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ReadingRoom
Introducing sizzling literary expertise Airana Ngarewa, 12 months 9 instructor and kickboxing champ with a strong new novel
At an occasion at this 12 months’s Auckland Writers Pageant, Airana Ngarewa appeared onstage immaculately wearing fitted pants and good tan boots. He was a bit nervous entering into, and launched into singing the start verse of “Poi E”. I felt for him: we have bonded prior to now over our lack of singing potential. I can’t maintain a tune both. On the e-book launch for my brief story assortment Destroy, I faltered twice throughout “Purea Nei” as a result of I used to be self-conscious my buddy Arihia could be cringing at me belting out the phrases.
However he gained the group over in Auckland, cracking jokes (“I see nobody’s ears are bleeding but”), a 28-year-old schoolteacher with a cheeky grin and carrying a sizeable taonga round his neck. It’s the top of a taiaha, half whalebone, half pounamu. “It has been stated that my whānau are the one whānau in Pātea that may’t sing.” After which he held the group, and used the occasion as a possibility to share some vital native historical past. That is Airana’s reward. Get them on facet, then educate.
Tomorrow evening, August 8, he’ll launch his debut novel The Bone Tree on the Pātea Māori Membership. It’s his residence turf. He says, “Pātea has every thing you possibly can count on of a city with a median annual earnings of $19,000. However rising up we at all times felt protected, we have been allowed to roam and do the entire free-range factor. Everybody knew you and in the event you ever acquired into hassle somebody can be round to save lots of you or inform your dad and mom on you. I do know heaps who went to school from the world however many got here again, the world outdoors so alien to them.”
His household’s connection to the whenua right here stretches again till the waka: Aotea. Airana lives in New Plymouth and teaches at a secondary faculty, however his major connections are to South Taranaki – Ngāti Ruanui, Ngārauru, Ngāruahine.
It took him 5 years to put in writing The Bone Tree. Whereas the novel asks how we will greatest defend those we love, in a system which fails us, it strikes me that that is maybe the identical query Airana is trying to reply in his job as a instructor.
He says, “Most of what I do helps Y9 children navigate faculty – notably centered on college students and whānau who haven’t had a constructive studying expertise. Instructing is nice. Hanging out with the native children is nice. I wish to go right down to the native basketball court docket and meet up with the children there as properly. Once they see your automobile pull up, they’ll flood down to return and say hello and shake your hand or provide you with a hug.”
He estimates about 90% of the scholars he teaches do not know he is a author. Whereas writing is among the most intuitive issues Airana feels he does, he says he tries to get out of his personal method, tries to present a voice to these disengaging from methods that do not serve them. The novel has particular markers which signifies it’s set after the Eighties recession in Taranaki, which resulted within the mass Māori migration to the cities. The shut relationship between brothers Kauri and Black is entrance and centre, and their connection to residence, versus CYPS and racist cops and colonising landowners.
I first discovered about Airana and his writing on the Ronald Hugh Morrieson brief story awards in 2020. That evening, he took residence an award for his story “Pātea Swimming pools”, judged by Whiti Hereaka. I applauded as he acquired onstage to simply accept his money prize and simply hongied the South Taranaki mayor and the aged, well-intentioned Pākehā sponsors. With this easy motion, the area was reclaimed as ours. He had a confidence I each admired and lacked as a Māori author.
In an e-mail later he apologised for not introducing himself. “It was my first time at such an occasion, and I a lot want to look at from the sidelines.” I think Airana hasn’t spent a lot time there. Rising up, martial arts ran within the household. Airana and all his siblings have been nationwide martial arts champions throughout many disciplines – karate, Brazilian ju-jitsu, Tae Kwon Do, Kyokushin Karate and Olympic freestyle wrestling.
Mum and Dad have been their coaches. He’s the center little one of 5 kids, and all his siblings stay in Taranaki besides his oldest sister who lives in Tāmaki. “She’s a detective,” he informed me. “Coaching at the moment on serving to reo-speaking kids who’re victims of great crimes.”
I requested about his personal education. He says he stopped taking part. He remembers spending most of his time sitting outdoors within the hall, whereas the lecturers did the speaking on the entrance of the category. “They knew what they knew,” he says, and not using a hint of bitterness.
He credit his mum, Tracey Bourke, with getting him to highschool day by day, typically in his pyjamas, with a change of garments handed to him on the gate. And his paternal grandmother, Colleen Ngarewa, who was the varsity caretaker at Pātea Main Faculty. “She studied to turn out to be a instructor and went on to turn out to be the principal at that faculty.She’s a really, very highly effective determine in my life. She had a stroke earlier than I used to be born and has been soldiering on for over 27 years: half her physique is paralysed, however her mana wahine and her spirit are nonetheless alive.”
But it surely was his Aunty Nicola who introduced Ako Mātātapu to Airana’s consideration in his early twenties. “Moreover introducing me to some sensible thinkers, what it did was put me ready the place I used to be capable of serve others, the place I might stand within the locations of those that stood earlier than me and attempt to do issues otherwise. Or moderately, as I got here to understand, proceed the mission of Nan and Koko and Aunty Nicola, disrupting academic norms and bridging the hole between what’s and what’s wanted.”
He gained a masters in Instructional Management. “See a necessity, fill a necessity. It is our duty as Māori. When you’ve constructed a very sturdy connection together with your college students, when you’ve constructed a very sturdy understanding of their life expertise, then you can begin discovering your house in that story of their lives and begin connecting their studying to the story of their lives as properly.”
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As his koro has aged, Airana has begun taking over extra duties on the pae. “The large duty I really feel is sharing our tales and the historical past, notably the historical past of Te Pakakohi. I do know heaps of people that went to school from the world however many got here again, the world outdoors so alien to them.”
Current historical past is important, too. It has been over 40 years because the closure of the Pātea freezing works. The Ngarewa whānau immediately skilled the repercussions. He says, “Once they closed the entire city turned immediately unemployed. Due to this, Koko went off to coach in his forties to turn out to be a secondary instructor. His brother and lots of of his shut mates left to seek out work elsewhere.”
The closure of the freezing works wasn’t the primary time Pātea had suffered on account of selections made by the federal government. Within the time of Puanga, 154 years in the past in Taranaki, this iwi was virtually worn out by land confiscation and the imprisonment of its males throughout the New Zealand wars. Though Airana’s father, Darren Ngarewa, has been researching this historical past for over thirty years, it wasn’t till just lately that the story of Te Pakakohi was shared extra extensively. Whereas Airana has written about it, he credit his Dad with recording a lot of the rohe’s historical past. “Dad is out most weekends along with his drone documenting completely different websites and trying to find their unique names and the tales connected.”
A month in the past, a waka believed to be at the least 154 years outdated was found within the Pātea River. That was the final time this space was occupied by Māori. Airana was a part of the 50 individual restoration staff. After the conclusion of Tītokowaru’s marketing campaign towards the Crown in 1869, many members of Te Pakakohi, Ngāti Ruanui and Ngā Rauru took refuge at Kuranui Pā, an space that might solely be accessed by the river. Given the make and the proximity of the waka to the Pā, solely metres from one in all its banks, it appears possible that that is its origin, maybe left behind by these of Kuranui after their arrest.
When the waka was lifted from the financial institution, it was 154 years later to the day the lads, ladies and kids of Kuranui departed the papakāinga of their 17 waka.
I requested Airana if he grew up with te reo. “My koro reclaimed his reo as an grownup and taught my older siblings at Patea Excessive Faculty. By the point I used to be at Excessive Faculty he had left and so did not have the chance to study from him. Now, I simply go to every thing. Lessons thrice every week most weeks…have heaps in my life I can kōrero with. Then I am going to all of the kaupapa to have extra immersion time. These days I am additionally doing a good quantity of studying in te reo as properly.”
Lately, Airana was shortlisted for the Pikihuia Awards nonfiction and poetry award, writing in te reo. After I ask him about this he tells me he set a purpose for himself initially of this 12 months. “Extra time listening, extra time speaking, extra time immersed. That is been the important thing for me. I simply go from kaupapa to kaupapa.”
Earlier than the final Ronald Hugh Morrieson brief story awards, Airana emailed me to ask if I’d be attending the occasion, and if I used to be, might I settle for any awards on his behalf. He was unable to attend. “I’ve acquired kura reo,”‘ he stated. His priorities are clear.
He cleaned up on the awards, successful the open part of the brief story competitors with “A casket made from flax” and the open part of the poetry competitors with “Poi E Gained’t Break Your Coronary heart”. One other brief story “Ever Had Yoghurt”, was additionally extremely recommended. I messaged him to inform him the information: “Smashed it e hoa.” He replied. “Oh wow – are you for actual! That is out the gate. You might be an uber g for happening my behalf.”
A number of of his tales have been printed at ReadingRoom, and his work is included within the new anthology of brief fiction by Māori writers, Hiwa, edited by Paula Morris. He is turn out to be a grasp of the brief kind. Evaluating brief fiction to the 5 years of engaged on The Bone Tree, he says, “Brief tales are low danger. It is a run in comparison with a race. They allowed me to play and discover and be foolish. They did not should be life-changing or transformative. A few of my favorite tales are simply excuses for me to get low-cost laughs. I used to be requested to current to a gaggle of youngsters outdoors of mainstream schooling final week and it was a good time, the children cracking up at how ridiculous storytelling could be typically. From that day on, one of many boys will greet me each time we see one another with ‘Shut the fuck up and blow the whistle, Gary!’
“I do know at some stage it is simply an excuse for him to swear at or round an grownup, due to course it’s – such are the absurdities of language and norms – however I believe it speaks to the higher connection writing was capable of foster between us. Not as a author and witness, or a instructor and teenager, however as individuals.”
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The Bone Tree by Airana Ngarewa (Moa, $37.99) is accessible in bookstores nationwide, and shall be launched tomorrow evening (Tuesday, August 8) on the Pātea Māori Membership. ReadingRoom is devoting all week to protection of the creator and his e-book. Tomorrow: a day within the lifetime of his marae
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