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Matangi - 2
W Rangi. 1920s

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1 - Wharetini Rangi and Ana Hato
2 -The 1930s and World War 2
3 - Post-war migration and Kiri Te Kanawa
4 - Sources

In 1930 the Rotorua Maori Choir is wairangi
In the late 1920s, a few bright young Arawa girls also headed for Auckland, for well-paid employment, leaving their friends and lovers bereft. And so, in these words from a 1930 Columbia recording, the members of the Rotorua Maori Choir express their loss with more emotion and less dignity.
E rere ra, te Matangi
Ki waho tara ma
Ki reira ra koe, hine
E arohatia nei e.
     Sail on, Matangi
away from our mountain peaks.
You are there on that ship, oh girl,
so loved by me here on shore
Haere ra te aroha5
Ki runga tu rawa
Waiho au i muri nei
Noho wairangi6 ai e
     Farewell my love
standing up so high.
leaving me here
going out of my mind with desire

5. "Te a-ro-ha" is standard pronunciation and better than the forced "Te A-raa-wa," but it is not standard Maori speech.

6. Wai-rangi means 'watery-minded' - emotionally disturbed, irrational, hysterical, infatuated.


 But 'Ta-ra ma' was not a common phrase, and soon 'Tau-rau-nga" was substituted. In this next version, from Sam Freedman's songbook, we are told of a girl who was going to Auckland, and the aroha line is also made more grammatical.

E rere ra, Matangi
Ke waho Tauranga
Kei reira ra koe, hine
E arohatia nei e.

Mauria taku aroha
Ki Akarana e
Waiho au i muri nei
Noho wairangi ai e.

     Sail on, Matangi
away from Tauranga harbour
You are there on the ship, oh girl,
so loved by me here in Tauranga

Take my love with you
to Auckland
leaving me here
going out of my mind with desire for you


A 1940s Arawa soldier is tangitangi for his distant sweetheart ...

And now, in World War 2, it is once again the man who has gone away, far far away to the Middle East. He asks the wailing wind, te ma-tangi, to take his feelings of loss and fear back to Arawa territory, and then return to him with his girl's passionate, reassuring love.

E rere ra te matangi7
I waho Maketu8
Kei reira ra koe - e hine
Noho wairangi ai e

Mauria mai to aroha
Ki i tawhiti e
Waiho au i muri nei
Tangitangi hotu ai e.
     Fly the wind yonder
from Maketu
where you, oh darling,
are going out of your mind with desire for me

May the wind carry your love
To this distant place
where I now stay,
wailing and sobbing.


7. te matangi, with a small m, is the wind that comes wailing, "ma - tangi," a very old word from Java's "angin." On the other hand, a refreshing breath of wind is a "hau," a Maori word originating in Tahiti.

8. Maketu is the bay where Te Arawa people came ashore from Hawaiiki. The singer says that only the wind can travel those great distances now, from the Middle East to his Te Arawa homeland, and then back again.

In December 1993, the Hon. Peter Tapsell, the member for Eastern Maori was elected as Speaker of the New Zealand House of Parliament. As a formal waiata after his acceptance speech, he sung this version of Matangi. Hansard

Dr Tapsell kindly wrote to me and told me that he learnt this version from his elders when he was a boy growing up at Makutu.

Notice how the song has changed. In the 1920s it was the voice of a mature, well-educated 40-year-old in a peaceful theological college telling of his deep love for his rock-steady mountain-wife 200 miles away.

Now we hear the voice of a lonely, frightened teenage soldier in a murderous war ten thousand miles away from his lovesick and vulnerable girlfriend.

... and Rev Waretini salutes the hospital ship Maunganui.

Haere ra "Maunganui"
Ki waho Hitini
Kei reira ra to iwi
E arohatia nei e

    

We passed the hospital ship "Maunganui"
outside Sydney harbour
with your kinfolk on board
so loved by us.


Toby Rikihana gives this third verse in his Waiata Maori songbook. Note how similar it is to verse 2 of the 1920s song. Was it written by Padre Wharetini Rangi on his way to Egypt to join the 28th Maori Battalion?

The Official History of the Maori Battalion says Padre Wharetini Rangi was 55 when he enlisted, although his army records give his year of birth as 1891, making him "49 years old." Thus he was rather old for infantry work, with three sons serving with him in the battalion, but the Official History says he made little of age and was giving splendid service up to the time when both his eardrums were burst by an exploding shell at Alamein. NZETC
The 7500 ton "S.S.Maunganui," carrying 2,200 troops, was the largest of New Zealand's troopships in WW1.

In WW2 she was refitted as a very well appointed hospital ship, with a staff of 104 doctors, nurses and orderlies.

On 10 June 1941 she left Suez with a full load of 298 Kiwi casualties from Greece and Crete, plus 40 Australians.

She eventually carried 5677 patients on 16 return voyages, the final one in March 1946, when she brought home the last of 2NZEF's invalids from Italy and Egypt. NZMar



NEXT >>

 1 - Wharetini Rangi and Ana Hato
2 - The 1930s and World War 2
3 - Post-war migration, Kiri
4 - Sources