When Tane sought to make peace with his brother Tangaroa he plucked off his eyebrows and threw them to his brother who didn't accept the offer but threw them back. They landed on the shore and to this day still protect the sand dunes from the sea.
In the middle of winter, just before the beads of Matariki make their first appearance in
the pre-dawn sky, a group of women can be seen hard at work on the sand dunes of
Rarawa beach, near Ngataki and north of Houhoura - north of just about everywhere in
New Zealand in fact.
They are pricking out pingao seedlings to be propagated in their nursery. It's one of four main natives used for weaving and is considered a taonga, a treasure and is the only natural fibre whose colour cannot be improved upon, a brilliant orange-gold that needs no further processing unlike black-edged flax which turns white when it's boiled. When the leaves are dried they will become tukutuku panels in the wharenui, or kete (bags), potae (hats) or whariki (mats) because the fibres are so strong.
This weaving group, this roopu, are all volunteers whose entire mission is to restore, preserve and utilise the coast of their area through educating local school children, through storytelling and by example. As Betsy Young explains, it began in 2000 when they received funding through the World Wildlife Fund and Far North Reap to begin their restoration programme.
"Our weaving group decided to grow our own pingao and we got five iwi to take part in it. The pingao acts as a stablilizer for the sand dunes and I see it as a companion for Spinafex and also as a place where dotterels can nest."
