WE A R ING HIS M ĀOR ITA NGA WITH PR IDE B Y J A N I N E J AC K S O N
Russell Riki pictured on the day he received his mataora which occurred during the same weekend as Koroneihana - the celebration of the reign of Māori monarch Kiingi Tuheitia Pōtatau Te Wherowhero VII. Images by Fe Rooney.
R
ussell Riki doesn’t take his role as the local kaumatua lightly.
Not only does he feel the weight of his community, both Māori and Pākehā, but always at his side are his ancestors. He now wears his pride in his whakapapa front and centre with a mataora (full facial tattoo) he received the same weekend as Koroneihana - the celebration of the reign of Māori monarch Kiingi Tuheitia Pōtatau Te Wherowhero VII. An auspicious time for Tainui to kawemate (remember lost loved ones), and when politics are debated, Russell, 62, chose local artist Simon Te Wheoro as ringataa (tattooist) for the eight-hour sitting at Poihakena Marae. “I meant to get this done when I turned 50 and the only reason I declined was because I felt I didn’t have the right because I’d married outside of the tribe,” he says. For the past 10 years it has been on his mind. He had encouraged many women who came to him seeking advice about getting their moko kauae; advising them to talk to the spirits of their ancestors and family. 4 | Raglan Chronicle Magazine Issue November 2022
The seed of wanting his mataora started to grow stronger and stronger, and he finally heeded his own advice.
Māori was the family’s first language and as the eldest son there was an expectation that he would learn the old traditions to keep them alive.
Covid saw plans for his mataora ceremony postponed until this year on his birthday on 21 August, which falls during Koroneihana. Russell chose Poihakena Marae because that was where he first stood in front of the Māori Queen at age 27.
Spending much of his younger years with the tribal elders, Russell learnt the old ways by osmosis, as he says; everything was oral and nothing was written down.
“This day is something my children, their offspring and my friends will remember for the rest of their lives,” he says. Whaingaroa rangatira Wetinimahikai from Rakaunui Paa was Russell’s last tupuna (ancestor) to walk amongst the elders who were adorned with mataora and moko kauae. Mahikai, who died in 1899, could recite back 20 generations of his whakapapa. Russell grew up with his grandparents on their farm at Waikaretu, between Raglan and Port Waikato. They moved to Rakaunui Paa in Raglan for his grandfather Kuru Riki Wahanga to live his final years on tupuna land. Russell was a young teenager at the time and this was a very different place from Waikaretu where he had spoken little English.
“The old people would be chanting and I would just be around caring for them and always listening.” At 15 years old, Russell ran off to Wellington to escape an arranged marriage proposed by the elders. Reluctant to return as he knew he had shamed the tribe, it was his grandmother’s death a year and a half later that drew him back home. He didn’t stay long, moving to Auckland and then Palmerston North where he met his wife Marianne Foster on his 21st birthday. Bringing her home to introduce her to the family didn’t go too well; his grandfather didn’t accept the relationship to a Pākehā. Russell went back to Palmerston North with Marianne to start a family but a year later the elders had convinced his grandfather to take Russell back, and to accept his wife.
