Tuesday 17 December 2019

Whiteness

It's something I've talked about previously. It's something I've discussed at great length with my lecturers and professors at Waikato University. It's something I've mentioned to other white-passing Māori friends/colleagues of mine too. 

Yet, it's still happening. 

My whiteness. 

My beautiful, olive skinned complexion. 

My whakapapa running through my veins. 

My feet resting firmly on the shoulders of my tupuna. 

I'm lifted up. 

But yet, it's somehow not enough. 

I know my ancestors would be proud of me, how far I've come. 

How I recognise all aspects of my whakapapa. 

How I travelled and pilgrammaged to Prague, Guernsey and waahi tapu throughout Te Rohe Potae in the past year. 

Yet, I was asked a question during my appraisal hui whether my struggles this year getting my leaders in my bi-lingual class, and therefore the rest of the students, to accept me, might have had something to do with my whiteness. 

But I know that not all of their teachers are "visibly Māori" as my appraiser put it. 

We've discussed this issue here on this blog at length. 

We've discussed my need at eight years old to do a haka on my grandfather's dinghi. 

I've shared and shared and shared the plethora of strategies I've used to belong in the classroom, to have success as Māori in the classroom but also and most importantly, to feel safe in the classroom. 

Because our learning spaces are not just for our students. They're our workspaces too. We need to feel safe in ourselves there too. 

Yes - I am white. My grandmother asked me last year whether I knew that. I looked at my skin and said, "Yes, I know I'm white. But I'm also French, Irish, Scottish, Czech, etc AND Māori too." 

At that time she had shared some frustration with the fact that I'd made a joke to my sister about there being a dead hawk in the freezer that she couldn't eat. That I'd be plucking it to use for my korowai sampler. Which I did. Under karakia and guidance and mentoring by my kairaranga last year. 

I've made so much change and development in my life to find belonging and understand who I am. 

I was brought up in a French whanau, who chose not to learn French. Who were and are quite happy with being all the good and all the bad parts of being a Pākehā New Zealander. 

They never appreciated or acknowledged I was Māori... until that one time Tainui owned the Warriors. Then, my Grandad shared my Māori-ness to some random stranger at a sporting shop in Matamata.

They came to my kapa haka performances. They also came to my netball and basketball games. I think they just loved me and watched me do whatever I was doing. 

They thought I was cute. Being one of the only 'white' kids in the roopu. Mum fought for me when a girl shoved me up against the wall in A block corridor at my high school and told me I was too white to do kapa haka. I tell people that I was the kaea. I'd like to think that my singing was that sweet. I don't know anymore whether that was the truth or a lie I've grown used to telling to make the story better. I tell people that she did this because she was from a gang family. That she would have been brought up a certain way, to not think much of me in the roopu. 

I wonder whether my whiteness was just too much for her. No matter that my whiteness hadn't been an issue since I was five and was in the roopu at primary school. My whiteness wasn't a problem when I performed in front of Te Ariki Dame Te Ataairangikaahu at Turangawaewae marae. Nor was it a problem when I became a Māori Mentor for the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at Waikato University. Because I belonged. 

From a young age I was taught the 'Pākehā way'. My Grandad caught eel, fish, whitebait, trout. He hunted for boars and stags. He shot many ducks and Canadian Geese. He was an inventor. He always had a green thumb and could grow nearly anything. He knew many names of the trees and brush in the bush. He had Māori friends. He taught me many of these skills. 

I learnt from a young age how to do Native American chanting. How to make medicine sticks. How to use sage to bless a house. How to use my naturally born wairua to impact on others. 

My mum thought this was okay. 

I do not. Learning an appreciation of another culture is great. Making it our own, is not. That's cultural appropriation.

I grew up, as my readers know, without my dad. I did however know my dad's mother, Mary who I now call Gran. My Gran sent me photos often of my beautifully multicoloured siblings who I didn't know. 

My Gran would share her whakapapa with me. She would share her stories with me. She would share her trauma with me too. Because it's important to share who we are, where we've been and where we will go to next. Who we might become. 

My Gran won't get to see this in person, but I know she's rooting for me. That she's supporting me, guiding me, being there for me. 

I know that she always wanted to go back to her grandmother's marae. Her marae. My marae. She insisted on waiting, for the right time. I have been assisted by my marae and trust board to get through University. I intend on going back there for wananga. I've invited my dad to come with me. He may choose not to. But I'm still going. Because it's my birthright. Because that's where our tupuna were born. That's where I will find our urupa filled with tupuna in our whanau. 

My grandfather Colin, was French. His father came to NZ when he was three years old. He was born in the Channel Islands. Grandad's grandfather Francois came to NZ with his brothers and father Jean Francois Le Long and mother Marie Nedellec. 

I know my whakapapa. 

I can quite happily recite strands of it back six or so generations. Some I can go back further. 

Maybe this new agitation is what was needed to build and stoke that fire within me once again. 

I don't need to prove to anyone who I am. 

I am me. 

I continue to learn, to appreciate, to grow. 

I once thought that my wings had been clipped. I don't think that any longer. But they were restrained. I needed that fighting spirit once more. 

Ngā mihi 🙌🏼


Sunday 15 December 2019

Last Goodbyes to S ❤️💔♥️

After a long, mostly intense and emotional year - I've finally said my last goodbyes to a young man who left us too early. But I guess, at the right time for him. 

The message below is one I shared with him and his whanau in their support group this afternoon. 

For those of you who know my story, my journey thus far - you'll know too that as teachers, the students we lose are the ones that break us the most. Losing S that day, in that moment, in the same year as Gran and other students - it was all just too much. S was truly a shining star. He deserves all the happiness always. Ngā mihi bub.

...

Hi bub. I've stayed too long in your whanau support group with you. I stayed too long because I wasn't ready to let you go just yet. You left our world when things weren't going so well for me either in my life. It didn't seem fair you leaving us and I felt guilty for not having done more, somehow to have kept you and other students that year here with us.

I'd seen you at kura maybe three or four weeks earlier and you'd came to see me and your other teachers to catchup and say hi - and bye too, I now know. You were happy and excited about your life. Things seemed to be going really well for you at the time, with work especially. You were bubbly again, smiling and incredibly happy in your own skin. I was really proud of you for the hard mahi it would have taken to get you to that happy place finally. 

I'm only sorry I didn't have time to have a proper conversation with you. You'd caught me on my walk across campus from one class to another. 

Reflecting back on that moment in time has held me stagnant for a long time. Because I wondered what else I could have done. How else might I have been able to help? Why didn't I see the signs? Those questions have been heavy ones to hold onto. I'm learning that I can't save everyone. That my job is simply to listen, support and be there when you kids needed it. I did that. But it still doesn't feel enough.

I guess because there is still more work to be done. Listening to Rob Mokaraka during his 'Shot Bro: Confessions of a Teenage Bullet' dramatic performance helped immensely as it drew all the broken pieces out into the light. His performance is one I suggest to everyone. To understand the depth of depression and potentially the warning signs. To recognise the good that is within and under all the pain. To speak up and often when things aren't going well or if we just need someone to talk to. 

I know your whanau are still healing, and always will be. Because kiddo you were a shining light in a lot of darkness. You brightened up our worlds, laughed at silly things and made us laugh with you. I know your classmates and the teachers who were blessed to have come into contact with you will always hold you in our hearts. 

I am beyond proud that I had the pleasure to have met you, to have taught you even for that small moment in time. 

Each time I see your brother at his work it makes me happy - because you live on in him, in all your brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews. 

You were a shining star. You left us too soon before we realised just how special the time we had already had with you was. 

I'll always be here for your whanau should they need someone to talk to. Walking with your sister on the Hope Walk was healing for both of us.

I know that you will be watching down on all of us, helping us heal and to appreciate and remember all the incredible moments we have before they're gone much too soon. 

Ngā mihi nunui ki a koe, bub. Kaua e wareware au i a koe. Moe mai atu ra.

Miss Le Long

Thursday 12 December 2019

Day 1 - Tauranga Digital Junior Camp - 10th-12th Dec

Day 1 - Digital Camp Tauranga 🙌🏼 Such an epic day so far. We had heaps of spare time this morning so we had lunch, checked out the mount, checked out my parking skills 🤦‍♀️ and checked out Tauriko Crossing before heading to The Cave (VR) and Jump at the Tauranga Entertainment Centre. Our van was easily the winners at lasertag!! Round two is Thursday. 

Massive kai, met our new music teacher for 2020 and kids are all knackered out and happy after today's antics. Great accommodation!! 🙌🏼 #OCdigitalcamp

New Library Books!!

Beyond stoked. Our new books for the library and the English dept turned up. 

'The Hate U Give' and 'On the Come Up' by Angie Thomas, 'He Kupu Tuku Iho' by Wharehuia Milroy and Timoti Karetu, and 'Telesa' by Lani Wendt Young. 

#OClibrary

Tuesday 3 December 2019

Ōpōtiki Birthing Unit March - 3rd Dec

Beyond proud of our rangatahi today. Thank you for coming with us on the march. 

#OpotikiMamasDeserveBetter #StopTheClosures #OpotikiBirthingUnit