Photo of the Week: Day of the Dead – Kāpiti and Coast Independent

There is some sadness as we remember our lost love ones, but it also a time of happiness as we are reunited. Mexican Ambassador, Her Excellency, Mrs Rosaura Leonora Rueda Gutierrez

Remembering the departed

By Roger Childs

This is a poignant time of the year for Mexicans, as they remember those who have passed on.

There are two days of remembrance:

~ November 1: a day when departed children’s souls return to Earth.

~ November 2: when the adults who have passed away return.

Many traditions accompany the commemorations, such as

having elegantly dressed skeletons with distinctive expressions (See below)
surrounding them with marigolds and lighted candles
having special bread and drinking hot chocolate.

Day of the Dead display at the Mexican Embassy in Wellington

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STORY OF THE WEEK

Kāpiti Coast councillors have toured of one of Aotearoa's unique buildings, the heritage - listed Rotunda at the former Otaki Health Camp, the country’s first.

Jeremy Smith reports that the 105-year-old, eight-sided rotunda predates the Health Camp.

It wasn't actually built in Otaki, but was one of two built in Rotorua in 1915 as part of a military hospital, on the site of Rotorua’s present public hospital.

Later they were taken to Otaki for the opening of the health camp in 1931.

Full story in the main column (December 19).

100 Years Ago — and the Maori Long March begins

Māori politics was dominated by the influential MPs (and sometime Cabinet ministers) Māui Pōmare ( Waitara statue photo above) and Apirana Ngata.

The 1920's also saw the rise of Tahupōtiki Wiremu Rātana’s religious movement, and the emergence of Te Puea Hērangi in Waikato.

Ngata worked hard to foster Māori scholarship and education and preserve traditional arts and culture.

He convinced the government to establish a Board of Maori Ethnological Research (1923), a Maori Purposes Fund Control Board (1924) and a School of Maori Arts and Crafts in Rotorua (1927).

The Reform government also took the first, tentative steps towards settling longstanding Māori grievances.

Agreements with Te Arawa in 1922 and Ngāti Tūwharetoa in 1926 recognised their respective rights over the Rotorua lakes and Lake Taupō, and led to the establishment of trust boards with some government funding.

Commissions of inquiry which examined Ngāi Tahu grievances (1920–21) and the Waikato and Taranaki confiscations (1926–27) recommended that modest compensation be paid.