“For a long time, we’ve had more of a focus on equality in health, where the approach has been ‘one size fits all’. But we know that this doesn’t work for our Pacific and Māori communities. What’s needed is an equity focus.” — Dr Dianne Sika-Paotonu.
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“I lived and worked in 30 countries, going around and around the planet trying to find out where I belonged. And, hey, the answer was right back where I started, where I am now in Te Puna.” — Tommy Wilson.
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“You know, anyone’s success belongs to a whole island of people. That’s one thing that Mum taught us. Never forget that your success is dependent on every person connected to you — and who’s helped you.” — Leatuao Larry Tua’i-Lavea.
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“I grew up as a young Sāmoan kid watching rugby, and Bryan Williams was my idol. . . . So there we had the first Sāmoan All Black who was also a lawyer, and I thought: ‘Man! That is really something.’” — Judge Mike Mika.
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“It’s really cool to see the narrative change, with people speaking up about their struggles — sharing all the different shapes and shades of ourselves, and not just talking about the things that are good.” — Sulu Fitzpatrick.
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“I grew up in Porirua. It was a very Polynesian upbringing — Sunday lunches with Nan at her house with taro and chop suey and that sort of thing.” — Monique Fiso.
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“Black Power Movement was about us discovering, defining, and becoming conscious of our taha Māori and who we were as Māori — and being able to maintain that in our lives.” — Genesis Te Kuru White.
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“My job is to create compelling alternatives to the policy failure and the market failure that continues to keep South Auckland poor.” — Tania Pouwhare.
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“My pathway into the Mob wasn’t one of crime. It has always been one of: ‘How do we develop people?’” — Harry Tam.
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“It’s only recently that we started to talk about ‘the Māori calendar’ — which doesn’t actually make sense. Because there’s over 500 of these calendars.” — Rereata Makiha, an expert on maramataka and ancestral knowledge.
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“It was just incredible to go back and lift our tūpuna out of the shadows, and to say: ‘These women, they were part of the story. So, let’s raise them up.’” — Amanda Malu, chief executive of Plunket.
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“When we can show people how we’re all connected, there will be more motivation to stand and fight as a region.” — Dr Emalani Case.
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“Mainstream health hasn’t done wairua well, or whānau well. So we’ve developed our own Māori model of health care.” — Dr Lily Fraser.
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“Sometimes we need to challenge the status quo and put forward our ideas so that we can shift the ground.” — Nigel Borell.
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“No party member is interested in anyone else beyond Winston leading the movement and fighting the good fight in 2023.” — Shane Jones.
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“They treated us poorly. But that was the only life I knew, so I thought things were fine.” — Bernie O’Donnell.
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“I’ve fallen in love with what it means to be Māori.” — Tony Kemp.
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“We have to treat every Pacific student as being precious because they are precious. And we should remember that each student is a connection to an entire community.” — Dr Sereana Naepi.
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“What outsiders see as mobsters, I see as bros and the people I grew up with and could trust.” — James Papali’i.
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“Rather than looking towards North America or Europe for inspiration, I took inspiration from Māori and Pacific ideas because that’s what I could relate to.” — Lama Tone.
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“As we embrace te reo Māori, as we embrace kaupapa like Matariki . . . we’re starting to indigenise Aotearoa.” — Che Wilson, Te Pāti Māori president.
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“Moving back to the Coast, I found two things that would become the love of my life outside my family. One was East Coast rugby and the other was Radio Ngāti Porou.” — Bailey Mackey.
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“It’s up to us to keep fighting for our language and ensure its survival. Our language is essential to our identity as Māori.” — Reikura Kahi.
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“You’ve got hundreds of years of research and development behind the wharenui that we see today. That doesn’t even take into account the building knowledge that our ancestors brought with them from Polynesia.” — Professor Deidre Brown.
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“Weaving is my way of connecting my past and present with my future — that is, with my children and my mokopuna.” — Veranoa Hetet.
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“I think what contemporary Pacific art tells us is what the truth of our reality is.” —artist-curator Ema Tavola.
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“Even though our Māori asset base is now worth $70 billion, that doesn’t mean anything if our families, who are still the working poor, can’t look after one another.” —Traci Houpapa.
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“We weren’t seeing true reflections of ourselves on screen. The reflections we were seeing on screen were nearly always driven by Pākehā. Mostly Pākehā men.” — Briar Grace-Smith.
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“When you’re around those whānau and individuals who’ve been broken, at the heart of that brokenness is a lack of belief in how extraordinary we are as a people.” — Dr Ella Henry.
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“No one was jealous when we had one-quarter of an acre. No one was jealous when we had the city sewer pipe spewing tiko and baby foetuses and amputated arms and legs right in front of our meeting house.” — Ngarimu Blair.
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E-Tangata is an online Sunday magazine specialising in stories that reflect the experiences of Māori and Pasifika in Aotearoa.
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