Day #6: Native Aotearoa

Day #6: Native Aotearoa

Welcome to Day #6 of your journey and the last day in the south island. You are going to start the day by traveling 63 km north up State Highway 1 from Dunedin to a place called ‘Shag Point.’ Shag Point is one of five places in the south island where the Maori arrived hundreds of years ago to settle in New Zealand. They arrived at Shag Point in large canoes called ‘wakas.’ For more information on Shag Point and other Maori landing places, go to the Waka landing places website.

http://www.kiwidaydreaming.com/p/new-zealand-maps.html

Activity 1: Let’s imagine that you were on the first waka to arrive at Shag Point. You had never been to New Zealand before and you had no idea what to expect. Write a poem describing how you would have felt when you arrived in New Zealand. Would you have been excited or scared? I would have felt pretty nervous, I reckon…

I would feel so scared and frightened

Because I see new faces

I saw new different places and spaces

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waka_(canoe)

Activity 2: After visiting Shag Point, you hop back in the van and drive all the way up the east coast of the south island until you reach the town of Picton. You get out of the van and onto the Interislander ferry. It travels back across the Cook Strait to Wellington. Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand and every winter the city hosts a huge Matariki festival to celebrate the Maori New Year. This year part of the festival is being held at Te Papa, a big museum in Wellington.

Read about the Matariki festival at Te Papa.  There are so many different things to see and do at the festival this year. On your blog, tell us about three of the events. You can choose any three events that you wish.

Answers: The first event I would definitely go too is the Mata and the Mysterious Musical Maunga.  The second event I would visit is The Māori Sidesteps. The last event I would go to is Te Whare Mātoro: Haka fusion.