Waitangi Day as it should be
Ceremonies are nice. Service is better.
Nowhere was Waitangi Day marked more appropriately than at Invercargill’s Murihiku Marae. Ceremonial options were put aside as wha¯ nau opted to make themselves useful there, where more than 30 people displaced by the Southland floods were being put up.
You don’t look surprised. Neither should you.
There’s much to be said for resonant ceremony and times of cultural communion, but when people around us need a hand then that’s what matters. It’s not even a difficult call.
None of the speeches at Waitangi itself yesterday really mattered more than Evelyn Cook’s words at Murihuku: ‘‘Our first responsibility is to care for our community’’.
At Waitangi it’s becoming commonplace for the great and the good to be seen cooking up and serving food. It’s not a bad look, politically, but that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily inappropriate, as long as the politicians are doing a fair share of the actual work rather than showing up, mugging for the cameras, and clearing off. This they will, of course, be careful not to do.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and some of her cabinet did a bit of serving at a big breakfast barbecue – which is fine, if not exactly the sort of loaves-and-fishes miracle one or two commentators inflated it to be. Foodsafe checks may have been in order, given her Government’s tendency to roll our undercooked delivery of policies.
The PM also took a turn paddling a waka, which again is an agreeable metaphor as far as political optics are concerned, and her toddler Neve was seen helping pack away boxes for recycling.
Again, some eyes may roll at this as a photo-opportunity, but that’s as bit sour. Most would surely recognise it as gardenvariety parenting of a sort that could be seen up and down the country.
The nation has let it be known, and clearly, that the Waitangi commemorations aren’t to be seen as open slather for naked political point scoring, at least not vainglorious protests that assume extravagant or distasteful conduct is somehow sanctified, let alone excused, by the day of commemoration.
The message is clear; you can make a point but not be a jerk about it.
Nationwide, Waitangi was commemorated and speakers sought to evoke messages of unity and paths for progress.
The extent to which the nation was paying attention shouldn’t be overstated.
It wasn’t a matter of indifference, but apart from the occasional notoriety, it’s tended to be one of the more low-key public holidays on the national calendar. After all, rightly or wrongly New Zealanders have, and tend to like that they have, a reputation for understatement.
And the Murihiku Marae example stands testimony to the truth that even ringing rhetoric tells us less about our culture than simple deeds do.
The nation has let it be known, and clearly, that the Waitangi commemorations aren’t to be seen as open slather for naked political point scoring.
Hands that pitch in to help achieve more than those that applaud even the finest expressions of sentiment.
Who knows, in that respect perhaps the day may come when Waitangi ceremonies are more about the barbecues and the sporting events, than the oratory?
If anything, that day may already have quietly arrived long ago.