Tena koutou. My name is Paul Meredith. I am from the Ngati Kaputuhi, Ngati Maniapoto people of Aotearoa. I met Noelani and others while at a conference in Athens Georgia. In 1907 John Tamatoa Baker, a kanaka Maoli visited Gisborne. Aotearoa. I understand he was the Royal Governor of Hawaii in the time of King Kalakaua and the he was the model for the statute of Kamehameha which stands out front of the Judiciary Buildings. A series of articles re his visit appeared in one of our Maori newspapers. I am currently translating these to share with you. Baker or Peka to us was asked to leave some words for the Maori people of New Zealand which he did so in his native tongue:
"Aloha oukou e oee makama. I hookahi au mapuna olilo. E aloha kekahi i ke kahi, maua ano apau. I hookahi Umauma no ka pono o ka Lahui. Koho i ke kauaka haopono i waha olelo no oukou i ka Hare Alelo. Paa a malama i ko ama mai kuai i ka kahi lihi ia hai. Panipani i na ipuka Liilii o ko okou waihoua.
These words were translated into Maori which I am translating. I was wondering if anyone might want to translate the above for me into English and then we can compare my translation of the Maori version. The Maori version is below:
Aroha ki a koutou e oku hoa aroha. He kupu kotahi taku ki a koutou. E aroha koutou tetahi ki tetahi i a koutou hanga katoa. Kia rite te hiki o te waewae, kia kotahi te whakaaro hei painga mo te iwi katoa. Potitia te tangata tika hei waha korero mo koutou ki te Whare Korero. Puritia, tohungia te kainga, kauaka rawa tetahi maramara e hokona. Papunitia nga puare o koutou peeke
Arohanui, Paul.
PS: I have also posted this with the Translation group.
Welcome to the group! It's interesting to see that some of the letter Us are supposed to be Ns. Did you get this transcription from the newspaper? We had the same problem here sometimes in that they would run out of Ns and use Us instead; well, I guess it actually happened with a few different letters. From the Hawaiian, I got something like this (and everyone else can chime in with what they think): "Aloha oukou, e o'u makamaka. I hookahi a'u mapuna olelo. E aloha kekahi i kekahi, ma na ano apau. I hookahi umauma no ka pono o ka Lahui. Koho i ke kanaka hoopono i waha olelo no oukou i ka Hale Olelo. Paa a malama i kou aina, mai kuai i kekahi lihi ia hai. Panipani i na ipuka liilii o ko oukou waihona."
I think a translation might run something like this: "Aloha, my friends [the use of o'u in the hawaiian gives this a bit more power than just friends alone]. I have one thing to say to you. Treat each other with aloha, in all things. Be of one heart for the benefit of the nation/people. Choose a righteous person as a spokesman for you in the Speaking House [not sure what this is a reference to, some kind of legislature?]. Hold firm and cherish your land, and do not even sell one little bit of it to anyone. Close up the gates/doors/openings to the waihona [not sure of the context for this one either. waihona can mean quite a few different things, but maybe the maori word is less vague].” Kind of a rough translation, but we should be able to see how close the two match now.
me ke aloha,
kamaoli
ps do you know the dates around when he went to visit Aotearoa? maybe there is some coverage in the hawaiian papers.
Three waiata or songs/chants are included in one of the newspaper articles. I have translations for two of them but not the following which includes a Maori translation for each line. Any help would be appreciated:
Kai wawa ka moku, Tai wawa (e huri i) nga motu,
Kai lanahu ahi, Tai ngarahu ahi,
Kai popolohua mea a Kane. Tai aumoana a Tane.
Inu a ka manu i ke kai-ula, Ka inu nga manu i te tai-ura,
I ke kai a ka omaomao, I te tai pounamu,
Aole ku, aole hina, aole moe, Kaore e tu, kaore e hinga, kaore e moe,
Aole wawa loa kai a ke ana oku, Kaore e wawa roa tai o nga ana tapu.
"Kai Wawa ka Moku" was published in Abraham Fornanderʻs Account of the Polynesian Race (V2:15) with the following mostly adequate translation:
The noisy sea (around) the island,
The sea of burning coals,
The azure blue sea of Kane.
The birds drink (of the waters) in the Red Sea,
In (the waters of) the Green Sea,
Never quiet, never falling, never sleeping,
Never very noisy is the sea of the sacred caves.
It appears in a section devoted to our early navigator chiefs/priests (Kamahualele, Kauluakalana, Kahaʻi, Paumakua, etc.) and to chants descriptive of their travels. Unfortunately, Fornander doesnʻt supply us with any context to "Kai Wawa"; he simply appends it to a Kaulu chant ("O Kaulu nei wau / O ke kama a Kalana") with the transitional sentence: "Another ancient Hawaiian bard sung about these foreign regions [as follows]..."
Fornander published his Account in the mid-1880s; my guess, looking at the 1907 Maori translation youʻve provided, is that Fornanderʻs English was the source of this Maori. The parenthetical renderings of "around" and "e huri" (line 1) seem too unusual to be the result of independent translation, and the correspondence between "sacred caves" and "nga ana tapu" (line 7) is even more striking when you recognize that the Hawaiian "oku" (erect, protruding; thunderstruck) is only barely suggestive of "sacred/tapu." Somebody probably had a copy of Fornander; itʻd be interesting to know if it was Baker or his Maori hosts.
Thank you for a fascinating discussion. To my knowledge, "Kai Wawa" no longer has a performance tradition; nobody does it anymore. You remind me of how appropriate it could be in the mouths of traveling kanaka maoli, and Iʻm thinking that our Hawaiʻi delegation needs to dust it off and breathe some life into it for the 10th Festival of Pacific Arts this July in Samoa.
Kia ora koe Kihei. Thank you very much for this translation. Its quite possible that the editor of the paper had a copy of that publication. Reweti Kohere may have been editor at that time, a well educated man having attended Canterbury University College and graduating with a L.Th. degree. I hope to finish the John Tamatoa Baker translations soon and post them here for commentary. I am hoping that someone might take up the challenge of investigating whether Baker publish an account of his visit to New Zealand in an Hawaiian newspaper.
Sorry Paul, I wasn't very clear in my post. He wrote quite a bit about his visit to New Zealand in the paper, along with the other places in Polynesia that he visited. They haven't been transcribed yet, although the images of the paper are available. Might be able to post it in the translation group and see if people have time to work on it. I've just skimmed through his travel account, but it seems quite interesting.
Hi again Paul,
Don't know how much you're interested in Baker, but it seems that he had wrote long letters to the weekly newspaper Ke Aloha Aina documenting his travels which took him throughout Polynesia. It runs for months, starting in August 1907 and running into 1908, but it seems there are many missing issues of the newspaper around then.
Kia ora Kamaoli, thanks for your translation. Here is my translation of the Maori version:
"My regards to you my dear friends. I have but one thing to say to you. Love one another in all your affairs. March in unison, let their be one mind for the good of all the people. Select the right man as a representative for you in Parliament. Hold onto and preserve your homes, do not sell one piece [of land]. Block the holes in your banks/bags."
Re the last comment, there is other comment around papanuitia nga puare kei ou pakete, ie blocking the holes in your pockets, save your money, spend wisely, money burns holes in your pocekts etc.
The talk around the Hare Alelo (Whare Korero) may have been around interest in the fact that Maori had 4 designated seats in Parliament.
Replies
Welcome to the group! It's interesting to see that some of the letter Us are supposed to be Ns. Did you get this transcription from the newspaper? We had the same problem here sometimes in that they would run out of Ns and use Us instead; well, I guess it actually happened with a few different letters. From the Hawaiian, I got something like this (and everyone else can chime in with what they think): "Aloha oukou, e o'u makamaka. I hookahi a'u mapuna olelo. E aloha kekahi i kekahi, ma na ano apau. I hookahi umauma no ka pono o ka Lahui. Koho i ke kanaka hoopono i waha olelo no oukou i ka Hale Olelo. Paa a malama i kou aina, mai kuai i kekahi lihi ia hai. Panipani i na ipuka liilii o ko oukou waihona."
I think a translation might run something like this: "Aloha, my friends [the use of o'u in the hawaiian gives this a bit more power than just friends alone]. I have one thing to say to you. Treat each other with aloha, in all things. Be of one heart for the benefit of the nation/people. Choose a righteous person as a spokesman for you in the Speaking House [not sure what this is a reference to, some kind of legislature?]. Hold firm and cherish your land, and do not even sell one little bit of it to anyone. Close up the gates/doors/openings to the waihona [not sure of the context for this one either. waihona can mean quite a few different things, but maybe the maori word is less vague].” Kind of a rough translation, but we should be able to see how close the two match now.
me ke aloha,
kamaoli
ps do you know the dates around when he went to visit Aotearoa? maybe there is some coverage in the hawaiian papers.
Kai wawa ka moku,
Tai wawa (e huri i) nga motu,
Kai lanahu ahi,
Tai ngarahu ahi,
Kai popolohua mea a Kane.
Tai aumoana a Tane.
Inu a ka manu i ke kai-ula,
Ka inu nga manu i te tai-ura,
I ke kai a ka omaomao,
I te tai pounamu,
Aole ku, aole hina, aole moe,
Kaore e tu, kaore e hinga, kaore e moe,
Aole wawa loa kai a ke ana oku,
Kaore e wawa roa tai o nga ana tapu.
"Kai Wawa ka Moku" was published in Abraham Fornanderʻs Account of the Polynesian Race (V2:15) with the following mostly adequate translation:
The noisy sea (around) the island,
The sea of burning coals,
The azure blue sea of Kane.
The birds drink (of the waters) in the Red Sea,
In (the waters of) the Green Sea,
Never quiet, never falling, never sleeping,
Never very noisy is the sea of the sacred caves.
It appears in a section devoted to our early navigator chiefs/priests (Kamahualele, Kauluakalana, Kahaʻi, Paumakua, etc.) and to chants descriptive of their travels. Unfortunately, Fornander doesnʻt supply us with any context to "Kai Wawa"; he simply appends it to a Kaulu chant ("O Kaulu nei wau / O ke kama a Kalana") with the transitional sentence: "Another ancient Hawaiian bard sung about these foreign regions [as follows]..."
Fornander published his Account in the mid-1880s; my guess, looking at the 1907 Maori translation youʻve provided, is that Fornanderʻs English was the source of this Maori. The parenthetical renderings of "around" and "e huri" (line 1) seem too unusual to be the result of independent translation, and the correspondence between "sacred caves" and "nga ana tapu" (line 7) is even more striking when you recognize that the Hawaiian "oku" (erect, protruding; thunderstruck) is only barely suggestive of "sacred/tapu." Somebody probably had a copy of Fornander; itʻd be interesting to know if it was Baker or his Maori hosts.
Thank you for a fascinating discussion. To my knowledge, "Kai Wawa" no longer has a performance tradition; nobody does it anymore. You remind me of how appropriate it could be in the mouths of traveling kanaka maoli, and Iʻm thinking that our Hawaiʻi delegation needs to dust it off and breathe some life into it for the 10th Festival of Pacific Arts this July in Samoa.
me ke haʻahaʻa
Kihei de Silva
Nga mihi nui,
Paul.
Don't know how much you're interested in Baker, but it seems that he had wrote long letters to the weekly newspaper Ke Aloha Aina documenting his travels which took him throughout Polynesia. It runs for months, starting in August 1907 and running into 1908, but it seems there are many missing issues of the newspaper around then.
me ke aloha,
kamaoli
"My regards to you my dear friends. I have but one thing to say to you. Love one another in all your affairs. March in unison, let their be one mind for the good of all the people. Select the right man as a representative for you in Parliament. Hold onto and preserve your homes, do not sell one piece [of land]. Block the holes in your banks/bags."
Re the last comment, there is other comment around papanuitia nga puare kei ou pakete, ie blocking the holes in your pockets, save your money, spend wisely, money burns holes in your pocekts etc.
The talk around the Hare Alelo (Whare Korero) may have been around interest in the fact that Maori had 4 designated seats in Parliament.
Nga mihi,
Paul.