Friday, September 4, 2015

When Whetu Calls: Taking Note.


http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11507595

I knew the call would come. The knock on the door.

ME: Good morning.
HE: Kia Ora, Bro.
ME: And what are we selling today?
HE: Me?
ME: You.
HE: Not me, Bro. I’se saving you stuff.
ME: Really?
HE: I’se saving you the stuff of having all that embarrassment stuff of offending my cultural identity…and stuff.
ME: And how am I doing that? And how are you going to do that?
HE: What?
ME: Save me the embarrassment of offending your cultural identity.
HE: I am going to take off your hands—free, like—all those $10.00 notes you got that got my Tauranga all over them.
ME: You mean taonga—treasure.
HE: Yeah, what you said.
ME: And why?
HE: Because it has got all that tukutuku design that you fellas don’t have permission to use from us fellas.
ME: So, you are from the Te Hau ki Turanga Trust then?
HE: The who?
ME The Te Hau ki Turanga Trust. The “fellas” who are saying that the Reserve Bank doesn’t have the right to use the tukutuku design panel on the new $10.00 note. That it infringes their cultural identity and that the wharenui in which the weaving patterns used on the note is owned by the Rongowhakaata Settlement Trust, which was confirmed in the Rongowhakaata Claims Settlement Act 2012.
HE: Yeah…what you said.
ME: I don’t have any.
HE: Any what?
ME: New $10.00 notes. They are not released until October.
HE: Oh.
ME: Yes, oh.
HE: No problem, Bro.
ME: No problem?
HE: No.
ME: No?
HE:We fellas in the Trust will trust you.
ME: I am delighted to hear it.
HE: A cheque’s okay.

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