholics both had numerous followers, while in our area, the local adherents of the Ratana church were members of five families. Now Uncle and Aunty had expressed a wish to become followers of Ratana, and join his church. There was great consternation amongst the family and church elders, but now that they had made up their minds they lost no time in making the change. The only one who didn't worry and made no bones about who knew it, was Granny Matilda, whom everyone said was a little bit porangi, and all of us, including most of the older ones, believed it then. But now, when I look back, I realise that poor old Granny Matire, as we all called her, (though whose granny she really was, I never did find out) wasn't a bit mad at all, not even eccentric—she simply was a nonconformist, who wished to do things the way she wanted them done. When every other woman wore black to a tangi, she would turn up dressed in white. It was whispered that she did mysterious things at night, for on certain nights she would sit up outside gazing at the stars till early morning, singing and posturing upon new mats that she made especially for this purpose. It seemed like some kind of ritual to me. Her strange ways and doings had no effect on her health, as she lived to the ripe old

age of five-score, before dying peacefully in her sleep. Anyway, at the time it became known that Uncle and his family had left the faith of his fathers, he was summoned to attend a meeting of the family and church elders at the hui-house. Old family feuds and tribal dissensions were aired and viewed in a very unkind manner, and only Granny Matire fearlessly stood by Uncle and Aunty, demanding to know by what right did they impose their minds upon anyone who wished to change their faith. It wasn't as if they were turning heathen, like those terrible Hainamana (Chinese) who prayed to big statues and idols. It was only that they were changing names, like they did when they married, while still believing in the same God. ‘Aue! What manner of talk is this? More foolish prattle from this silly old woman,’ scoffed some maliciously. But they underestimated Granny Matire, She asked some of the women to serve out pieces of feathery-light sponge cake, piled high with mouth-watering whipped cream and fruit salad. Each of the men had a slice or two, but this was also breaking tribal protocol, as food was not generally eaten until after the meeting. But then again Matire was an unusual person to say the least. ‘Aha! This is the work of the women. This is where women should be—in the kitchen, not arguing with the men,’ cried Hoani, cramming another piece of Granny's cake into his mouth. ‘Tino reka hoki te kai nei e Kui,’ said Pera, wiping a coating of cream from his lips with his tongue. ‘What has all this got to do with religion?’ his eyes glancing around for the plates of cake. From her kit Granny removed a glass jar of honey, and two packets of tobacco. ‘Pai kare!’ heaha te mahi a te Kuia nei i tenei taima?' laughed Tamati. Matire ignored these remarks. After all, didn't she know men? ‘See this jar of honey,’ she said, holding it up ‘Well, the bees can teach us all a lesson. The honey that fills it comes from not one flower, but from all the flowers in the bush. But it is still honey. And here is a packet of Riverhead Gold. It is my favourite tobacco, but if I run short then I will smoke Silver Fern or some other brand. Two brands but nevertheless, tobacco. Those cakes you ate? Obviously you enjoyed them. Well the cream comes from Hemi's cows. Not just jerseys, but all kinds of breeds.' ‘Ka tika nga korero nei, e Matire’, cried out Hoani, not wishing to be made a fool of by the old woman, seeing that things were turning out in her favour. ‘So seeing that our relation Hemi and his family have left the church, let them go with our blessings, rather than our ill will,’ said the dear old soul, finishing her speech. This realistic approach of hers left them speechless, ashamed that a crazy old hag, as some were known to call her behind her back, had showed them all up, for who could deny such logic and reasoning? Nevertheless, to save losing face, the old shrewdies carried on the discussion and tactfully ended the meeting with the conclusion that all were God's children, and should Aunty and Uncle not be happy in the new church they could always come back into the old faith. During this first visit of mine to Uncle Hemi, another relation came to stay as well, and it was he who showed me things I knew nothing of. Grand-uncle Wiremu took great pains to show me the preparations that went into making a tapapa for kumara plants. Then he showed me how to prepare the earth mounds for the planting of kamokamo, pumpkin and water-melon. All were planted during certain phases of the moon, according to the Maori custom handed on from family to family. With the planting of the melon seeds, I was to see the first of many strange happenings, These were planted during the hours of darkness, on the night of the new moon, after it had risen. One would place the dampened seeds into the prepared earth, stand with one's arms and hands stretching until they formed a big circle over one's head, facing the moon and chanting some lines I can't remember, do an about turn, bend and show one's bare backside to the man in the moon. My young cousins and I always found this a very hilarious act, but to Grand-uncle this was a very serious and dedicated business, that resulted in growing the biggest and sweetest of water-melons. At night if a ruru (an owl) came close to the house while hunting, and settled in any of the nearby trees, screeching and call-

ing, this was considered an ill omen. Should it happen to choose any part of the house as a perch and was seen, this would set tongues wagging in the most depressive manner, for in Maori folklore, ruru the messenger of evil, was also the carrier of death. It meant that someone close within the family circle was very ill, or someone close to all had died. Great emphasis was placed upon dreams, and was not the Holy Book full of stories about God's chosen ones having dreams as signs and warnings, to prove it? There were plenty of kaumatua and kuia adept at figuring out the meaning. A wedding was interpreted as a funeral, and to dream of a tupapaku (a corpse), meant wedding bells. To dream of catching a monstrous eel, if ill, was a bad sign, though to dream of loved ones who had journeyed into the land of the Great Unknown, particularly if one remembered the conversation, was a good thing. For a rooster, who for some reason happened to be startled into wakefulness and felt like crowing (perhaps he too was having a nightmare) to ‘cock-a-doodle-doo’ before midnight or just after, meant an accident or serious trouble. When a house, or a church, or a meeting house was being built, no woman was permitted to enter it until the tapu was lifted and it had been blessed by the elders. It was considered bad taste for a woman to walk across a field or sports area prior to any games or events. If meat was hung under the trees and left hanging at night, great care was taken to see that the moonbeams did not touch it. Many of the people held great fears about the kakariki (gecko). To come across one basking in the sun, especially if it was looking directly at a person, face to face, was enough to make grown men run in fear. At night, we would huddle under our