Poroporoaki : Kateia Burrows

Thursday, 12 January 2012, 1:53 pm
Press Release: The Maori Party
The Hon Dr Pita Sharples
Maori Party Co-Leader | MP for Tamaki Makaurau
12 January 2012

Poroporoaki : Kateia Burrows

Iri te rau kawakawa iri ki whare aitua.
Tenei ia kua riro ki te kapunipunitanga o nga wairua, kua tua o te pae o maumahara.
Haere e te tuahine, haere ki tua atu i Te Reinga, ko taa mätou te hunga ora, he whai i nga tapuwae kua pikitia e koe.
E Kateia, moe atu, moe atu, moe atu raa

Dr Pita Sharples, MP for Tamaki Makaurau and Co-leader of the Maori Party, is heart-broken at the tragic death of Kateia Burrows, of Ngati Porou and Rarotongan descent.

“I have known Kateia for many years and considered her an exemplary young leader, of great talent, fierce intellect and a huge commitment to taonga Maori”.

“Kateia founded the London Mau Taiaha group, Maramara Totara, in 2003. This, the London branch of Te Whare Tu Taua o Aotearoa (the national school of ancient Maori weaponry) went on to successfully grade more than forty people through the school, with grading taking place in Hawai’i (2006) and Takapau (2007). It has been a remarkable achievement to see such success so far from home".

“Te Whare Tu Taua o Aotearoa is dedicated to ensuring te reo Maori, our history, our cultural values, whakapapa, haka, karakia, waiata and the traditional art of weaponry is sustained for future generations. Kateia took on all elements of the programme and in doing so, helped create a thriving Maori community in London.

Kateia had an enormous appetite for taking on new projects and her short life demonstrates this in great quantity”.

“She established Manaia, a Maori performing arts company in London which alongside of cultural performances taught traditional Maori culture and skills in schools throughout the United Kingdom”.

“Kateia was involved with Ngati Ranana (Maori cultural group in London); a Maori language school (Kiwa) and in fact had made such a distinctive presence in the London setting that in 2006 she was nominated for ‘New Zealander of the Year’.

“Our greatest sympathies are extended to all the whanau, both abroad and at home, to Ngati Porou, her Taranaki whanau, her Cook Island family and in particular to her three children, Kimiora, Tira and Kahu Huia”.

“We grieve for the loss of one of our glittering stars, who inspired so many with her leadership. We know that because of her vast endeavours, she has blazed a trail that will ensure her legacy lives on”.

Kateia - her gift to New Zealand

Kateia: Her gift to New Zealand

Tribute by His Excellency, Mr Derek Leask, High Commissioner from New Zealand to the United Kingdom, 14 January 2012.

Tena koutou

New Zealand has lost one of its leaders.

Kateia galvanized us here in London. She made things happen.

She was central to the way in which New Zealand presented itself on many important occasions in Britain and more widely in Europe.

And when she made things happen, she made sure they happened right. She was a true professional.

We all know that Kateia had high standards. She applied these to her performance. She applied these to her art. She applied these to the intellectual underpinning for everything that she did.

And just as Kateia applied these standards to herself, she had her ways of insisting that those around her applied them too.

Above all Kateia was always true to her origins. She fought hard for Maori. And I welcomed that.

She and I shared a viewpoint. We agreed that that old expression Overseas Experience still captures something that really matters for Aotearoa New Zealand.

We agreed that New Zealand was a better place if Kiwis young and not-so-young came to Britain and Europe to learn what the world was about.

And to learn what New Zealand was about; to learn about themselves, and to discover their own identities. This was an important point to Kateia.

We knew that those people who then went back to New Zealand would have the skills and ideas, the values and the leadership that our country needs.

Kateia had many ambitions, but one of those was to make sure that the Maori community here in London is a successful community.

She wanted Maori to take full advantage of this opportunity.

She did that through Manaia, through Ngati Ranana and through her extraordinary network of friends and colleagues.

I have the greatest admiration for Kateia and her contribution to the vitality of the Maori community here in London.

Kateia was not alone, but she was a force, and a force that will be greatly missed.

We owe her a debt of gratitude.

Thank you Kateia.

You were a great friend in every sense of the word to all of us.

No reira.

Arohanui.

Review of 2009

Kia ora,

My first blog ever! But need to do my bit and share a few things that Manaia have been involved with over the past 18 months! First things first though, Karl has been studying at Cranfield University for the past 12 months doing a full-time MBA course. Cranfield is a private post graduate university and is reknown for offering one of the best 12 month MBA courses in the world! Karl is the first Maori student to do the course and with great support from the university, his family and his peers he has been doing exceptionally well. We look forward to having him back with us when he officially finishes in September 2010 (next month). Good luck and kia kaha Karl!


Whatelse?

Ryefield Primary School
This was probably my most favourite education job of the year. Ryefield Primary School is nestled out in Hillingdon which is way out west, the 2nd last tube stop on the Piccadilly line. Bruce and I worked with all 17 classes (Nursery up to year 6) over the period of 3 & a half days teaching Maori culture. A couple of the teachers were from NZ and prior to our arrival, they taught all the kids the NZ version of 12 Days of Christmas. You know the one, 'On the 12th day of Christmas my teacher taught me...12 piupiu swinging, 11 haka lessons, 10 juicy fish heads..........and a pukeko in a ponga tree'. Well after about the 5th class singing it to us, we wanted to surprise the next class and started singing it to them (making out we didn't know that they knew), and they were so happy they could join in, so we all had great fun singing it together! The Ryefield kids were just GREAT, the teachers were AWESOME and we all had a fantastic time with one another.

Manaia head to Istanbul

A private 50th party saw Manaia heading to Turkey for the first time. A strong team of 10 went and welcomed guests who had travelled from all around the globe for the celebration. The following day a couple of the guys took a haka workshop with about 30 of the guests, who alongside the Manaia team performed to the other 120 guests that night at main birthday party held at the old Orient Express Railway station, one of the endpoint stations of the famous railway which started in 1883.





Hewlett Packard

Garry Veale first experienced a Manaia haka workshop in Colorado while working for COPAN. When he shifted to HP, he invited Manaia in to work with his new teams in the StorageWorks division. Kiwi, myself, Bruce, Piri and Reagan kick started this mahi with a workshop in London, then Piri and the team ran workshops in Madrid and Frankfurt. Following the success of these workshops, Manaia were then invited to work with another HP team in Barcelona in early 2010.







Manaia go back to Marseille
Manaia were invited down to Marseille to perform at the Couleur rugby hospitality event prior to the All Blacks vs France game in November '09. Couleur are a large French travel agency who specialise in sports travel and were keen to make the most of promoting NZ, the Rugby World Cup and selling travel packages! Tourism NZ helped 'dress' the room to give it a real NZ feel and Manaia to entertain Couleur's 400 clients. Jonah Lomu also made an appearance as a guest speaker, but much to the guests delight, they were in for a real bonus when we jumped on stage with Jonah where we all performed the haka together. Ex-All Blacks captain Tama Umaga (here with Mereana Hond) even made a surprise visit on the evening. And just to top it off, of course the All Blacks won!






Finally....
Just to give you a taste of whatelse we got up to this year, Manaia ran Maori cultural education sessions at various schools and community organisations around the United Kingdom, here's some to name a few;

• Royal Liberty School
• Bamford Primary School
• Monks Eleigh Primary School
• St Augustine's Primary School
• Jumoke Family Centre
• Cheapside Primary School
• St Helen's Primary School
• Northway School
• Cheam Common Junior School
• Berger Primary School
• Tunbridge Wells Grammar School

Work this year also took us to Dusseldorf and Frankfurt with German heating technology company Buderus. We teamed up with Tourism NZ and worked on a promotion in Hamburg for Radio Hamburg. Once again we went to the worlds biggest ICT trade show (CeBIT) in Hannover with New Zealand Trade & Enterprise and perhaps a memorable job for the team was catching a private jet to St Moritz, in Switzerland where they performed at a private wedding.

All in all it was another great year for Manaia, educating and sharing with the European community more about NZ Maori culture.

Kia ora ra,
Kateia.

Review of 2008

Although not as frantic as year of the RWC07, 2008 turned out to be a very interesting year with more work overseas than in the UK. We worked in Germany on a 7 occasions, Wroclaw in Poland, Berne in Switzerland, Barcelona in Spain, Paris and the United States. We worked closely with Tourism New Zealand in promoting New Zealand and held one of our biggest haka workshops with Vodafone.

Vodafone haka workshop

Manaia runs haka workshops where we teach haka as a means to help express passion and power. Our workshops are about unifying groups and building teams.

In June 2007, we were approached by Vodafone UK to help unify 1400 delegates at a conference for UK managers. Manaia proposed composing a haka specifically for Vodafone which focussed on their core values, red, restless and rock solid. The whakatauki "Ko te toka tumoana tu tonu e" became the base of the message... standing rock solid despite being battered by the elements. Manaia performed a number of famous haka and finished with our own composuition. Then we spoke about haka and its meaning, particularly about people coming together, working as one to overcome challenges. We then m,oved 1400 people into 8 groups into a huge airport hangar and taught them the haka words and actions with a final performance back in the main auditorium.






Globe Runners in Roth

We were in Germany at the request of a New Zealand company which promotes an annual triathlon in Wanaka. With Tourism New Zealand, the objective was to promote New Zealand as a destination for tourists and to invite competitors at the Roth triathlon to make the journey to Aotearoa to take part. Manaia performed on a small island in a lake at the commencement of the race and were there at the end supporting the runners.

Here is the multi-talented Mr PJ Campbell supporting a Kiwi runner across the finish line.


Globe Trotters in Cologne

Globetrotter is an outdoors lifestyle company with a number of stores throughout Germany. The Cologne store has been voted the best store in the country and has a very interactive approach to promoting products, including a dive pool in the middle of the store to try out dive gear, canoes and other water sport products. It also has a wet weather room where customers can try on clothing in extreme weather conditions. They sell a number of New Zealand products and the New Zealand image ties in well with their brand. Tourism New Zealand and Globetrotter invited us to their Cologne store where we performed haka and took workshops for the public and the press. We were treated very well by our hosts and were given the experience of dining at a German Beer Hall with its wonderful food, drink and raucous atmosphere. Being in Germany we were able to utilise one of our Hamburg based performers, Reotakiwa Dunn, a very talented musician in his own right.

Down the Yellow Brick Road

For 10 years Electrolux Professional have been traveling down their own Yellow Brick Road, a metaphor from the Wizard of Oz which represents the journey to the Emerald City. The goal is now in sight. It is time to celebrate and motivate. Manaia were asked to compose a haka and teach it to the delegates to ensure success on the last leg of the journey. Takahia ra Takahia ra, Haruru ana te ara kowhai, Takahia ra e tutu te puehu! Trampled, trodden on, this Yellow Brick Road shakes. From our collective stride, the dust it stirs and flies. In the mountains of Berne, Switzerland, at a military base in the middle of winter, 200 delegates, employees of Electrolux thundered the words of their haka.

Haka workshop in Colorado Springs

Copan Systems is a new company that has developed server technology to rival the big established players such as IBM and Sun Systems. However, they are new and much smaller company and to compete their sales staff needed to be motivated. Gary Veale, Copan System's Chief Sales Officer is Welsh and has a love for rugby. The attitude he required from his staff to take on the big guys and win reminded him of the All Blacks and Maori in their struggles against the British. He wanted his team to "take on the big guys and win".

Manaia were invited to contribute to the conference by giving our views. This was a great opportunity to talk about who we are as Maori and how we survived and thrived despite colonisation and for this to be an inspiration to those in the corporate world. I spoke about Parihaka and the role of Te Whiti o Rongomai and Tohu Kakahi and the passive resistance movement that ensured the survival of the people. We imbued the korero with movement, action, dance and waiata. Finally we got the delegates motivated through performance of haka. Colorado is a beautiful state, over a mile above sea level and we were there in the middle of winter. Americans love doing everything big and the great enthusiasm they brought to the haka will be something we will always remember.

Former All Blacks support charity event with haka

Carlos Spencer and Aaron Mauger, former All Blacks now playing for premier teams in the UK were special guests at the Leicester Football ground in a charity dinner for the Gary Rees Testimonial year. Being in the middle of an All Blacks tour in the UK, the organisers wanted something special to mark the event.

Manaia were able to add to the occassion by welcoming Carlos and Aaron onto the stage with haka powhiri. We spoke about haka, the meaning and story behind the haka Ka Mate, the haka performed by the All Blacks but composed and performed first by Te Rauparaha, chief of Ngati Toa. Carlos and Aaron then joined us in a performance of the haka which was a great way to finish and give back to the organisers and audience. Amelia Benskin of Champions Uk Plc said "It really was amazing to watch and you performed so well and the fact that both Carlos and Aaron came up to join you was just brilliant."

Manaia help celebrate Fisher and Paykel 10 years in Germany

Fisher & Paykel, one of New Zealand's truly global companies celebrated 10 years since the establishment of their German office. The celebrations were held in Dusseldorf at the Medica exhibition, the largest exhibition for medical technology and equipment in the world.

Fisher & Paykel's stand was one amongst thousands but being themed on New Zealand rainforest and featuring performances by Manaia it certainly stood out amongst the rest and attracted plenty of visitors. Manaia's role was to support the exhibition and provide some well needed entertainment. With some of our top Maori performers sourced from Germany and the UK, Manaia performed haka, waiata, poi, demonstrated weaponry and Maori traditional instruments. We spoke about our culture, our country and our traditions. And of course, the audience were given the chance to talk to Fisher & Paykel staff about what they can offer.

The 10th birthday was celebrated on a boat, the MS Heidelberg on the River Rhine with a gala dinner with the New Zealand Ambassador with some magic from Manaia.

Review of 2007

2007 was a very exciting year for Manaia. We had a lot of work as our profile slowly built up and because of the interest in the haka generated through the Rugby World Cup, held this year in France. Of course the All Blacks never made it to the final, but our focus was on our culture and the history of the haka and the legacy passed to us from our ancestors.

Some of the highlights of 2007:

Marbella, Spain - Opening of the Don Carlos Resort Hotel: Marbella in Southern Spain is a famous playground for Europe's more well off. The Don Carlos is a hotel known for entertaining and accommodating that particular clientelle. Following a recent refurbishment, the hotel was "reopened"in grand style. One of the organisers is married to a New Zealand Maori and had experienced the emotion of a Maori welcome at her wedding at a marae, a Maori meeting house in New Zealand. She wanted the guests to experience something similar so asked Manaia to help out. We took over 20 performers to Spain and entertained guest with traditional Maori songs, poi and haka.

We also formally welcomed the guests including German Royalty to the event in traditional Maori style on behalf of the owners. We were very well looked after and had a well deserved couple of days relaxation in Malaga following the performance.

Here's the team just before our performance.

Filming of Bride Flight in Luxembourg. Bride Flight is a Dutch Film about a the true story of the Last Great Air Race London – Christchurch in October 1953, and the KLM aircraft that won the handicap race, which carried 26 young Dutch brides-to-be on their way to join their fiancés already settled in New Zealand. Manaia re-enacted a haka powhiri that greeted the travellers when they arrived in Christchurch. We flew into Luxembourg in the afternoon, drove to an unused airfield in France via Belgium. It was really freezing and we had to do so many takes to film the scene.

Maori film stars with 1950's hairstyles and cool 1950's clothing, plane and cars to match. Here is the link to the Bride Flight trailer. If you are sharp eyed, you may even catch a glimpse or our Manaia poi performers.


Marseilles for the Rugby World Cup: On behalf of the New Zealand Embassy, the Manaia crew spent nearly a week in the South of France performing in Marseilles and Aix en provence, promoting Maori culture, the haka, New Zealand and the All Blacks.

We started our first media performances and workshops at the beach Rugby tournament, performed at a photography exhibition featuring moko (Maori traditional tattoo), held workshops for children at local schools, performed down-town Aix en provence, held public performances at Marseille stadium and performed with the Black Seeds. And during all this we even managed to meet the All Blacks before their game with Italy.

It was one of our most memorable trips of the year, with great sunshine, friendly people and we even had a chance to swim and paddle a Tahitian waka ama.

La Notte Bianca: The White Night Festival - Rome: This is Rome's yearly festival where performers around the world perform throughout the summers night until Sunday morning. Following Marseille, a number of Manaia performers flew into Rome and met with our crew from London to perform in the festival. In a wonderful outdoor auditorium overlooking the city of Rome, Manaia performed to over 2,500 people. Our performance included traditional songs and a haka workshop with a large number of locals joining us on stage. The performance was sponsored by the New Zealand Embassy in Rome and Iveco, the sponsors of the All Blacks.

Rovigo, Italy - Community workshops for Sky Television - While we had a crew in Marseilles, Greg Lacey and I travelled to Rovigo, a small rugby mad town in Italy to do some promotional work with Sky Television. The event coincided with the Italy Vs New Zealand game. Greg and I spent time with local children, performing and teaching about Maori culture and of course the haka.

Prince Andrew opens New Zealand Garden in Windsor
A New Zealand garden at Windsor's Savell Gardens was opened by Prince Andrew, the Windsor Park Ranger. The garden was designed by Sam Martin, a New Zealander based in London. Manaia were involved ceremonially with putaatara (conch shells), karanga (ceremonial calls) and haka powhiri (welcome chants) as well as running workshops for local children on Maori instruments and Maori dance.

Cardiff for the World Cup Quarter final All Blacks to France - Manaia crew were invited to perform at the All Black vs France quarter final for Rugby World Cup main sponsors Societe Generale. Unfortunately, despite a spirited Manaia performance, the All Blacks were not able to match it and their resulting loss to France meant they were out of the World Cup. And with Manaia's two week stint in Paris commencing the next day, our work was going to take on a new twist.

Le Balon - Manaia in Paris for the Rugby World Cup
Well the French Border guards couldn't resist commenting when they saw our New Zealand passports. Here we were, in Paris the day after the All Blacks lost, working with Tourism NZ to encourage people to visit New Zealand, looking to ride on the back of the success of the All Blacks. Tourism NZ had erected a magnificent gigantic rugby ball that could seat 200 people and promoted New Zealand as a tourism destination.

But not even the All Blacks losing was going to stop us. And of course the French were very gracious in the All Blacks loosing. Tourism New Zealand had scored a top spot right next to the Eiffel tower in Champs de Mars. Thousands of tourists were making their way to Paris to watch the World Cup final semis and finals, all looking for something to do. It was Manaia's job to get them over to the Ball, get them inside to learn about New Zealand as a possible destination for a holiday, especially with the World Cup being held there in 2011.

So, Manaia performed near the ball, under the Eiffel tower, with celebrities, went and talked and chatted and had photos taken, signed autogrpahs even. People came, watched, particpated, had fun and we managed to help get some 25,000 in to glimpse a wee bit of New Zealand inside the Ball. Tourism New Zealand staff were very motivated, great to work with and made sure we were well looked after, kept warm and had a full social calender.