The rainbow connection
The Rainbow Valley community has just marked its anniversary. CHARLOTTE SQUIRE talks to residents about its past and future.
Ifirst saw Kahu Squires streaking across the fields of Rainbow Valley riding a large, dark horse. She was crouched low on his back, her face set and determined, and they were one, as if on a battle field. Only they were chasing a cow. And she was barefoot and wearing tiny shorts and a singlet.
Ten years later the beloved horse has passed on but Squires still looks the same. Slim and wiry with long dark hair, she’s the youngest permanent member of Golden Bay’s oldest intentional community – Rainbow Valley Community.
She arrived there 20 years ago, has raised three children, and intends to remain until she joins her horse.
Golden Bay’s oldest intentional community Rainbow Valley is celebrating its 40th year. Based at Glover’s Flat, the foot of the Kahurangi National Park at the top of the wild Anatoki Valley, the community is made up of a stable group of permanent residents who co-own land, and a wider group of community members.
Growing up in the ‘burbs of Paraparaumu, Kahu had ‘‘dreamed of living in a community’’ since she was eight. She tried Graham Downs, then Tui and settled at Rainbow Valley.
Over the years she has turned her hand to beef, sheep and pig farming. She has also created countless sculptures, which adorn her gardens.
Her three children, now aged 20, 22 and 27 are all returning in January for the 40th anniversary celebrations.
They feel a strong bond to Rainbow Valley.
Robyn Holloway moved to Rainbow Valley in a big yellow bus in the 70s, aged 25. She became a hippy at a time when ‘‘everyone was going back to the land’’.
She had married at 20 and lived in Auckland, in a lifestyle she described as very detached from nature. She moved to Rainbow Valley with two young children, two dogs and a friend.
‘‘It was my dream, I thought it was the only way to live. We lived together in the barn for a few years, while we were getting planning permission to build our houses. We lived without electricity for the first ten years. All those early houses were built without the aid of power tools. And three of us were having babies.’’
Challenges during those early years included washing in cold water by hand and living in a basic and, at times, harsh environment.
‘‘My baby was born mid-winter and our bedroom was the shearing room [in the barn]. It was quite hard to keep warm, you could see daylight through the walls. The water would freeze in the hoses. But we all believed so strongly in what we were doing,’’ Holloway said.
‘‘We believed in co-operative
Kahu Squires uses the community tractor at the old barn that provided an initial home for the first Rainbow Valley Community residents in the 1970s. living, bringing up our children to be part of a group, part of one big family. There was no door knocking.’’
Her introduction to Rainbow Valley was being taken into the farm by her now husband to learn how to milk cows.
She milked them, by hand, for the next 20 years. They also ran 100 sheep and bred their own pigs.
‘‘We made bacon and salted it down, we bottled everything we could. And we had a go at growing everything we could, even soybeans and peanuts!’’
The community house was built in 1978, though more work was done to it after that. It became and remains the ‘‘heart of the community’’ Holloway said. It has seen weddings, births, funerals, conflicts, mediation, psychodrama workshops and many, many shared meals.
Surrounded by well-tended gardens, with a lovingly decorated and tidied interior, the community house proudly displays photos of the original Rainbow Valley members. An upright wooden beam records the growth of countless residents over the years, aged zero up.
After initial resistance from the council, Rainbow Valley was granted permission to build more residential homes in the 80s. The homes are dotted about the land, cloaked in gardens, chicken runs and other animal holdings.
As the children, who were mostly boys, grew up, they freely roamed the land. They were in and out of each other’s homes, with the sense of being part of a large extended family.
At one point, the children decided to experiment with a parent swap, thinking other parents were better, Holloway said. But they didn’t like it and decided they preferred their own parents.
A group of 12-year-olds also tried living in a house alone and taking care of all their household needs. That experiment involved the kids doing their own budgeting, meals, laundry, getting ready for school. It lasted a month.
‘‘We tried to homeschool the kids but my six-year-old daughter, seeing her younger friends playing all day, decided it was unfair and she wanted to go to a proper school. So they plugged into the school system,’’ Holloway said.
Thanks partly to the media, certain beliefs developed about life in a commune.
Holloway said popular TVNZ presenter Jim Hickey, during a Flying Visits episode about Golden Bay, once asked her if free loving was a feature at Rainbow Valley.
‘‘That’s never happened here. Our family structure is the just the same as anywhere else, with the added advantage of being more inclusive,’’ Holloway said.
With a culture of regular meetings and an almost consensusbased decision-making system, Holloway said teachers used to comment on their children’s ‘‘great communication skills.’’
Making bacon: Free-range pigs are kept for meat by Kahu Squires.
‘‘They were outspoken and knew how to speak up for themselves and were always respectful. They didn’t hold any adults in awe, they just saw them as equals. They all have good selfesteem.’’
Holloway isn’t sure whether she’ll see her final years out at Rainbow Valley, though it has her heart.
Rainbow is a company in which all shareholders have equal packets of shares, that is the legal entity, said resident historian and passionate intentional community commentator Robert Jenkin. He arrived 26 years ago and lives with his partner Anne Taylor, who arrived with the first wave of residents in the seventies.
Over the next 40 years, Jenkin said the goal was to move Rainbow Valley into an eco-village model.
‘‘We hope to bequeath our community to another generation,’’ he said.
‘‘When I plant a tree here, I’m aware that it’s for my children and my grandchildren. It puts us close to that turangawaewae Maori connection to the land.’’ At present, a new wave of young parents are living at Rainbow Valley. They, too, share a passion for community, though Jenkin said ‘‘we want young people who are interested in our community.’’
Rainbow Valley residents meet up once a month for a meeting and meal. Currently 28 people live there, including nine land shareholders.
‘‘There is not currently an open membership provision, simply because we have to upgrade our status if we want to build further housing. Plus, this land seems to have supported a similar number of people to what we have now, ever since the beginning,’’ Holloway said.
‘‘I doubt we could manage so well if we increased our numbers. It takes a long time to assimilate new folk, and to get to know them well deserves time and energy.
‘‘Meetings are the life blood of community,’’ Jenkin said.
In 2012, he completed an M.A. in history focusing on intentional, rural communities that were founded in the 1970s.
From his research into other intentional communities around New Zealand he found regular meetings were one habit that had helps communities remain intact.
‘‘Although meetings are a vital part of our communication and sharing of ideas, I would not go as far as to say they are the ‘life blood’,’’ he said.
‘‘To me, the life blood is commitment, tolerance, willingness, acceptance, and having faith in a long held shared dream.
‘‘We strive for consensus, if it doesn’t work we have to reach a 75 per cent vote.
‘‘We all have an opportunity to speak if it’s a difficult decision and we try our best to find a decision that suits everybody.’’
While the community have monthly community meetings, they have more regular director’s meetings, for those owning a share of the land.
‘‘Every group has its own culture, different communities have similarities but you develop a culture within it that’s unique to each group. You wouldn’t know it unless you’re part of it,’’ Holloway said.
‘‘It’s our shared identity and we work at it,’’ Jenkin said.