‘You are not a mechanic?’ Tamati asked disappointedly. ‘I am a factory assembler. I make cars, not fix them.’ ‘Your time was obviously wasted in New Zealand,’ his father said sadly. Tevita knew that he had shamed his father in the eyes of Tamati. He should never have come back, he thought miserably. His older brother had been right, he was crazy. Tamati got slowly back in his truck and started the reluctant engine, and missing badly, it chugged off, leaving a drooping Tevita standing in the hot tropical sun. His father wordlessly got his hat and prepared to leave for the banana plantation. Tevita closed his eyes and slept. His home-coming had been a complete failure. A young girl, daughter of the village constable, woke him an hour later to say there was a telegram for him at the radio station. And would he ring the radio station and they would read it to him. Tevita wondered who would be sending him a telegram as he walked across the village green to the village constable's house, followed by a retinue of village children. A telephone call was a big event in the village, and a telegram an even bigger one. The constable's wife beckoned him inside and he lifted the handset off the hook of the old-fashioned wooden crank telephone, nothing like the coloured plastic telephones in New Zealand. ‘Hullo,’ he said cautiously. The radio station established his identitv and read out the text of the telegram which was from New Zealand. ‘Please send me case of bananas from our plantation.’ And it was signed ‘Brother’. ‘Was it important?’ the constable's wife asked interestedly. ‘Yes,’ Tevita said thoughtfully. ‘Very important.’ He and his brother had always enjoyed bananas sent from their own plantation, though they had always made Tevita home-sick. His brother must be feeling a little home-sick. He'd have to be cured quickly. Still followed by the boys and girls he strolled homewards. The village houses were still in the strong sunshine. Everybody not working in the plantations was asleep. It was a very familiar scene, but he didn't think he was going to miss it. The car factory had said he could have his job back any time he wanted it, and he had laughed. He hoped he hadn't laughed too much. His mother had heard of the telephone call in the kumara patch, his father and sister in the banana plantation, and they were waiting on the verandah for him. ‘What was it?’ his mother asked anxiously. ‘A telegram,’ Tevita said casually in a man-of-the-world manner. He was not a common villager excited by a telegram. ‘What about?’ his father asked. ‘From the car factory,’ Tevita said regretfully. ‘They want me to come back to work as soon as possible.’ His father nodded. ‘I will have to return to New Zealand on the next boat,’ Tevita said more briskly than he had spoken since the day of his arrival. He made no mention of the bananas, and he wasn't taking any back with him, they were too depressing. He felt happier than he had since the day of his arrival, and also sadder, as if he had, somehow, failed.

I Te Mate Ka Tu Ka Ora The Whitianga people were once in force, but over the years their number and strength declined. But today the people have stood up and banded together. We will now live again and be strong. This expresses the thoughts in the minds of the local people last November, when a new dining hall was opened at Whitianga. It was named ‘Rangi Te Tae Taea’ after a tipuna of the Delamere, Black, Poihipi and Tawhai families. The historic meeting house on the marae, Tutewake, is one of the oldest on the East Coast, but the present meeting house was re-erected in 1957. The people at Whitianga are of Te