Potiki

by Patricia Grace

  It was more than thirty years ago, at fifteen, that he’d left school to work the land when his father died. He’d had to take much of the responsibility for the gardens then, while his older brother Stan was away getting further education and his cousins were doing their trades. His own apprenticeship, his own education, had been on the land, and after his father had died Grandfather Tamihana had taught him everything to do with planting, tending, gathering, storing and marketing. He’d been taught about the weather and seasons, the moon phases and the rituals to do with growing. At the same time he was made aware that he was being given knowledge on behalf of a people, and that they all trusted him with that knowledge. It wasn’t only for him but for the family.

  They’d had a reasonable living for a number of years with he and his grandfather doing most of the work, and others helping when they could. Then the old man died, and once his brother, sisters and cousins married and began building homes and having families there had not been enough in it for survival, and not enough people free to work in the gardens.

  He had not been happy about giving up what he knew was a charge that he’d been given. But it had only been given up temporarily, he’d always known that. He’d always known that one day he would return to the land, and that the land would support them all again.

  And they still had their land, that was something to feel good about. Still had everything, except for the hills. The hills had gone, but that was before his time and there was nothing he could do about that, nothing anyone could do. What had happened there wasn’t right but it was over and done with. Now, at least, the family was still here, on the ancestral land. They still had their urupa and their wharenui, and there was still clean water out front.

  It hadn’t always been easy either. They’d had to watch, be careful over the years. There had been requests to the family to sell land at the back, and some pressure on them to open up the road along the beach. But they’d all resisted firmly over a number of years. Just as well.

  These days people were looking more to their land. Not only to their land, but to their own things as well. They had to if they didn’t want to be wiped off the face of the earth. There was more determination now – determination which had created hope, and hope in turn had created confidence, and energy. Things were stirring, to the extent of people fighting to hold onto a language that was in danger of being lost, and to the extent of people struggling to regain land that had gone from them years before. The people at Te Ope were an example and it was looking good for the Te Ope people now. They were going to win their struggle at last, after years and years of letter-writing and delegations and protest. It was only since the people decided on occupation that attention had been given to their situation and an enquiry had been brought about. Te Ope was going to win through now that the courts had found them to be right in what they had always claimed, and had made a decision in their favour.

  Good on them. It was things like that that made you feel good. He was proud that he and his family, the whole whanau, had given support to the Te Ope people. Well it was no distance for them to go with their koha, and Tangimoana, James and other young ones had spent many weekends there over the past two years or so. That was something to be proud of, and anyway it was right they should give their support. After all they had their own connections there, their own whanaunga. It was right, no getting away from it.

  The young ones had not only given their help and support but they’d learned some good things too. One more legal battle to go then Te Ope would be building, rebuilding their wharenui on their own land at last. Had their plans drawn up already, that’s how confident they were, and they’d asked James to come and help with the carvings of their house. Well that was a great thing. There’d always been carvers among their tipuna here, but although the works and the stories had survived, the skills had not. Now, through James, and thanks to an old man at Te Ope, they would get those skills back into the family again. It was meant, everything was meant, and people hadn’t forgotten how to care. Much had been lost, but people hadn’t stopped knowing how to care for each other. It was good. He aha te mea nui i te ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata. He believed in it.

  And people were looking to their land again. They knew that they belonged to the land, had known all along that there had to be a foothold otherwise you were dust blowing here there and anywhere – you were lost, gone. It was good there was more focus on it now, and more hope.

  For him, being out of a job meant that he would be able to get on with his real work, and that he’d be able to pass on what he’d been given. Everything was meant, that’s what he’d always believed. But if you missed the signs, or let yourself be side-tracked, you could lose out. Everything was meant but you had to do your bit too.

  The two young ones had seen him coming with the horse. They’d be disappointed that it wasn’t a riding horse, but it was good to have a horse again. There was a good horse smell to do with the land, and there was a good whiff of the sea mingling with it. He could give Manu and Toko a ride, then he’d have to go and finish the fence he’d been making. There was plenty of time now to get everything in shape, and there’d be plenty of help too. There were young ones here with no work to go to, who were looking forward to doing something that was their own, for themselves. There were those who had moved away but who would come back as they got sent down the road from their jobs. James would spend time here and time at Te Ope, getting some of those other skills back into the family. He’d come home when he was needed. Tangi would go to university because it was what the people wanted her to do. She’d be home with them in the holidays.

  They’d have to make sure that they were producing enough for their own kai first, and for any manuhiri of course. Wouldn’t be easy. Then later there’d be surplus to sell or store. They’d try out some new crops, the markets were different now. Couldn’t wait to get into it.

  ‘What’s his name?’ Manu was steadying Toko with his arm. They’d been hurrying. ‘You’ll have to think of a name.’

  ‘Didn’t he have a name before?’

  ‘Didn’t ask his name, we’ll have to give him one.’

  ‘Well can we ride him?’

  ‘Not a riding horse but you can have a ride. He’s a working horse.’

  He helped Manu on to the horse, then lifted Toko and seated him in front.

  ‘He needs a big name,’ Toko was saying.

  ‘Call him Kaha then.’

  Kaha. Yes, it was a good name, strong but gentle. Manu had the knack. He always knew the special thing about a person – or a horse. ‘Kia kaha,’ he said, moving the horse forward again.

  Roimata was waiting for them on the verandah.

  ‘What do you think of him, Roi?’

  ‘Big. Bigger than the one you used to have.’

  ‘This one’s a worker.’

  ‘Cold mornings when you’d been hurrying your horse to school you’d see her steaming.’

  Years ago.

  Manu slid down the horse’s flank and onto the verandah. Hemi lifted Toko down and steadied him. ‘We’ll take him out the back and find something to put water in,’ he said. ‘Then we’ll have to finish that fence before it gets dark. Kia kaha.’

  Pigtail girl. Waiting there every morning holding the gate of the school paddock open for them. And so good to Mary always, he’d never forget. None of them would ever forget that. A couple of years later, she was six or seven, was when her father started bringing her there to the beach. Not long after her mother died. Must have been a lonely pair in those days, but he hadn’t thought about it then. A good man, her father. Good to them during the war years. He’d come there and given their old people a hand in the gardens at a time when there were no young men about. If there was a death, or a wedding, he’d be there to help.

  Just like another uncle. And Roimata was just like another cousin to all of them. Never thought then that he’d be married to her one day, but she knew. She said that she knew when she was five t
hat she’d marry him. Well he was a real slow arse but he supposed it was all meant. Couldn’t imagine a life with anyone else, even if it was true that there had been someone else in his life for a while.

  Couldn’t remember where he’d met Sue, but it was probably at a party. At the rugby club, most likely. He seemed to be in love with her, really in love. Then. But looking back now it was easy to see that he and Sue were really nothing to do with each other. That was what Granny Tamihana had said at the time too. She’d told him that he couldn’t just see a woman at a dance and marry her, someone who was nothing to do with him, or with anything of his. Anyone else wouldn’t have listened to old Granny and her growling, and he hadn’t wanted to at first. But he had listened, and he did know, he’d really known all along. Sue knew it too. They’d both known that he’d never leave there, that he’d never leave his sister Mary, or his mother who was ill by then. And Sue wouldn’t have fitted into their household, they both knew it.

  Well he’d felt very lonely after Sue left and he’d thought he’d never marry. Not that he hadn’t wanted to, but it was the way things were. He couldn’t turn his back on them.

  Then Roimata came. She’d been a part of their lives, she and her father. But she’d left there when she was fifteen, the same age as Tangimoana was now. In some things he was a man by then, with a man’s load. Roimata was like a young cousin going away. Not that he’d forgotten her, but it was Mary who’d noticed it most when Roimata left. It was Mary who had missed her.

  He hadn’t known then that Roimata would come back twelve years later looking for him. Funny though, because when she did come, when he saw her, he knew … as if he’d been waiting … It was all meant, he supposed.

  Back from the house he began work on the almost completed fence. The next day he would sort out all the gear that was hanging in the shed. Didn’t think there’d be too many repairs needed, perhaps a bit of rust to deal with, but they had looked after it all these years. They’d clear the ground out back first, then start ploughing. He was looking forward to that first furrow, that first turn of the soil. Before winter they’d get their firewood down from the hills. Couldn’t beat a horse when it came to getting manuka off the slopes.

  And there were so many things in his head at the moment. It wasn’t just the gardens, it was everything, the whole place, the people. There was the sea. It was true that they’d always used the sea, and the shores, but they were not using them to the same extent now as they had earlier. The kids knew a lot already. They were good in the water, and in the boats, but there was more that the young ones could be shown now that there was time, and freedom. It was important now, important for their survival. There were all the things about the moons and tides, winds and currents, and how to find the fishing grounds, that needed to be told. Not just told but shown. There were skills like net mending and crayfish-pot making that needed to be passed on.

  Then apart from the land and sea, apart from the survival things, there were their songs and their stories. There was their language. There would be more opportunity now to make sure that they, the older ones, handed on what they knew.

  Kids were different these days. They wanted knowledge of their own things, their own things first. They were proud and didn’t hide their culture, and no one could bullshit them either.

  In his day they had been expected to hide things, to pretend they weren’t what they were. It was funny how people saw each other. Funny how you came to see yourself in the mould that others put you in, and how you began not to believe in yourself. You began to believe that you should hide away in the old seaweed like a sand flea, and that all you could do when disturbed was hop about and hope you wouldn’t get stood on. But of course you did get stood on.

  Well their ancestors had been rubbished in schools, and in books, and everywhere. So were their customs, so was their language. Still were rubbished too, as far as he could see. Rubbished or ignored. And if those things were being rubbished then it was an attack on you, on a whole people. You could get weak under the attack, then again you could become strong.

  The kids these days were strong, well some of them were. Others were lost and without hope. But the strong ones? They were different, tougher than what his lot had been as kids. They didn’t accept some of the messages they were receiving about themselves, couldn’t afford to if they wanted to stay on the face of the earth.

  Education was a good thing, he’d always believed that, wanted it for the kids. And the kids believed it. But the kids wouldn’t take any rubbish, and that made sense. Didn’t know what was wrong with them all in his day. They went into everything blind trying to find a pathway to heaven. Believed everything they were told about themselves, accepted every humiliation as though it was good for them.

  There were exceptions even in his day of course, like their mate Reuben up in Te Ope, same age as himself. At the time when he himself was working the land, learning what he could, Reuben was standing up to them all, digging his toes in. Years of his young life, and all on his own at first. But Reuben had never taken any crap and had never taken old people for fools the way the authorities had. It was true that young and old had had quite bad disagreements at times over the handling of things, but Reuben had always had his head on straight. No doubts. Always believed in himself and his people.

  His own daughter Tangi was like that too, never let anyone put her or her people down. Had such a clear view of what she stood for and nothing got past her. If she’d been round in Reuben’s day she’d have been up there beside him spitting. Yes Tangimoana was the one. He hoped his daughter wouldn’t suffer too much for the sort of person she was.

  The night she was born was the worst night of his whole life. The little one had come without too much trouble, but then there had been difficulty with the afterbirth and his Roimata had come near to death. When he saw her there so colourless and unmoving after the emergency operation he felt as though he’d killed her.

  Hadn’t wanted any more kids after that, but after a few years Roimata had decided to have another. She was all right that time, but it was little Manu who’d had to fight for his life, spending his first few weeks in an incubator. Well perhaps those first few weeks would be the only time Manu would ever spend separated from the family, time would tell. You had to trust what people knew in their hearts. People knew things in their hearts, even little kids, or especially little kids. Manu knew he shouldn’t go to school, and their decision to keep him home turned out good for all of them. They’d had to decide what was important and what was not.

  After Manu they’d decided not to have any more kids. And he had decided to go and have something done about it himself. Wasn’t so straightforward those days either. Well everything was meant, but that didn’t mean you just sat round and hoped. The old aunties had had him on about it too of course, but it was just their way of bringing it all out in the open, letting him know they were backing him up in what he’d done, letting him know they thought he had good enough reason. His business, but as usual it was the whole family’s business.

  So then Toko was a real gift. That wasn’t what they’d thought at first of course, because they’d been upset and angry at the time. Angry wasn’t the word for it. He’d felt like killing … someone. Didn’t know who and could only guess. They’d never found out from Mary, who had no memory or understanding of what they’d been asking her, and it seemed she had no memory of the baby’s birth either. He’d never forget the way she’d looked that night when he got home. No expression, nothing to say. And he’d never forget the poor crooked little baby they’d shown him.

  That old bloke had never turned up again, lucky for him, but still you could only guess. And what they had not thought of at first was that it could have been … Mary. Her own … desire. But even so she was done wrong.

  And they’d tried to trace him at first, Williams. They’d found out that he had a little house up the line that he lived in during the winter months, but the house was empty when he and Stan h
ad gone there. Neighbours had been able to tell them that the old fella took to the roads and beaches every year in the late spring and that he’d been gone a week. Then not long after that they’d seen in the paper where he’d been found dead on the side of the road somewhere.

  God he’d been upset at the time. He still felt guilty about it, not angry any more but guilty, after having promised his mother that he’d always look after Mary. Well they’d named the old bloke as father anyway, whether he was responsible or not. Joseph Williams.

  Hadn’t known his name until they’d been told it by neighbours. And yet Mary – it almost seemed as though she’d known it. Then they’d read about Joseph Williams in the newspaper. There’d been quite a write-up about him too.

  Anyway Toko was something special they’d been given, no doubt about it, Joseph Williams or no Joseph Williams. A taniwha. That’s what they’d been given, a taniwha, who somehow gave strength … and joy to all of them.

  And he himself had been given a lot, and now that he was at last getting back to the family things he could deserve what he’d been given. You had to deserve things. He was getting back to it and it was a good feeling.

  It was dark now, on this, his first day of no work, and he wouldn’t get the fence finished after all, but there was tomorrow. The fence was good enough as it was to keep the horse from getting out. He could hear it snuffling and stamping in the dark, and he could see the darker-than-black shadow of it as he made his way, first to the shed with the gear, and then to the house. He could hear Mary in the house singing.