Waitangi Day

Dear Reader,

Out of all the things that I should be doing right now - sleeping, writing an essay, writing a different essay, researching for another essay - writing a blog post is low on the list.  Which is, of course, why it brings me great pleasure to do so; today's post will offer up a narrative of Waitangi Day here in NZ, celebrated on the 6th of February.

Waitangi Day is not quite like Independence Day in the US, but in some ways it has a similar feel.  It is a day off of work that people often don't truly appreciate the significance of, it is right smack in the middle of the NZ summer, and it is characterized by barbecues, outdoor concerts, beach parties, and apparently cruise ships - there were two of them docked in port today, and the poor fellows found much of Auckland closed for the holiday (which was presumably a rather bewildering discovery on a Wednesday).

The significance of Waitangi Day is that it was the day in 1840 on which Te Tiriti o Waitangi was signed by Maori chiefs and British representatives of the Crown.  I say Te Tiriti o Waitangi (written in Maori) and not The Treaty of Waitangi for two reasons: firstly, Te Tiriti was originally written and signed in Maori, and secondly, The Treaty of Waitangi, the English "version" of Te Tiriti, is in fact a bastardized version of the original document and bears little resemblance to it, nor is it recognized as valid under international law.  Details...(said with heavy sarcasm)...we'll deal with these another time...

On this important national holiday, I decided to make my way to the Waitangi Day Festival at Bastion Point. Bastion Point is east of Auckland between the aquarium and Mission Bay (cute little newly upscale beach town).  Deciding that we wanted to get to the festival early to stake out a good seating site for the concert, myself and three friends arrived at Bastion Point at about 9:45am, and spent a bit wandering around the various shops and food stands set up around the main concert stage, and also took a look at the wharenui (the main building on a marae; for sleeping).  Bastion Point is technically a part of the marae of Ngati Whatua, the iwi (meaning tribe/nation) that used to live in and around Auckland, and the Point is the site of a historic confrontation between the NZ government and the Ngati Whatua culminating in a protest march at the Point in 1978.

After wandering around a bit, and eating a few freshly made mini doughnuts, we wandered down the hill a little to the official entry for the concert area and proceeded to set out our beach towels and do some relaxing in the sun as the first set began to play.  The sun on my face, my giant floppy beach-mom hat, the reggae music playing from the stage, and the friends I was surrounded by made me wonder if I could be living in any more an idyllic moment (the answer was no) and made me forget all about the snowy cold winter that is blasting the States at the moment.

By the time all was said and done, there were 16 Dartmouth students that attended the concert, spread out on a motley variety of beach towels and surrounded by sunscreen.  Some of us, myself included, danced to the music up near the stage for awhile, and got autographs from one of the musical groups.  I was there from 9:45am to 4:15pm, and would have stayed longer if time had allowed.  Food highlights of the day included  the aforementioned doughnuts, chicken kebab wraps and shaved ice type drinks, and the musical highlight for me, at least, was listening, dancing, and singing along to the group 1814's set.  They were amazing!  I've posted some of their song lyrics below and a link to one of their videos.

A fantastic day, in sum.

Next up for blog posts will be: a recap of my day on Waiheke Island, the Bay of Islands trip, and moving in with my AMAZING host family!

Cheers from NZ (prnounced "en-zed" here)
Maggie



1814 Songs

http://www.myspace.com/1814official/music/songs

The link above is a link to some of their top songs - listen and enjoy!

And here is their website: http://www.1814.co.nz/index.html