Witi Ihimaera - Bulibasha

‘Hold on, son,’ Mum said.

Tyres squealing, we pushed the Buick back across the bridge with the De Soto.

‘You crazy bitch!’ Caesar Poata yelled.

Did I forget to tell you that my mother could not abide bad language? At the words, murder came into Mum’s eyes. She pressed the accelerator right to the floor. It was all Caesar could do to keep the Buick from boomeranging off one side of the bridge and on to the other.

At the other end of the bridge the waiting cars scattered. The Buick skewed off in a cloud of dust. I caught a glimpse of Saul and Tight Arse’s frightened faces as the car came to a halt. Wouldn’t you know it? Rupeni Poata was obviously enraged, but with his face in rictus he looked as if he was laughing his head off.

‘Don’t call me a bitch,’ Mum whispered to herself. She was so wonderful when she had her wild up.

‘That will teach Rupeni Poata to come onto the bridge when we’re on it,’ Grandfather muttered.

As if still recovering from her last car ride with Grandfather, my mother came on the school bus to Patutahi when she wanted to pay off some of our account at the general store.

‘Do you want me to come with you?’ I asked when the bus dropped us off.

‘No.’ She bit her lip. ‘You go on to school. Not long now before you break up, ne?’

‘Two whole weeks,’ I moaned. ‘Are you sure you don’t —’ I knew she was trying to change the subject.

‘Haere atu,’ she said.

I watched nervously as she hesitated, then walked up the steps and disappeared into the store.

‘Why, Mrs Mahana!’ I heard Miss Zelda say in her bright tinsel way. ‘Daisy? Scott? Mrs Mahana has come to visit.’

‘It’s so wonderful,’ Miss Daisy chimed in. ‘Since the shearing started, Zelda, all our Maori customers have been to see us.’

‘I don’t think we have one customer in the red any longer,’ Miss Zelda replied. ‘As I always say, Mrs Mahana, pay as much of your account now, because when that nasty winter comes —’

My mother didn’t say a word. I had a mental picture of her standing there, immobile, while the two sisters chattered to one another. She was a clockwork doll that had stopped working — an automaton with a silly smile on her face, mesmerised by what the sisters were saying, opening and closing her mouth but with no words coming out. I rushed inside. Sure enough, there she was, trying to talk, the perspiration beading her forehead, her cheeks crimson. I felt you only needed to give her a slight push and she would topple to the ground.

‘I–I — I —’

Miss Zelda and Miss Daisy were staring at Mum. ‘Isn’t that right, Mrs Mahana?’

‘Good morning, Miss Zelda,’ I said, breaking the spell.

Miss Zelda gave a cry. ‘Oh you startled us!’ she said.

Mum swayed. Blinked. Then recovered. ‘Yes, Miss Zelda,’ she said evenly. ‘That is right.’ She reached into her purse and passed the money that Dad had given her. Miss Zelda counted it.

‘My mother would like a receipt,’ I said.

Miss Zelda obliged.

‘Thank you.’

Mum and I walked out into the sunlight. She looked at me, pressed my shoulders and ran her fingers through my hair.

‘I wish you’d get your hair cut,’ she said. ‘Your grandfather is always talking about it.’

My mother sighed and began to walk back to Waituhi. I watched her reach the edge of the tar seal. She looked so lonely. A slight windstorm swirled around her, like a miniature tornado. She crossed over into dust country.

The day finally came when school was out for the year. We were out of jail . Andrew and I wrestled all the way to the bus. Even before Haromi had left the playground, she’d slashed her lips with lipstick.

‘When do we pack up to go to the shed?’ Glory asked Mum that night.

‘The shearing gangs come to collect us in the weekend,’ she said. ‘Once testimony-bearing is over, we’ll return to the sheds with them.’

Glory was getting into her costume for the tiny tots’ parade. It was the night of our school break-up ceremony and Glory was going as Little Bo Peep in a blue satin dress that had once been a blouse. On her head was a baby’s bonnet, and in her hands were a crook and a small felt lamb.

‘Don’t forget,’ I warned her as she twirled around, ‘when you sit down, hold your dress like so —’ I had made a hoop to go under her dress so that it would stand like a Regency ballgown. ‘Otherwise, your hoop will flip up and everybody will see your pants.’

‘We wouldn’t want that to happen,’ Mum said.

The tiny tots’ parade was first on the programme and, in the excitement, Glory forgot her instructions. Not only that, but whenever she bumped into anybody the hoop would slip backwards or forwards. Very soon all the little boys were bumping into Glory accidentally on purpose. When she eventually punched persistent Rawiri Jones on the nose, it was time for the hoop to come off.

Next was the school choir, conducted by a stern Miss Dalrymple. All the Maori parents in the audience winced as their daughters strained and screeched through ‘Cherry ripe, cherry ripe, riii-ippe I prrayee !’, enunciating in clipped plummy voices as if they were English broadcasters. That, however, wasn’t as bad as ‘In Dub-leen’s fairrr cit-eee, where the girrls are so prrre-tee —’

Ah, Miss Dalrymple. She had tried so hard with her elocution lessons and this was her one moment of triumph — her chance to reveal to the parents that every last Maori vowel and consonant had been knocked out of their girls. Or so she thought.

The end-of-year prizes were given out by Mr Johnston and required him to use both his hands. It was strange to see them so exposed rather than in his trousers. The certificates were read out in order, from the lower primer classes up. Every time a Pakeha got a certificate, there was a polite smattering of applause and compliments. When a Maori got one, the Maori parents copied Pakeha behaviour.

Clap, clap, clap of gloved hands. Oo, yaas, we ore ve-rry prr-ow dd , which translated meant, Pae kare, we thought our kid was a dumb cluck.

I was second in my class after Richard Jenkins, the red-haired son of the garage proprietor. When I went up to get my certificate, Andrew whispered, ‘Brainbox!’ Haromi was hiding in a corner, disassociating herself entirely from me and the whole prizegiving. Even in coming second, I was being embarrassing. Becoming more Pakeha and less Maori somehow, because being Maori meant being dumb, always coming last and not caring about it because everybody else was dumb or last too. Or, as Grandfather would say, becoming whakahihi. Too big for my boots. Not staying in my place.

I didn’t care. Miss Wallace had told me what my prize would be and I wanted it desperately. Another H. Rider Haggard novel, Allan Quartermain .

Nor did I care that only the women of the homestead were at the break-up — Grandmother, my three aunts, Mum and my sisters. There were very few men at all in the hall, and certainly not Grandfather Tamihana. He said that school prizegivings were like flower shows. Let the women attend; the men had better things to do. I didn’t mind. It was the active support of women — the showing up, standing up and eventually petitioning for changes in Maori language and culture — which would, in future, change all our lives.

Our father Joshua and the other shearers returned on the Saturday night before the first Sunday of the month. As usual, we were late for opening prayers at the homestead.

Sorry Bulibasha sorrysorrysorry.

Then we were off to church. On that day I realised the real reason why we all met beforehand. It was so that we would make a marvellous procession on our way from Waituhi and people could admire us for our godliness. Mind you, we were looking particularly impressive today, in keeping with the spirit of testimony-bearing, the monthly highlight of church life when the faithful bore their testimony to God and the church, and unburdened their guilt in the process.