‘I finally feel connected to my whanau’: Waitangi Day marked in Canterbury

Tuesday, 6 February 2024

Kāi Tahu waka, Kōtukumairangi arrives at Okains Bay for the Banks Peninsula settlement’s annual Waitangi Day commemorations.

Attending Waitangi commemorations in Canterbury’s Okains Bay was a meaningful and emotional day for Bradley Schwalger.

The 32-year-old and his wife Michaela Schwalger, on holiday in New Zealand from Vancouver, got up at 5am to drive two hours and 45 minutes from Geraldine to Okains Bay on Banks Peninsula to join in the settlement’s annual Waitangi Day commemorations on Tuesday.

The bay’s event is the largest and longest-running Waitangi commemoration in the South Island, and returned this year after a two-year hiatus.

Bradley Schwalger and Michaela Schwalger attend their first Waitangi Day event.

It was the first time Bradley Schwalger, whose father is Ngāi Tahu Wairewa in nearby Little River, had been able to attend “such a special and meaningful event”.

“I was born and grew up in Auckland, but I've moved to Canada since I was 20. My tribe is so close to this place (Okains Bay),” he said.

“Finally I feel connected to my tribe, my whānau and my history.”

The crowd is welcomed onto Ngāi Tahu Reserve with a pōwhiri.

Tears ran down his face during the pōwhiri, a traditional ceremony welcoming people onto a marae, on Ngāi Tahu Reserve, opposite Okains Bay Museum.

“It's very emotional. I finally have my whānau to sing the songs with, and talk about our land, water, greens and history,” Schwalger said.

Tuesday’s event drew in about 2000 people.

Quentin Phillips and grandson Uruao Phillips, 1, at Okains Bay.

It was a family tradition for Aaron Hāpuku and his tamariki - Kaahu, 11, Mere, 8, and Ngaakau, 4 - to attend every year.

'My tribe is Ngāti Kahungunu, along the east coast of North Island, but we live in Birdlings Flat for many years, and we’ve be been looked after well since,“ said Hāpuku, who performed as a Māori warrior at the pōwhiri.

The uplift of the hāngī at Okains Bay on Waitangi Day.

It was a good way to for his tamariki to “learn and remember our history, and look into the future”.

A hāngī lunch was one of the highlights of the day-long event for many.

Food from the hāngī is prepared for guests at Okains Bay.

“It's the first time we provide a hāngī feast for free. We have 500 tickets and [sold] out within an hour,” said Mihiata Ramsden, a Christchurch resident who has being doing hāngī with her brother, Mananui Ramsden, for many years.

They started the bonfire at 3am on Tuesday and put 500kg of food - 200kg of meat and 300kg of veges - into the hāngī pit at 8am, she said.

Children check out a waka at Okains Bay during Waitangi Day commemorations.

“I feel we have more people coming this year.”

Quentin Phillips (Te Waiariki, Ngāti Korora, Ngāti Takapari) said he had visited Okains Bay “quite a few times” many years ago. This year, he brought his family - including 1-year-old grandson Uruao - to the bay’s Waitangi event.

“It's good to be back. It is a long way to come here from Whangarei… But I always feel a big connection to the South Island. Our ancestors first came down here,” he said.

“We are here to celebrate Waitangi, to find our way to the future together. That's what the Treaty is about: partnership and good faith.”

Ngāi Tahu’s official Waitangi Day commemorations rotate year by year between the three locations where it signed Te Tiriti O Waitangi: Te Rau Aroha Marae at Awarua, Bluff; Otakou Marae, near Dunedin; and Ōnuku Marae on Banks Peninsula. This year it was hosted in Bluff.

Okains Bay is known for its historical connections to early European settlement and Māori culture.