One Land – The conclusion.
The wonderful series “One Land” finished this weekend and I am still in awe of it as much now as I was when I first blogged about it. It took 3 couples back to 1850′s New Zealand, and aimed to show what it was like for both Maori and the European settlers of the time.
The Pa (Settlement) where the Maori Families live.
To recap – there are three families involved in the show:
The Ririnuis, Aramahou, Toni and six children.
Toni and Aramahou live in Tauranga with their blended whanau of four children, Tuhawaiki (9), Ngawaka (5), Hemorere (4) and Te Hapirangi (2). They are also joined on the Pa by Aramahou’s son Rerehou (10) and Toni’s niece Te Ao Marama (13).
The Dalrymples, Evan, sally and two daughters.
For the Dalrymple family from Gisborne, the One Land experience will be a journey of discovery. A blended family, Mum Sally is Pakeha, while her two daughters are both part-Maori, as is their step-father Evan.Kayla and Jess are part Ngati Kahungunu, while Evan is part Ngati Pouru. But none of the family have ever experienced Maori language or culture, despite their own heritage and living in a region rich in Maori history.
The Smiths: Tarnia, Lyndsey and 4 children:
Tarnia and her husband Lindsay live in Christchurch with their four children Marshall (21), Matthew (19), Nadia (11) and Conrad (9). Tarnia is a busy and popular independent midwife, while Lindsay runs his own house removal business.
The Ririnui family were to speak only Maori on the Pa, and the idea was that the Dalrymple family would get a chance to lean and embrace their Maori Heritage. Unfortunately – other than Evan, they didn’t want to. The two girls were rude, sulky and whiny the whole way through. I think the tone was set in the second episode when the Pa Families went to see the Smiths in their settler home. Sally Dalrymple said she “wanted to live with the white people”. She didn’t say she wanted to live in the settlers shack – just with white people.
(On a similar note – that same week I read an article in an NZ magazine where a Maori lady mentioned that she walked into a hall of people, breathed a sigh of relief at seeing a load of “brown people” and went and sat by them. At least ingorance isn’t one sided!)
Their behaviour got worse and worse, with Sally Dalrymple telling one of the Ririnui children to “bugger off” several times, and eventually culminated in Evan smacking one of the Ririnui children across the head, and then getting offended when Aramahou shoved him in the face.
A telling point was that Mrs Dalrymple claimed that this fulfilled every Maori stereotype – and yet what I saw was that they in fact were the ones walloping a child (and what’s more – someone else’s child) – the very stereotype that Maori face everyday. We didn’t see the Ririnui family even smacking their kids.
Now obviously – that’s not to say they didn’t – I suppose the TV show could have been edited to show the Dalrymples in a bad light. But It was quite telling that one of the smith boys said that Evan was going to “come across as a douche bag” on TV if he didn’t start behaving better – so it looks like the issues were real. He had certainly been very dismissive and rude to the Smith boys when they turned up at the Pa with their first haul of fish – of which they were rightly proud.
I ended up with a huge amount of respect for the Ririnui family, and their love for their heritage and history. They sat by while the Dalrymples girls literally sneered and poked fun of their culture. I Personally don’t think this has anything to do with “cultural sensitivity”. It’s to do with manners, and respect for others. When I go into a church, I respect the meaning it has for other people there, even though it has nothing to do with my beliefs. When I go into a Mosque, I cover my head and wouldn’t wear a strapless top. The two girls were almost sniggering at the customs they were being shown. It was plain old rude and obnoxious. As someone who is extremely proud of my heritage, history and culture; I could see how difficult they must have found it.
The smiths on the other hand dealt with their new lives with a huge amount of fortitude and guts. It was hard not to have a huge amount of respect for the family. Yes they struggled – Tarnia Smith broke down in tears at one point because the men hadn’t bought any food home from fishing or hunting and they hadn’t eaten much in days. They struggled at first – like many migrants these days, but stuck it out and in the end coped and thrived.
Watching two grown-up boys chase after turkeys was hilarious. And they all said how much closer they became as a family. I think they showed the “Kiwi can-do attitude” to a tee. And how much they appreciated being able to see a side of thier own history they new little about.
Not only that, but they gained the appreciation and friendship of the Ririnui family because they were open to what was on offer. At the end of the show, Aramahou and his son made a wonderful carving for the smiths to take away with them – a carving of their ancestors. It was very touching.
There’s a lot more to see in the program, and I still highly recommend watching it if you can. More than anything it shows quite clearly that you do not have to have a perfect experience of your new life at the start, in order to become happy and settled. If you face problems – you can overcome them. It doesn’t have to be perfect from day one.
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One Comment on One Land – The conclusion.
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Hubby on
Thu, 21st Jan 2010 11:01 pm
Personally I found it fascinating. While the producers and cultural advisers on the show clearly had some expectations about what would happen (Dalrympe’s embracing their Maori heritage for example), it was indeed telling that the ‘emigrant’ Smith’s were more open and respectful of what to them was entirely unknown Maori culture.
One of our friends commented, when is season two coming? I think for once this is a reality TV show that would benefit hugely from a second run, possibly with more people, and being able to compare progress in say the 1870′s.
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