Last week Haumanu hosted the first national wānanga since the official reforming of the ‘collective’ at Pūrekireki marae in Pīrongia and I was lucky enough to attend. It was a success and stands as a new milestone for Haumanu in pursuit of providing a solid foundation for the revitalising of taonga pūoro and the normalisation of these of taonga pūoro in today’s context.
Taonga Pūoro Wānanga content
This wānanga event was a goal for Haumanu for sometime they included important aspects of taonga pūoro including reo, tikanga, taonga pūoro used in colonisation context, taonga pūoro in the environment, taonga pūoro in connection with the oro and higher realms, taonga pūoro in rongoā Māori, the making of taonga pūoro and of course an ever constant would be the playing of taonga pūoro.
5 Days of Wānanga
Each day started with Karakia Oro, often followed by sessions of playing taonga pūoro together and then parakuihi. Every single day of the wānanga was packed full with events including guest speakers, presentations, impromptu performances, wānanga specifically on important aspects of taonga puoro and the making of taonga pūoro.
Pīrongia hīkoi
Day two of the wānanga involved a hīkoi on Mount Pīrongia where we listened to the sounds of the ngāhere (forest) and mimicked the sounds around us. During this time we were visited by various groups of manu (birds) curious to the sounds that they were hearing. We created performances whilst in the ngāhere and at the close of that made our way along the Mangakara track to the award (river) where we bathed, played and bonded together in the ngāhere playing with the ngāhere.
Taonga Pūoro making workshops
Everybody came away from the wānanga with new taonga pūoro that they had made. Even the practitioners enjoyed time hands-on enjoying areas of making, playing or kōrero on aspects of taonga pūoro which may not have necessarily been their area of expertise. In this, the whole level of mātauranga was raised throughout all levels of capability throughout the week.
Ngāhau / Concert
As performers and practitioners we spent the final evening playing music together, performing stories and sharing the sounds of taonga pūoro. This was an amazing evening of performance and play where everyone got involved in some way to share ora reo together .