Journeying home

And so our week away has come to a close. The rest of our extended family are staying for a second week. While it was lovely to see so many of my family, especially some who are now living overseas, I am under no illusions that this was a relaxing break and am glad that we chose to be away for just one of the two weeks. There were many moments of frustration and sheer annoyance accompanied by the exhaustion that comes from very little sleep and being surrounded by so many people for such an intense period of time. However, the journey home came with a surreal sense of fulfillment; for one precious week I was able to leave behind the realities and perils of my life at home. Although physically and emotionally tired, I am feeling strangely content and somewhat recharged. I am looking forward to the new year with equal parts anticipation for what 2010 may bring and eagerness to leave behind 2009.

Our return journey also had its moment of comedy and unorthodoxy. As we were checking in, my cousin (who had promised to bring our luggage to the airport but predictably turned up after we had already arrived) asked if anyone wanted to take home a live crayfish that was on the back of his truck. If we didn't want it, he'd just give it away to someone else at the airport. My sweetie was not going to let an opportunity like this go and promptly ventured outside, armed with plastic bags and his carry-on bag. I think Air Chathams must be the only airline which does not raise an eyebrow to carrying live crayfish as carry-on luggage during a flight! This 3kg beauty was a welcome surprise for my sweetie's parents when we turned up at their place for an impromptu dinner tonight.

We said our goodbyes and filed onto the plane. Being last on meant there was no choice about where we sat (no allocated seating here!) but also revealed a slight problem: someone had miscounted and we were short one seat on the plane. Let me explain ... the plane seats a maximum of 50 people but has an expandable cargo hold. On our flight down, there were 18 seats and lots more space for cargo; our return flight needed 28 seats but ended up with 27 which could be occupied and the 'shotgun' seat, usually reserved for a small person or a child. A bit of shuffling around meant that a seat was found for my mother, and we were off! Well, after more rearranging was done once it was realised that my nephew was sitting in an exit aisle - both his parents were in one each. So guess who ended up sitting in the seat with no window in what is usually the cargo hold? Yep, that's what aunties are for, lol.

As we finally took off, I couldn't help but wonder when or if I will return to Wharekauri. Each trip after my grandparents' funerals has been an absolute bonus; there are no guarantees of future trips.

I feel I have well and truly achieved an ongoing goal on this trip: #69 - Take meaningful photos of my local area. In addition to my Project 365, and whatever photos I take in the future, I am really pleased to have built up a cache of memories from my father's family homeland.

Town and around

In November, the women in our family were challenged to a netball game by the Chatham Island netball team. The men were also asked if they wanted to take part in a mixed team challenge; the golfers had other plans, so the invitation was duly declined. A women's team was assembled and a training programme scheduled; this was readjusted several times during Christmas week, as no-one was keen to go running or practise after a huge meal or early in the morning! A team uniform was improvised: green t-shirts and hair ribbons. The big day arrived.

From the start, the odds were somewhat unfairly stacked; our team boasted a junior Silver Fern/Pulse player, a netball coach/PE teacher, several regular social netballers, and some school representatives. The team composition changed each quarter, eventually ending up with a D-strength team who comfortably won with a score of 31-24, and the star players barely breaking a sweat!

Adjacent to the netball court is the memorial garden, where families can arrange to have small memorials set among the plants. The garden itself needs a lot of maintenance, but it was nice to see a tiny plaque in remembrance of my grandparents. We also found the elusive millennium plaque; it was actually one of two braziers lit at the turn of the century. The designs on the side are based on ancient Moriori carvings.

We headed into town for the first day that the shop was open after Christmas. Yes, the shop (singular, not plural); Waitangi Store is as far as shopping goes!

Freight to the Chatham Islands is incredibly expensive. For this reason, we ordered in as much food before our arrival and also each surrendered 5kg of our luggage allowance to be able to pack fresh food, fruit, and vegetables. The Wellington crew were collectively 5kg overweight (a miracle, really!), but the Aucklanders ended up having to pay $240 in excess weight to the airline. Take a look at some of the prices below; you'll see why it was so important for us to bring as much as could with us.

To put things into perspective, strawberries in Wellington currently cost $2.50-$3 per punnet, compared to $6 in Waitangi; 2l of milk is about $4 at home, but $8 there; colby and mild cheese is between $6-9 here, and $14.90 there; a kilogram of carrots could cost $2 here but $8 there. It pays to be prepared and order in bulk well in advance, where possible.

As my sister-in-law's family were not present at her wedding on Boxing Day, she was keen to send her parents and 6-year-old nephew a postcard from the place where she got married. The postcards would actually fly to Wellington on the same plane as us the next day, but we were hoping that the postmark would read Waitangi or Chatham Island. My sweetie's mother always sends up postcards from the various overseas destinations his parents visit; however, her handwriting is usually barely legible, with only occasional words standing out clearly - we put the rest together using our knowledge of the context she is in and tease her about it mercilessly. (Thankfully, being a teacher for many years has helped in the deciphering process!) So, we were keen to repay the favour by sending a messy postcard with only every few words written clearly. However, when we came to carry out the task, I couldn't help but write neatly and figured we could get her back in another way. ;-) This also led to the completion of a 101 in 1001 goal (albeit a joint one): #68 - Send a postcard in the mail.

As our holiday was due to draw to a close, we wanted to take a set of whanau photos featuring each of the seven families descending from our grandparents, including aunties, uncles, cousins, great-grandchildren, etc. When 60+ people are involved, aged from 2 months to 70+, this is no simple mission, especially when we are almost all related! The only other occasions we have photos of us all together are from 1982 (we still look cute!) and at my grandparents' 60th wedding anniversary in 1998. Hopefully we will be able to salvage something memorable out of the mayhem that emerged during the early evening photo session!

Big day out

Today was the first whanau big day out. We headed east to explore the side of the island that is the first part of the world to see the sun. We stopped off first at Kopinga Marae, the recently built Moriori marae at the top of a hill overlooking several small lakes and farmland. I had visited the marae while it was still being constructed in 2003 and it was great to be able to see it in its final state. Photographs of the marae's interior, or exterior featuring carvings or artwork, are strictly prohibited. However, the view from the far side of the meeting house is quite spectacular and free for all to enjoy. My sweetie took this panoramic photo.

Ten years ago, the new millennium was about to dawn. The Chatham Islands are 45 minutes ahead of mainland New Zealand, making them the first inhabited location to see the sunrise each day. Although Pitt Island is technically further east, the celebrations were held on the east coast of Chatham, which hosted a raft of television crews and visitors who trekked over a few kilometres of farmland to find the right spot. Our convoy of six 4WD vehicles bobbed up and down as we climbed higher and higher; my 22-month-old nephew loved all the bumps! We inadvertently took a wrong gate somewhere along the way. However, the first place we stopped gave us a distant view of Pitt Island, as well as the lovely different colours lapping the cliffs on the sea below us.

We found the correct gate and proceeded another couple of kilometres up the hill before getting out to walk the final distance across more farmland. Some of our family were at the millennium celebrations ten years ago, but couldn't accurately recall the exact spot where they took place. We were looking for a memorial plaque to confirm the location; we couldn't find it, and later were told that it had been shifted into the memorial garden at Waitangi (town). Once again, the view was beautiful and the walk made us feel virtuous after so much indulgence over Christmas. This is a view of the three rocks known as The Pinnacles:

Once we hit the main road again, we drove out further east towards Manukau to visit the memorial statue of Tommy Solomon, the last-known full-blooded Moriori who died in 1933. The statue is a much slimmer representation of his full girth. His coffin was made by my great-uncle and his grave dug by my great-grandfather.

Owenga is a small settlement near the east coast of Chatham Island. Its wharf was recently rebuilt and is mainly use as an alternative fishing port to Waitangi. Today, the water was uncharacteristically clear and calm. Several years ago, my uncle's fishing boat was lost in this very area in a freak storm; it's hard to imagine on such a beautiful day like this.

As we walked down to the end the wharf, we came across some locals who were fishing off the edge with hand lines. They caught a conger eel, which apparently is too bony to eat so would be used as crayfish bait. Next to the eel is a blue cod they had caught earlier, also by hand.

Slightly along from Owenga and heading back towards town is Shelly Beach, so named because it is where thousands of sea shells wash up from the sea. Last time I was there I collected several orange-coloured scallop shells, large paua pieces, and pink mussel shells, most of which have done the rounds of several friends' classrooms since then. I absolutely love natural paua (unpolished, and not the vivid blues and greens used for tacky souvenirs) and have a range of paua jewellery pieces and shells. This time, I gathered some cream-coloured queen paua shells to bring back and add to my collection.

A day at the races

There is some beautiful scenery on the Chatham Islands that I wanted my sweetie and sister-in-law to explore and my brother and I to revisit. A natural attraction heading out towards the western side of Chatham Island is the area of volcanic rock known comprising of basalt columns. The columns are a curious sight; each column stands individually yet gently touches the one next to it. They are accessed off-road via private farm land. Over the years, erosion has diminished their height and stature, but the columns are still a remarkable sight to see and unusual for this part of the world.

27 and 31 December are also race days on the Chatham Islands. More than a dozen races (gallops and trotting) are run, each with 3-5 entries. Held at the racecourse just opposite my family's land (and on land which is partly owned by us), race day is one of the highlights of the Chatham Island social calendar, where everyone goes to catch up with others and have a day in the sun. It's also a day for food and drink; my sweetie tried smoked eel for the first time, along with pipi and, later in the day, inanga. Here is a photo of the grandstand, although most cars drive into the centre of the racecourse and set up there for the day.

Various sweepstakes are operated and moderate betting takes place on each event. My sweetie and I are terrible gamblers. (We set ourselves a limit of $20 each and one hour at a casino on the Gold Coast last year, and left after 15 minutes, having spent just $1 between us!) Still, he was keen to have a punt on a local horse and blindly splashed out a big $3 on horse #3 in the last race. It might have been a better idea to have a look at the horses and jockeys in the holding pen before committing such a big investment to the cause; Wild Eye was the smallest horse on the field and sporting the largest rider. We should have been suspicious when the other two horses emerged to take their place at the starting line with very little fuss, but Wild Eye was mostly jumping around sideways, which is pretty much what he did throughout the race! Here is Wild Eye, bringing up the rear by quite a substantial margin.

Boxing Day wedding

Boxing Day. A very big day for us, as my brother got married in the morning at the Chatham Island Court House. About a dozen of our family were there to witness the brief ceremony before heading to my cousin's home for a day of celebrating in the sun.

To start the day, my sister-in-law and 22-month-old nephew came up to the cousin's house where I was staying to get ready. The wedding dress had successfully made the journey from Wellington, the cake was looking good, but only parts of the bouquet remained; the white gerberas survived, the roses had to be culled.

Fitting in perfectly with the Chathams' laid-back ways, we were casually getting ready for the wedding when my sweetie called out that a weka had come into the house. Where else but on the Chatham Islands would this happen? These cheeky birds are protected on the mainland of New Zealand, but are actually a pest on the Chathams and, therefore, are allowed to be eaten. We watched this one playing around on the deck and running under the trampoline before heading back inside to continue getting ready.

The ceremony itself was incredibly brief; we managed to video all of it in around ten minutes. Apparently the only formalities required in order to get married in New Zealand, apart from applying for a marriage license more than three days before the ceremony, consist of a declaration of two sentences stating that the couple know of no impediments to their being married and calling upon those present to witness the marriage. And so I became an official witness to a marriage for the first time, proudly signing my name on the dotted line.

The roads on the Chathams are mostly gravel, some covered in lime, and very few are sealed with tar. Clean vehicles are a rare sight; even the newest cars or machinery are quickly coated in thick layers of dirt. My sweetie took this opportunity to write a message on the back of our family vehicle soon after the wedding ceremony:

The only problem is that it was us who were mostly out and about driving in the vehicle, and not the newly-married couple. I was looking around for a cloth to wipe off the incriminating writing later on when my cousin insisted we leave it; she thought it was hilarious, and apparently this is what gets rumours started!

The reception was a casual, all-day affair at my cousin's historical home, Nairn House. Built in 1882, it is one of the oldest on the island and they have done a beautiful job of restoring it in recent years. My sweetie took this panoramic photo from the garden, where we had a barbeque lunch and enjoyed a day simply relaxing in the sun. People came and went while the children played alongside the house, then went swimming in the adjacent river.

In a year's time, my brother and sister-in-law are hoping to throw a wedding party in Wellington and this time invite their friends, including some from overseas, along with my sister-in-law's family from Finland. For our family, this was the perfect way for them to get married without any of accompanying 'fuss' and mayhem that we see all too often and weddings.

Christmas at Wharekauri

Christmas morning delivered a sunny, calm day. Our Christmas celebrations, however, were anything but calm. When you put 50+ family members, including 14 very excited under-9s, in one big room ... well, you can probably imagine the noise. The gift giving was organised with military precision, with the children being told which presents they could open and when; there are definitely too many teachers in this family and this kind of 'organising' makes me glad to have left the profession a couple of years ago! We had hung the personalised Christmas baubles we'd made on the tree the night before, to go with the piles of gifts each of the seven families were giving to the children. Our selection of baking for the aunts and uncles also went down a treat - I must remember that next year.

Christmas Day for us was also going to incorporate four family baptisms. Remembering where we were, there was no question that this ceremony was going to be as informal and unorthodox as the rest of the week's proceedings. However, I think even the minister was surprised at how little of the service he actually got to perform once the hysterical screams overpowered his words! We ended up just singing the remainder of the hymns and Christmas carols before going outside to pacify the last of the screaming babies.

 I have posted some more photos of the church here.

After church, we put the finishing touches on a huge Christmas meal. As always, food plays a big part in our family celebrations. We dined on crayfish, the flounder caught yesterday, ham, pork, and piles of vegetables. The dessert table was groaning with brandy snaps (carefully brought over as carry-on luggage), trifle, cheesecake, pavlova, steamed pudding with custard, and my cousin's gorgeous gingerbread house.

After lunch was the cousins' Secret Santa and a shortened version of the Yankee swap. A couple of presents were 'stolen'; some of the choices were questionable at best! I was happy to swap my beach towel of a common beer brand with my beer-brewer brother after the game and come away with a blow-up lilo and beach towel checkers set. Apparently it's a big joke for boutique micro-brewers to be sporting logos and memorabilia of big (opposition) commercial breweries!

We ended Christmas Day by chasing the low tide to collect pipi from a nearby beach. The last time I went pipiing was as a seven-year-old. I vividly remember standing on a pipi which closed up on the sole of my foot, pinching together the skin and giving me plenty to be upset about! This time, I was prepared with aqua socks, but we were a couple of hours behind the low-tide, meaning that only who were prepared to dig into the sand further into the water had any success. We city folk played in the cold water along the shoreline while the sun went down, watching about a dozen of our family members filling up four big buckets with their catch. Oh well, I suppose that it's being there that matters!

Christmas Eve

Anticipating the arrival of the rest of the whanau in the evening, Christmas Eve mostly become a day of preparation: food, bedding, Christmas decorations etc. We started out with a bit of tiki-touring around my grandparents' farm land to see how things had changed over the years and also to introduce my sweetie, sister-in-law, and nephew to the land. While out exploring some of the land that our family is set to inherit (once the Maori Land Court make up their mind - nearly nine years later, grrr!), my sweetie got an close up view while riding my cousin's 800cc four-wheel bike. The kids have smaller versions of the bikes and fearlessly race up and down the hills and dunes. So different to city life!

In the afternoon, a group went out to the lagoon to set flounder nets, ready to be retrieved early the next morning. An overcast day and the whitebait were hiding. Never mind; there was still plenty of crayfish left over from yesterday.

And the net result (overnight) of 12 flounder for a perfect Christmas breakfast:

Wharekauri

Several generations on my father's side of the family are from the Chatham Islands (Wharekauri). My father is one of seven siblings, and his mother was one of twelve, all of whom were born and bred on the Chathams. You don't need to do the maths to realise that this makes for a very big family. This year, about 40 of my cousins, aunties, uncles, and immediate family flew in to the Chathams from various locations around New Zealand, as well as Sydney, London, and Canada, to celebrate a whanau reunion at Christmas. It was one of the rare occasions when all 18 of my first cousins were together, apart from at my grandparents' funerals in 1998 and 2001.

Having very limited internet access on the island has meant that I've prepared this series of blog posts offline and will progressively post them during the next week. Hopefully they will give you a glimpse into a whole new lifestyle, where everyday goings-on are both laid back and unorthodox, yet they are a part of who our family are. We took a few hundred photos, some of which I will share here, but the majority which I will keep offline as personal memories.

The Chatham Islands are a group of 10 islands approximately 800km east of Christchurch. The aging Air Chathams planes fly daily to either Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch, or Napier. Our flight from Wellington to Chatham Island took 1 hour 45 minutes, an average flight time between the two airports. Of the 18 passengers on board, 16 were directly related to us and our whanau reunion. As with everything on the Chathams, many aspects of the flight were unorthodox, including one of my cousins having to retrieve her stray netball from the runway before departure. We were also preparing for my brother's wedding while we were away, and our carry-on luggage included a wedding cake, wedding bouquet, and my sister-in-law's wedding dress. Just before takeoff, the air hostess grabbed her camera, excited to see a wedding dressing hanging up in the cargo hold before! Check out how small the runway on Chatham Island is - luckily the pilot knows where to look!

We stopped off at the urupa (cemetery) to visit our grandparents' grave on the way from the airport to the marae where everybody was staying. The last time I had visited the island, along with most of my extended whanau, was for the unveiling of their headstone in April 2003. The perimeter of their double grave is inlaid with beautiful paua shell fragments and it was lovely to spend a few moments there with everybody. Oh, we also had some curious onlookers observing us from the adjacent farm:

Chatham Island is small, with nothing more than an hour or two's drive away. Waitangi is referred to as town; it takes all of a minute to look around. However, it houses all of the essentials. My sweetie found this sign really funny: where else would you see a bottle store, Catholic church and hospital all given equal billing? Our panoramic photos of the bay and wharf didn't quite stitch together correctly. I'll see what we can do with them in Photoshop.

Our first night on the island saw us cooking dinner for about 25 people. One of my cousins had been out catching crayfish in the morning and we enjoyed the first of many fresh seafood feasts, accompanied by my aunt's famous Chatham Island doughnuts. Here is a small sample of our dinner. The crays in the bucket are draining after being boiled in a big pot on an outdoor gas ring, and the second picture shows one being cut open, ready for eating.

Day One drew to a close, having seen the arrival of 16 of us from Wellington and anticipating the influx of 16 more from Auckland the next day. It was exciting to be back at my family's homeland, and also to introduce my sweetie to Wharekauri, but I was under no illusion that this was going to be a relaxing holiday.