Teenaa koutou, teenaa koutou, teenaa koutou katoa,
Ki te taha o tooku Papa he uri ahau ko Ngati Porou
Ki te taha o tooku Mama ko Nga Puhi raua ko Waikato ahau.
My name is Catherine Tamihere, and I have been blessed to be a part of the amazing Arts Faculty here at PHS for the past 4 years . I am very honoured to stand before you tonight, to talk you through some of the special things we have achieved here in Pukekohe. I really cant stress enough how special these things are as evidenced by the fact they have been recognised (not only) nationally but around the world.
So where did it all begin?
Our story begins when I was a student teacher at PHS in 2020, I noticed CLEAR divisions in my class room. To me this was odd as I have never experienced such an obvious divide in kids, one clearly defined along racial lines. On top of this I picked up on some not very nice attitudes in the town.
At the end of 2020 I happen to stumble across a book “No Maaori Allowed” for those who may not be aware, covers some of the darkest chapters of Pukekohe – I was deeply affected by the stories, my husband and I have two young tamariki and for this reason I felt an overwhelming sadness for these whanau who had to suffer through the loss of their own tamariki.
After reading the book and starting to learn more about the history of this place it started to shed some light on the attitudes I have experienced since moving into the community and started to explain some of the divisions in my classroom.
As I began to understand the dark history of Pukekohe I found myself wondering, surely it doesn’t have to be like this. What can we as teachers do to help? We started discussing it and as all good art teachers do, we came up with a vision. The vision was that our tamariki would grow up in a world without racism, but we had no idea how to get there, becasue there was no road map, we couldnt just pick up the phone and ring someone to see how to do it, because there wasnt anyone, as far as we were aware that was doing anything similar. We decided the best course of action was to just start and figure it out as we go.
I came across an event on Facebook, the Author of “No Maori Allowed” Robert Bartholomew was giving a talk at the Auckland City Library and my immediate reaction was to email him and ask him when he was going to do a talk in Pukekohe.
Robert got back to me and said he was so far unable to find a venue willing to host a talk, but he was super keen to come out and speak in Pukekohe if it could be arranged. My initial thought was – this could be the perfect development opportunity for teachers given they have to work with families who have been directly affcted and continue to be affected by this history. Unfortunately I was unable to arrange a talk for the teachers here at PHS due to the extreme reluctance of a select few former leaders to allow such a confronting subject to be discussed within the school, but I believed so strongly in the fact that this would be beneficial for alot of people – when you know better, you do better, so this was one of those moments where the action was why not go big, I decided to book the town hall and invite the whole community.
As word started getting out about Roberts talk, it evoked some very strong reactions from various parts of the community, some overwhlmingly positive but also a lot of aprehension. This resulted in alot of robust discussion on social media and in doing so massively raised the profile of the event as there were people from all over were commenting and adding their opinion. Given the profile that talk had now been given, it caught the attention of Corinna Hunizker, Reikura Kahi and Megan Jones of kindred films who reached out and asked if they film the talk as they thought this would be a great story to give more exposure.
On Thursday 24th of June Robert arrived in Pukekohe and was met by a large diverse crowd seated in the town hall as well as cameras and a request to be mic’d up, the latter of which he probaby wasnt expecting. We also had a suprise guest the then race relations comissioner Meng Foon who had heard about the talk and wanted to show his support for the kaupapa.
This was the first time the histories of injustice had been publicly acknowledged in this town in a public forum. The talk – and reaction to it, was dignified, respectful – even unifying.
The Sunday after the talk we had arranged a hikoi for harmony, where we marched up king street led by Matua Robert Nahi holding signs and singing waiataa. The purpose of the hiikoi was to come together to honour everyone who had been and still are affected by what had occurred, and to enjoy the company of like minded individuals who feel passionately about the future of our tamariki.
At the Hikoi, I was asked, ‘What’s next? How can we continue this Kaupapa? And the Mural Project was born.
The vision of the mural project is to dismantle the racism in our community by educating through art. The creation of beautiful public artworks that depict the ao Maori world-view where all things are connected and inter-related, can help us to heal as a community and further break the taboo that has hung over this town like a dark cloud. For only by acknowledging the past, can we move into the future.
These murals will be a constant reminder for those who sit in positions of power that we have a long way to go. They are here to help educate our children and community, so that when our kids are in charge, they know our history and they have a better understanding of partnership, participation and protection.
Our murals. ARE not just paint on a wall. They are toi Maaori and they reinforce to our tamariki that they belong to this world and to this community. Our tamariki are seeing themselves reflected in the world around them.
These murals are here to inspire all our kids – Māori AND Non Māori. Having our kids working on a mural means that together they learn about our history – the good, the bad and the ugly. The mural project specifically teaches them how to respond to this history through art, and to achieve this they have been mentored by some of the best Māori artists in Aotearoa. Through the mural project our Rangatahi get to visually transform public spaces, and our murals stand here as a reminder of what they have contributed too. On top of the physical impact the mural project has allowed our Rangatahi to have on the community, it gave them the opportunity to speak with others they wouldn’t normally speak to, and learn that they can be part of shaping this community into the place they want it to be.
The filming at the talk evolved into a full documentary based on Roberts book NMA.
As you may recall, I mentioned the recognition that we have received. The documentary “No Maori Allowed” has played on national television in America, Canada and Australia. It has also picked up the top awards at the film festivals in Tahiti, Hawaii, Timor Leste and our very own NZTV awards 2023 best documentary. The murals have been featured on an American TV show called House Hunters International where a couple from America were filmed in front of our murals.
On top of that our mural project won the Canon Oceania Grant – which meant money and gear for our kids!
This year our mural project was part of the huge Matariki Festival where two of our students – Fern Taiapa and Streme Clarke in partnership with mana whenua took the public on a mural tour.
Through every part of this process our rangatahi were involved by watching, learning, growing and having fun.
You might be wondering why the documentary did so well, it is because Pukekohe you are a successful story of how an indigenous peoples can work together towards healing for the generations to come. The issues we have been trying to address are not unique to Pukekohe. They are universal questions like How do you address difficult histories and how can you respond to it, how do you prepare the next generation so that they are equipped to lead us into a better future. Fundamentally we believe it is by knowing what happened yesterday, is how they will address today, it is how they will share the future. Like Maya Angelou said “do the best you can, until you know better, then when you know better you do better”.
Our kaupapa has always been about enhancing our mana, growing our spirit and always putting our kids at the centre of it all.
Throughout these 4 years there were epic challenges, but there was epic growth – for everyone involved. Some of the outcomes we have seen is a mana whenua led – subcommittee in Local board for the $700,000 redress of the unmarked graves of children who died during the very dark period in our history, an apology to the people of Pukekohe from Auckland City Council and the Govt in the works, and by me standing in front of you tonight an acknowledgment from our new school leadership of the importance of teaching this history. From the outside looking in, it might appear to be one massive chunk of work, but in reality it was just a series of small actions – a series of intentional acts that has transformed our school and our wider community.
Our rangatahi have taught me more in these last 4 years than I have learn ’t in my lifetime. They are thoughtful, curious, hardworking and they have radar for injustice. Many of these students are present here tonight and some will be picking up awards for the outstanding year they have had. I would like to think, at least in a very small way, what we have done over the last four years have helped to mould them into the fantastic people they are, and that if they chose too we know they are capable of changing the world.
So, that’s our story, it’s been a pretty crazy 4 years. So much has been achieved. However, I would like to make clear that while we have been able to achieve so much, a lot of our success comes off the back of the tireless work done by a number of people over a life time. I would just like to take this opportunity to make special mention of Materoa Kite, Tahana Waipouri, Janey Astell, Phyllis Bhana, Massey Hiku – to name just a few who not only lived through this time but have then gone on to fight for their people through educating, standing strong and never giving up.
One of our inspiring students - Rhen Pressnell who has played a central part of this kaupapa has put together tuumeke film for us…
It takes a community to change a community, so none of this would be possible without the support of some fantastic people who not only believe in the kaupapa, but most importantly are also willing to publicly stand alongside us. So on that note I would like express my personal, sincere gratitude to our kaumatua and kuia, those who have passed and those of who we are blessed to have with us guiding. Thank you to our community of leaders, teachers, mentors, whaanau and tamariki who believe we will be The most aroha town in Aotearoa.
I will leave you all with a quote from my great great Grandmother, a quote I believe in whole heartedly. “Take care of our children. Take care of what they hear. Take care of what they see. For how the children grow, so will the shape of Aotearoa.”
No reira,
Teenaa koutou, teenaa koutou, teenaa taatou katoa.