Witi Ihimaera - Bulibasha

‘You may tell the pastor,’ Grandfather said, ‘that the Mahana family would be pleased to support such work. Kua pai?’

‘Kua pai.’

Oh that was just great. Now twenty per cent of Dad’s earnings was going to the church.

‘Let our light,’ Grandfather began, ‘so shine before men that they may see our good works and glorify the Lord our God who is in Heaven.’

Blah blah bloody blah. My thoughts weren’t complimentary. I looked upward. My father and our family had just been shat on from Heaven.

‘So what are we going to do?’ Dad asked Mum. They were whispering in the dark on the other side of the bedroom wall.

‘We’ll manage,’ she said. ‘We always manage.’

‘I think we can last out till August,’ Dad said. ‘Money will be tight from then though.’

‘There’ll be seasonal work,’ Mum said. ‘Perhaps we can pick up some scrubcutting. If we have to, we can always ask Miss Zelda for more credit —’

‘Only if we have to.’

‘We’ll cross that bridge when the time comes,’ Mum said.

That night I dreamed my mother was standing on a stage in front of an audience of a thousand people. She looked like Edgar Bergen’s dummy, opening and closing her mouth without being able to say a word.

‘Please Miss Zelda please Miss Zelda please —’

Next morning I was angry enough to confront Grandfather Tamihana.

‘I disagree with your decision,’ I said. ‘You should not have committed more of our income to the church.’

He was amused. ‘Why didn’t you say so at our meeting?’

‘I will next time,’ I answered. ‘What you have done is make things more difficult for all of the family.’

‘The church comes first.’

‘Charity begins at home,’ I hit back.

‘Don’t you start quoting my Bible back at me, Himiona.’

The words stung the air between us.

As if that wasn’t enough, my physical development was bringing me into conflict with grandfather too. I was starting to sprout in all directions and, yay, was now at eye level to the mirror in the bathroom.

‘That boy of yours,’ Grandfather said one day to Dad at dinner, ‘is eating us out of house and home.’

‘Didn’t you tell me once,’ I responded, ‘that I should eat what was put before me?’

My father nudged me. ‘Don’t be disrespectful to your grandfather,’ he said.

Growing up was having its positive side, though. Even Mohi The Turd Who Walks was treating me with guarded respect, and girls were starting to look at me.

‘It’s your tight pants,’ Haromi said. ‘Aunt Huria should buy you some new ones. They’re managing to cover everything, but only just.’

I blushed. Haromi, Andrew and I were at our usual place, waiting at the bus stop, doing our usual thing — slinging off at the family. I knew she was right but couldn’t bear the thought of having Mum spend our hard-pressed cash on new clothes.

To change the subject I asked, ‘Did Aunt Ruth ever tell you guys about how our grandparents met?’

‘That old story about the lightning rod of God?’ Andrew asked. ‘Sure.’

‘Huh,’ Haromi said. ‘I’m not going to be struck by no lightning rod of God or anything else. Any storm cloud comes along, or even any hint of a clap of thunder, I’m out of here.’

‘I sometimes wonder whether they really loved one another or not,’ I said, ignoring her. There, I had admitted the possibility to myself.

‘Of course Grandmother and Bulibasha loved each other,’ Haromi said. ‘Look at all the kids they had!’

Oh really? As if having fourteen children was the ultimate proof of love.

Haromi turned tragedienne. ‘Please, God,’ she screamed to the world, ‘save me from having too many kids crying at one end and shitting at the other! I’m too beautiful to have my body ruined and to end up looking like, Jesus ber-loody ker-rist, my mother!’ She threw a hail of pebbles at the little kids playing hopscotch on the road. They looked up, bewildered.

Oh, just Haromi again.

In this dangerous mood I turned fifteen. That same April the annual Maori cultural competitions were held between haka teams from all over the district. The Mahana family had the first inkling of what was to come between us and the Poata family of Hukareka.

As in past years, the venue was the Gisborne Opera House, now long demolished, a two-storeyed building with upstairs and downstairs decorated in fabulous gold and red. In its heyday, at the turn of the century, the theatre hosted overseas opera and theatre companies which performed everything from Puccini and Verdi to Shakespeare and George Bernard Shaw. During the 1920s it became more versatile, even going so far as to become a boxing venue for the great Tom Heeney, a local boy, before he went to live in America. Gisborne was on the Williamson station circuit and one of its claims to fame was that J. C. Kerridge had opened the first of the great Kerridge-Odeon theatres in the town.

By the 1950s Gisborne Opera House was more a backwater venue. Although it still hosted first-class shows and the occasional visit of the New Zealand Players — valiantly dedicated to bringing culture to the provinces — it was more likely to feature local productions. Sometimes the Gisborne amateur dramatic company put on operettas and musicals like White Horse Inn or Rose Marie ; Gilbert and Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance, HMS Pinafore , and The Mikado were also occasionally dusted off. In August the annual amateur dramatic competitions took place, and singers, tap and ballet dancers and elocutionists trod the boards of the Opera House. Little did we know in the 1950s that a bright-eyed, ringlet-covered girl with a silver voice would follow an earlier East Coast Maori singer, Princess Te Rangi Pai, and turn from being ‘Tom and Mum’s daughter’ into Dame Kiri Te Kanawa.

The haka competition was tough. Twenty-five teams were in the open section. Last year Mahana had managed to win, receiving the glittering Ngata Cup and the Hine Materoa Shield in the process, pipping Waihirere and Hauiti at the post. Our job this year was to hold off all challengers.

So far so good. We had succeeded in getting through the first round and were now among the twelve semifinalists. Again our performance was impeccable. When the curtains opened, we were already grouped to give our traditional item, ‘Po Po’. After that, our programme was fluid, moving with professional ease through action song bracket, poi, haka and exit waiata. Most of the team comprised the Mahana and Whatu families: my aunts, mother and other female in-laws all in the front row, and the Whatu women and others from Waituhi in the second and third rows. Behind them were my uncles and father, led by Uncle Ruka, and in the fifth row were the younger men including Mohi, myself and Andrew. Pani had been dragooned into joining us.

After our performance we sat upstairs in the balcony with Grandfather Tamihana and Grandmother Ramona, other teams, supporters and spectators.

‘We’ve got it in the bag,’ Granduncle Pera said, shaking our hands.

Aunt Sarah, our tutor, and Uncle Ruka thought we had done well, and of course Mohi was receiving the usual pat from He With The Gammy Leg. The women were dressed in their headbands, bodices and piupiu; the men too were in piupiu, but wearing coats or jerseys over their chests. All of us were sweating, and our grease-applied moko were smeared.

Hukareka was the final team to perform. The lights dimmed. The plush red velvet curtains swished back.

Huh? The stage was empty. Normally haka teams were already onstage in their ranks, two or three rows of women in front and two rows of men at the back.

Then, from the side of the stage, a woman’s voice called out authoritatively in the karanga.