Waitangi Day 2005: Smiles, music, plenty of kai make day

A waka crew head out to practice. Picture / Dean Purcell

5am, Treaty Grounds

The air is muggy and the sky lightening to a leaden grey. Inside the sweltering meeting house (whare runanga) about 200 people listen to sermons.

Outside, several hundred more stand in the dark, among them Christchurch aluminium joiner Murray Clifford and his mate George Neale, a dairy farm worker.

"I feel a bit of a foreigner here, there's all those suits," says Mr Neale - he means the politicians' bodyguards, and the large Destiny Church contingent, all wearing trademark black.

The 30-something pair have been staying in nearby Kerikeri while on a "beer drinking and fishing" holiday, and are making their first Waitangi visit.

"You hear a lot about Waitangi," says Mr Neale, "and the sensational bits and mud-slinging. But it's actually very peaceful."

9.15am, Te Tii Beach

It's raining, easterlies are whipping up waves and goose bumps, and the whole day's waka activities have been canned. Among the disappointed are Auckland art teacher Jonnna Duder, 35, and her daughter Cedef , 8.

Even so, being at Waitangi "means to get an alternative view of what you see in the paper", says Ms Duder, who is staying at the local campground. "And I want to show Cedef - on Friday at her school they did a day's study of Waitangi Day."

10.20am, Canoe house

Vi and George Milne, of Aberdeen, Scotland, are waiting for the start of the church service - Destiny and Ratana churches are to take part, among others - and are hoping to hear some singing. Kiwis for five years in the 1960s, the Milnes, a retired couple in their 60s, are back on holiday.

They scoff good-naturedly telling of an Auckland friend who, upon hearing their plans, said it would be "dreadful". "Everyone here is smiling back at you."

11.50am: Treaty Grounds

A hikoi of some several hundred people from the Hauraki region is arriving, climbing the hill to the flagstaff; they are silent save for a man, carrying a small child on his shoulders, who periodically blows a conch shell. A phalanx of police arrive first, at a jog, and surround the flagpole, shoulder to shoulder, faces set. A german shepherd police dog drags its handler inside the cordon. The hikoi stops at the cordon and its leaders eyeball the officers. Bystanders, feeling no threat, drift over.

Two teenage boys, arms crossed and faces amused, provide commentary: "That dog's amping, eh!" says one. Replies his mate: "There are a lot more people this year. Heaps! Shall we run in now?" They don't move.

Noon, Treaty Grounds

The frigate Te Mana lets off a 21-gun salute, something that has been absent from Waitangi for some years.

The marchers at the back of the hikoi turn around and cheer at each boom and the flash from the frigate's guns. Then they turn back to eyeballing the police. Bystanders drift away.

Ryozo Iida and his daughter Mei shelter from intermittent rain under a tree. Ms Iida, 21, who has just arrived in New Zealand, is surprised to see her peers marching: "In Japan people of my age just don't do that."

Not long after the Ratana brass band does a turn on the Treaty Grounds another hikoi, this one from Te Tii marae, arrives, singing, and stops in front of the whare runanga. Maori Party election candidate Hone Harawira, when he speaks, urges his people to give up smoking and drinking.

1.15pm Canoe house

The Navy band is playing a range of numbers.

The Navy's kapa haka group follows. Among the watchers are retired Kaipara friends Georgina Tahere and Kahu Tapiata, who started their day at the dawn karakia.

"They are just so professional," says Ms Tapiata, who has attended nine consecutive Waitangi Days.

But she thinks this year's Waitangi Day has somehow had a stronger wairua (spirit): maybe it's "from the top", she says; maybe it's because the Ratana church is present; or maybe, she suggests, it's because there was a "wairua input" by her ancestors on the day they signed the Treaty of Waitangi.

2pm, sports ground

Whangarei community health worker Atarangi Kask, 42, is busy ladling out free meals of cooked mussels, kina and scallops to the hungry, cooked on gas rings sitting on the back of a trailer. It's a chance to get healthy kai into people and hand out health advice on the way.

Earlier in the day, the chirpy Ms Kask, an aerobics instructor for 25 years, had led an aerobics class from the deck of a truck.

2.30pm, Te Tii Marae kitchen

Marae treasurer Leanne Tamou, 39, is overseeing lunch for the 500 people staying in the tent city next door: roast lamb, chicken and beef, roast vegetables, salads and steamed pudding.

"Well, actually, it could be any number of people and we have to feed them," she says.

She remains remarkably unruffled by the heat, the prospect of extra mouths (and the effects of sleep deprivation - she and volunteers have been cooking continuously since Wednesday).

"People bring donations," she says, "but not much."

5.30pm, flag-lowering

In crisp white uniforms, the Navy band plays, drummers drum, and the four flags traditionally on the flagpole on February 6 are ceremonially lowered and folded.

Waitangi National Trust staff are happy, despite the erratic weather; hand-held clickers have recorded more than 20,000 visits to the site on New Zealand's national day, a record.