Powhiri

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Today Henderson South had a Powhiri for all of the new students, teachers, and the BYU students. A Powhiri is a Maori welcoming ceremony that is conducted to welcome the visitors/ new people to their school or land. The ceremony starts with a call where some of the women of the land, in our case three of the older girls at the school, call the new people into the hall in Maori. A welcoming speech is then given in Maori, which Mr S our deputy principal gave to welcome all of us into the school and as people of New Zealand rather than as visitors of New Zealand. The children then sang a beautiful waiata or song. The children sang so beautifully.

Dr. Jacobs then gave a speech in Maori and English and offered a gift to the school thanking them for letting us come to teach and for hosting the Powhiri. He gave the school a Navajo sand painting that was gorgeous and shares a similar story to the Maori creation story. After Dr Jacobs gave his speech, we (the BYU girls) stood up around Dr. Jacobs and sang Te Aroha (a maori song we learned for the occasion). It went so well; the students were so impressed with our singing that all of them gave us a paki paki (clap) which does not normally happen at Powhiris. Mr. Diamond our principal then gave a speech welcoming us into the school and thanking us for being there. The children then sang another waiata.

The formal Powhiri then ended and all of the teachers came around to the front to greet the new people with a hongi, which happens by shaking hands and touching nose to nose. It symbolizes a sharing of breath and shows that we are now a people of the same land. So after the Powhiri I am officially a member of Henderson South school and of New Zealand. It is such an amazing ceremony to be apart of and I felt the spirit and such love in the room during the ceremony.

I am so glad we had the Powhiri at my primary school instead of one of the others because I got to experience it with my kids and staff which means so much. The kids did so well during the Powhiri and the staff members made me feel so loved during the hongi and got so excited that I was not officially apart of their school. They just had huge smiles on their faces and gave me huge hugs during the hongi. It was so cool and such a blessing and experience that I will never forget to be apart of the Powhiri at Henderson South. And it is such a blessing to be in the beautiful country of New Zealand and teach at a school with such lovely children and staff. I love how they have a ceremony like that here and invite us to be people of the country just as they are.

After the Powhiri of all of the new children at the school got a biscuit and all of us went to have morning tea. There was heaps of good food for morning tea including keish, brownies which I have really missed since being in New Zealand, meat pie, bread, biscuits/ cookies, etc. It was all so good and I probably ate too much. My class did a story writing on the Powhiri afterwards.

I am doing so much teaching this week. I have taught reading, hand writing and maths everyday, some story writing, topic (health), swimming, etc. It is so fun and I love getting to teach so much. I am going to start swimming with the kids twice a week next week and teaching them, which I am pretty excited about and I have my first formal observation with Dr. Jacobs on Monday.  I hope it goes. well.