Aorangi A small band of enthusiastic workers is striving hard to preserve a piece of living Maori heritage in Feilding — a heritage that will have a real place in the community of tomorrow, particularly for the Maori people. This heritage lies at Aorangi, a small settlement about two miles from Feilding, for here is the Aorangi marae. The Aorangi Marae Committee needs funds for renovations on the marae, and staged a mammoth Polynesian festival in Feilding on August 17 as part of a drive for finance. The Aorangi marae has played an important part in local Maori culture, and can continue to give impetus to the direction of Maori and Pakeha culture in the future. Some measure of its value to the community is found in its history. Having travelled down from Waikato around 1830, the Ngati Kauwhata people eventually settled in the Awahuri area, close to the Oroua river. Here they established a settlement and took an interest in clearing land for agriculture. In the late 1880s Te Rama Apakura and his wife Hurihia (also known in Pakeha circles as Mr and Mrs Robert Durie) moved from from Awahuri to Aorangi and began farming family land there. With them went other members of Ngati Tahuriwakanui, a sub-tribe of Kauwhata, and they built houses as land was cleared. They also moved their meeting house, Maniaihu, which had previously stood on the Awahuri side of the Oroua River. How the house was transported is not known nor is its exact age on record. It was, however, in good repair when it was re-erected on its present site around 1890. A small settlement of Ngati Tahuriwakanui grew up around the meeting house, which served as a much-used cultural centre for the various families living there. Today only one of the original homes still stands but even in the 1940s four or five other homes were located adjacent to the marae. The marae boasted its own bakery and blacksmith and a Maori-owned store was in operation by the turn of the century. Other signs of permanence including a burial ground appeared a few hundred yards away. In later years as the Maori population moved towards Feilding, the marae saw many alterations. The bakery was no longer needed and the store had been replaced. By the 1920s much of the responsibility for the marae had been assumed by the late Mr Mason Durie and his wife Kahu, who were farming the surrounding land. They were to spend a lifetime continuing to develop the marae and were largely responsible for the national prestige which became associated with Aorangi. From its beginning the marae was closely involved with the Anglican church and it became the centre of the Maori mission in the Manawatu-Rangitikei pastorate. The meeting house itself was used as a regular place of worship for many years and frequent large church gatherings were a distinguishing feature of the marae. Later, after World War II, another building was added — St Luke's Chapel. This had been constructed by voluntary labour when the Rev. M. Bennett (now Bishop of Aotearoa) was pastor in the area. Each month services in Maori are still conducted in the chapel. Other improvements included a new dining room and the establishment of many native trees. The links between Ngati Tahuriwakanui of Aorangi and the other sub-tribes of Ngati Kauwhata have always been strong and there has been close co-operation between the three Kauwhata maraes. At Awahuri a large meeting house, Te