Ngāti Koraha perform kapa haka at Expo 2020. Photo / RNZ
By Ashleigh McCaull of RNZ
Aotearoa is not the only place celebrating and embracing te wiki o te reo Māori.
From podcasts, online classes, kapa haka and kōhanga reo in different countries, whānau living overseas are doing their best to keep the language thriving.
Grant Whitbourne, a descendant of Te Whanau-A-Apanui, was born in Australia and is the president of Te Ūkaipō Māori Club in Newcastle, New South Wales.
He has a Facebook page and podcast called “Starting in te reo Māori” where he has taught people across the globe for around five years.
He created it because it was important for him to help those living away from home connect with their culture.
“I definitely get a growing sense of cultural identity disconnect, especially from people that have moved to Australia in say the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s and then their kids and their grandkids now are coming through.
“Something I sort of regularly hear is parents and grandparents getting asked like ‘why didn’t you teach us about our culture, why didn’t you teach us where we’re from or our language?’”
Whitbourne said there was a lot of value for his listeners by sharing other stories of those also on their reo pathway.
“I really like the quote ‘you can’t be what you can’t see’ and for people to be able to see the journey of other people rather than just me telling them that they can go on that journey is rather valuable.
“So whenever I do get the chance I’ll interview people, talk about what their journey’s been like, where they started, how they’re travelling, where they got to, where they want to go to in the future and it helps to humanise the overall experience.”
Going further afield to Memphis, Tennessee, Amelia Butler runs a business called Learn Māori Abroad where anyone overseas can pick up the language.
She started her online classes five years ago and her first class had 10 students.
Now she had had to employ other kaiako and kaimahi to help with demand.
There are about five classes with 16 students in each of them. Her youngest student is 6 years old while the oldest so far is 80.
Amelia estimated hundreds of people had gone through her courses, and not just Māori or other New Zealanders.
“Some of our students have actually never been to Aotearoa and they don’t have a direct connection with Aotearoa.
“But they might just love the haka or the All Blacks or they really love Polynesian culture. And so it’s really interesting to see the diversity of our student bodies.”
She said her classes had created different communities across the world where her students met up in real life.
She hopes mahi happening overseas will be acknowledged more as the language continues to grow.
“This is actually a global movement, we don’t have to limit our thinking or our viewpoint to just Aotearoa.
“There are one in every five Māori living abroad and so just that kind of next step to acknowledge what’s happening globally, not just back home.”
Keeping it in the whānau, her sister Monique Lynch is also helping te reo flourish in Dubai with her kapa haka group Ngāti Koraha.
They recently performed in Sri Lanka to reopen the New Zealand embassy and did a haka in France at the Rugby World Cup.
Monique said being able to spread te reo and te ao Māori was a vital part of life for her in Dubai.
“It’s just real important for me to share what I’m about and share where I’m from because we have so many different nationalities and cultures over here.
“I’ve got friends from everywhere it seems now, and they’re sharing their food with you, they’re sharing their culture with you, of course you want to reciprocate that.”
She had not done kapa haka since she was 13, and over the last few years has learned how to do poi.
She also found passing down waiata and haka to tamariki uplifted her wairua, especially when they got to showcase it at Pacifica UAE.
“They love it. We had our kids’ group perform at the most recent one, they did Tūtira Mai and they did the haka which was awesome.
“It’s so great to see them just go hard out and get really into it and they love learning all the actions and kinda copying us and it’s just so great to see.”
Meanwhile, in London, tamariki at Ngāti Rānana’s Kōhanga reo are also being passed down te ao Māori values.
The kōhanga was established in 1997 because rōpū members at the time felt it was important for tamariki to have their own space.
Ngāti Rānana views te reo and te ao Māori as a taonga that is important to share from their tupuna to their babies.
Kōhanga chairperson Donna Scott said the language helped bring tamariki closer together.
“Many are aware from their own whānau, they’ve become cousins to one another, they’ve grown up together so those relationships are so important.
“The concepts we believe, we practise and then you see the manaaki that the whānau have for one another like there are the celebrations and the parties and all the events and the achievements, but also in sad occasions like tangihanga.”
The kohānga runs once a month and includes primary-aged children.
Here they learn waiata, pepeha, Māori concepts, emotions and storytime in te reo.
Many of the tamariki transition from the kohanga and into Ngāti Rānana’s Kapa Haka ropu or help out in different ways.
“Just to see that progress, yeah they did the CBeebies when they were little but my 17-year-old has just gone out to Leiden with kōhanga and is helping lead workshops in the museum over there.
“She was on te rākau but I heard back she was helping with the babies. We’re just so proud of them all.”
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