Mōteatea

Searching for mōteatea from my iwi and exploring the meanings behind them should have been something I did a long time ago, but better late than never. I visited the library, researched online and looked through past iwi wānanga booklets. Many of the waiata I knew that we often sung back home nowadays was contemporary, the challenge of finding something much older made me search further and deeper. There were so many I loved, but when I heard a recording of ‘Penei tonu ai’ I was instantly transported by to one of my whare, listening to my koroua on the pae while I sat by the flag pole warmed by the hot sun. And then when I researched for translations of the kupu I knew it aligned with my last semesters work and my feeling that that work was unfinished. I put a call out on my iwi facebook group asking what whanaunga knew of the song and will update this mōteatea page as I continue to learn about it.