Tangaroa
January 17th, 2020.
I am Māori and part Pasifika. Raised in a time and place where I could not see myself anywhere, which has, like many others, held years of pain and confusion.
Today I arrive, healing my story.
As I embrace all of my Māoritanga, I am still left wondering, who am I and which Island do I belong to?
Who are my people?
Where is my village?
I am here, I am ready, but I am lost.
I know nothing of my Pasifika heritage, yet if you see me, you cannot deny the blood that runs through my veins.
As I look for images of myself, in books, on television and on the streets, each day I wonder who I could be? With hair that curls, and skin that darkens from the rays of Tamanuiterā, I sit in the sand looking out at Te moana nui a Kiwa wondering…
I ask directly:
“Tangaroa, do you know who I am? How I got here? Where my people are? Can you take me to them and show me the way?”. I ask him every day, and still no answer.
For now, I let him cradle me in his arms. I think of him as my biological Father, for the one who made me, left me in the womb of my mother long before I arrived in this world of light.
As he holds me in all of my 36 years, he rocks me gently within his waves. His oriori subdue my fears, and I am reminded, with him, I am free. He is the keeper of my secrets, my whakaaro and more, here I am safe.
He shows me visions of how our people arrived here on many mighty waka. Voyagers.
Floating in my moemoeā, I touch my kauae and envision the mangōpare that revealed itself in my ink.
He kaitiaki ia.
“Kaua e mate wheke, mate ururoa”.
“Don’t die like an octopus, die like a hammerhead shark”.
Although the journey has been and still remains a long and arduous one, I continue on my way to find the other half of me. As I sit with this whakataukī, the words of our tūpuna remind me, don’t give up.
Soon I shall find her.
