Tiki Haere

He Whakamatautau

2008-07-11T14:08:00.000-07:00

I thought y'all would know I was only kidding about the exam at blog's end. Engari, since four of you have made mention of it I thought I'd better pull finger and set an exam, so here goes:

How many fingers am I holding up?

Now that I'm back, I'm
(a) exhausted
(b) broke
(c) drunk
(d) consumed with work
(e) other (please specify) ______________________

What's the name of Joseph's baby Momma? (Spanish and Maori language equivalents will be accepted).

I think the cowboy on the wall in Pilsen is Anthony Quinn, why?

Got any fry bread?

Finish this sentence: When I talk to the Pakeha I .....

Finish this sentence too: The best thing about the Tikihaere blog is ..... [note: 'it's finished' is not an answer].

Empty your handbag/manbag and explain everything in it.

What's the one thing you thought I'd comment on but I didn't?

Send your answers to 27.5 people who like pink and a plasma screen tv will be couriered to your whare within 24 hours. Or send your answers to me and I'll grade them according to how much they make me laugh.

Hiki Tu Hiki Ora

2008-07-05T12:38:00.000-07:00

She's back! She's exhausted, she's broke, she can't figure out where the extra luggage came from. And try as I might, I can't get her to do the submissive, reclining, dusky maiden pose that was suggested (by you, eh Amo?). She's got her own self-determining mind, that Hiki.

It was a good flight home, clear and smooth all the way until it was time to descend into cold, wet and dark Auckland. It helped, no doubt, to use my airpoints to upgrade to Premium. It's not first class, but you get everything first class gets except the bed thingy. And the seats are bigger and recline further than in economy. Also, I got to use the Maple Leaf (Air Canada) Lounge at the airport. The way to get your money's worth out of those lounges is to drink as much of the free booze as you can before departure. Overall, Hiki gives Air New Zealand Premium two thumbs up.

Melissa and I are off to Melbourne tomorrow for the Australian History Association Conference. Melissa's presenting, and I'm going to lead the cheer squad, yay.

Last Weekend

2008-06-30T17:50:00.000-07:00

Wow, what a last weekend I had in Vancouver, largely thanks to Corinne (who I met at the beginning of the month) and John, and Corinne's warm and generous whanau. Corinne's iwi is Wet'suwet'en (I think, there's a little bit of guess work going on because I've been having trouble distinguishing the spelling from the pronunciation.) They're from northern BC, at the 'top of the lakes' a place described as the first to get the snow in the winter, and the last to thaw out in the summer. It's moose, bear and salmon country. Corinne and her whanau insisted I won't have really seen Canada until I see their territory.

John and Corinne picked me up on Saturday and we followed the coastline just below UBC here and made our way to North Vancouver. The weather meant that much of the Vancouver population had flocked to the beaches so it was pretty busy. At North Vancouver we went to the Squamish Rez, where I met Carla and Brian and their family. (Brian is Cornne's tungange and the mataamua of their family). We took a nice walk to the North Vancouver beach and I got to step into the Squamish nation's part of the Pacific, watched over by those imposing maunga of theirs. There's a little bay on the way to the main beach where dogs are allowed off their leash. In practice that means the dogs (encouraged by their owners) have the run of that particular spot. There must've been a dozen dogs swimming there as we passed. Well, turns out that the dogs are allowed off their leashes on the beach and park areas that are on Squamish lands. Meanwhile, dogs have to remain leashed on the publicly owned areas. Carla made a comment about how it seems okay to have different standards for Squamish lands and attempts at change attract cries of denial of public rights. I said something like the public could maybe enjoy their dogs on the land they got by virtue of colonisation. And Carla said something about my response being the response of an historian. Goes without saying that we had a lot to talk about and share.

This totem is at the end of a pier on the main North Vancouver beach. We sat below it and Carla and Corinne totally privileged me with some singing and drumming. Carla is an accomplished singer and has been teaching Corinne. Her first waiata was her granny's favourite, a snowbird song. Carla's granny died earlier this year so, as you can imagine, I shed a few tears while she sang. But I was cool, you know, just a few quiet tears for grandmothers and their granddaughters, no great sobbing mess. She also did a healing song, and Corinne did an honouring women song and a celebration song.

After hanging out at the beach and Carla and Brian's, John, Corinne and I drove to the opposite side of Vancouver, Steveston, a little fishing village where the south arm of the Fraser River meets the sea. So it was fish and chips on the waterfront for dinner, and sunset on the horizon.

Sunset over Vancouver and the gulf islands, from Steveston.

I met even more of the whanau on Sunday, and took up an invitation to church and a ceremony for Carla and Brian's son, Brian Jr. Yes, I went to church and it wasn't part of a tangi or wedding or unveiling etc. So you can all pick your jaws up now. How could I not go? It was 29 June, the feast of Saints Peter and Paul. And church was at St Paul's Squamish Catholic Church. It has a garden dedicated to the Squamish elders next door, which includes a statue of Mary in a little grotto. And there's also a roll of honour for their soldiers. Built in 1884, St Paul's is the oldest surviving Catholic church in northern Vancouver. Before the railway was built directly in front of it, it was right on the shoreline and the locals could just row their waka right up to the steps. Corinne described St Paul's as small, and I smiled, and imagined that three of our small North Hokianga churches could fit inside it. It was an interesting exercise for me. I realised that although I don't go to church that often when I do go mass, or most of it, is usually in te reo. I guess that's got something to do with mostly going to church when I'm up north. But, my Catholic education proved itself and I was surprised at how easily the prayers (and the actions) came back to me. The hymns were new to me though.

St Paul's Squamish Catholic Church

Mmm, Mary

After church we went to Carla's parents' home, also on the Rez, and I got to be a part of an incredibly special family ceremony for Brian Jr. I guess I would describe it as a transition or puberty ceremony. I probably don't have the language or the cultural know-how to be trusted to clearly convey what I witnessed, but there were some key principles that I'll be packing in my luggage to bring home with me. I guess the ceremony (where the food came first, like at the Chicago American Indian Centre) was an acknowledgement of Brian Jr's achievements to date, where his whanau members got to publicly voice their aroha and pride for him, to give advice where they saw fit, to talk about his whanau and whakapapa and heritage. It was too much, and I was moved in a way that I can't really express. And I cried again. And not in a cool way either. I basically got invited to speak, and I stood up and water came out of my face. I just think it was a great thing to do for a young fulla. He's 13, will start high school in the fall, killed his first moose last summer, has had his Indian name made public, and from all accounts is a good boy, and even good boys have those teenage-parent tensions. To have a day that was essentially an acknowledgement of a young person was such a powerful thing to me. His cousins and his sister seemed to listen to everything that was said, which really caught my attention. Even though I've never been a part of something like that, it seemed like such an obvious and sensible thing to do. I'll be beating my drum about that one when I get home. And Mohi, you seem like a prime candidate to me: You finish intermediate this year and start high school next year. You just entered your teens. You've been on your first pig hunt - don't know if you've caught anything though. We'll see what we can dream up, eh.

Today, Monday, it was back to the research grindstone. Nothing too taxing though, just tidying up a few of those loose ends. Found this cartoon too, from mid-1981 when a group of women occupied the Vancouver office of the Department of Indian Affairs, an expression of longstanding dissatisfaction with the administration of Indian affairs generally. The whole story has a familiar familiar ring.

Vancouver

2008-06-27T16:40:00.000-07:00

One of the carvings in the First Nations Long House at UBC.

Wednesday in Vancouver turned out to be quite an auspicious day, for a while anyway. Corinne asked me if I was interested in going to a tribute to the indigenous Canadian actor Graham Greene. (You might know him from Thunderheart, Maverick, Dances With Wolves, Skins, The Green Mile, and other flicks). Well, who am I to say no? And saying yes meant I had to get off campus using public transport (bus and train), which has got to be a good thing. On the bus ride into town I talked to a woman who works at the Museum of Anthropology. She was cool, very friendly, and thought she had seen me on campus before. We spotted a couple of urban eagles. Well she spotted them and pointed them out, and I just got all drop-jawed. The eagle is such a majestic bird, and to see two of them high above the city skyline, indifferent to the drive time rush, was pretty special. My impromptu kaiawhina said eagles are seen now and then in the city, though most people aren't looking skyward so don't notice. She said they're a good omen, an affirmation that you're on the right path (or right bus, as the case may be).

Graham Greene was funny, quick-witted and, unfortunately, rude when it came time to press the flesh. He could have been feeling unwell or tired or whatever, but if that was the case he should have bowed out of the post-talk reception. Turning up only to completely ignore people who approached him to shake his hand and say a few words of appreciation (it was a tribute after all) was just plain rude in my book. Corinne was disappointed and kept apologising to me. I wasn't going to mention it, but I've had a couple of days to reflect, and figured he was comfortable saying derrogatory things about fellow-actors so in some ways I'm just following his example, at least that's what I'll tell myself so I can sleep tonight.

One of the fun things about using public transport, besides that strange feeling of never knowing for sure where you are, is that you get to parts of the city you might not otherwise. After the Graham Greene disappointment we headed off to the Indian Friendship Centre (kinda like the Chicago American Indian Centre, which kinda reminded me of Te Unga Waka) for West Coast night. Well, we literally got there for the last few beats of the drum. Never mind, on the bus ride there I got to see a seedier side of Vancouver - the drug-dealing, crack-head precint downtown, apparently the worst in the North America. I guess the police turn a blind eye, we even got to watch dude score his weed then sit down in a bus shelter and roll-up. The interesting thing is that the junkies and co. crowd around a gorgeous historical builing - the Carnegie Public Library. After the Friendship Centre we strolled up Commercial Road to the train station, via an Indian neighbourhood where the young ones milled around on the corner drinking (sound familiar?) and a hip, cafe culture neighbourhood. I guess I saw three or four different Vancouvers in one night. Not too different from Auckland then.

I've been working too. I hit the Koerner Library yesterday, and the Xwi7xwa (pronounced kui-wa) Library today. I had better luck at the Xwi7xwa and will go back again on Monday, checking out some records they've got on the British Columbia Indian Homemakers' Association. I like this by-law from their constitution: "Indian men will be allowed into the Society without voice or vote or holding office, but will be allowed to speak to members of the meeting with the consent of the meeting".

The Xwi7xwa Library is part of the Long House complex. The whole complex and grounds is a really nice, peaceful space. The library is in a circular building. This top photo is taken from outside the library looking up, and the next photo is looking back down to the library from above. It's hard to describe, and just as hard to find something to say about the spelling for Xwi7xwa.

It's a long weekend here, Canada Day on Tuesday. And it's definitely summer. I can tell by the strawbs and the cherries, the outdoor festivals and flip-flops (jandals). There are a lot of people around, on-campus and off. And those magnificent mountains in the background, constantly, missing nothing, and ocassionally sending out an eagle to take a closer look. This time next week I'll be home.

There's something unsettling or surreal about heroic mountains as permanent backdrop to Vancouver city, especially when the landscape I'm most familiar with is Auckland and Taitokerau.

Saskatoon to Vancouver

2008-06-25T09:13:00.000-07:00

I'm back in Vancouver with seven sleeps to go, staying at the University of British Columbia (UBC). I don't think I realised how pretty it is when I was here at the beginning of the month - I must've been so focussed on the conference (and running from building to building in the rain). But pretty it is - the pic is taken from campus - and the weather is lovely, fine and sitting in the low to mid 20s, so not as hot as other parts of the country, but still v.nice.

I think it's official: I'm all conferenced out. My paper the other day was average. I got a few questions which I usually take as a good sign. But it was still average. Good to make some more contacts though.

The weather at Saskatoon was fantastic. And the conferencing was broken up by a Neville Brothers gig and National Aboriginal Day.

The Neville Bros were fantabulous. And I know there have been plenty of opportunities to see them live in Aotearoa, but there was something extra-special about seeing them perform in the Beesborough Gardens, a short walk from where we're staying and on the river bank. It's a smallish outdoor venue, so it was a nice-sized laidback crowd. According to the media coverage, Aaron Neville hasn't sung since his wife died early last year. According to the review the next morning, the big hits that got the crowd going were Everybody Plays the Fool and Tell It Like It Is. Tell It... was pretty special, but my personal pick was Don't Take Away My Heaven. Aaron's voice seemed to crack with emotion, and he looked like he wiped away a tear, even though they all come across as far too cool for tears. But it's my blog/fantasy so I'll write it how I see/dream it.

All in all it was a fantabulous night - easy weather, venue, crowd as the backdrop to the relaxed funky groovy soulful Neville Bros. (So relaxed I thought Aaron was going to sing with his hands in his pockets).

Another highlight of the weekend was chancing upon a National Aboriginal Day event in a park just beyond where the Neville Bros performed. So we caught the welcoming dance, kai (including fry bread, yay). Apparently National Aboriginal Day used to be called National Aboriginal Solidarity Day until it was 'mainstreamed'. We trawled the stalls and I nearly traded an arm and a leg for a beautiful soft rich alpaca wool cape. Mmmm. Lucky for me I literally walked straight into Corrine, a first nations woman who I met in Vancouver and who I'd already planned to hook up with later this week. By the time I caught up with her and her husband it was time to get back to the conference and there was no time to leave my arm and leg behind after all.

The conference I went to was run in conjunction with a performing arts type festival. So the closing event was a night of poetry and readings and drumming/singing. It was a special night, but I found it hard to sustain my concentration after three days of conferencing. Might be a lesson in there somewhere. One of the conference organisers was kind enough to pick up fellow-panelist, Catherine, and I and take us to Wanuskewin, a traditional winter settlement for plains peoples. There's a buffalo jump there where the tangata whenua herded the buffalo and drove them over a bank. And I guess that was their kai for the winter. It's one of a handful of places where I was struck dumb. And it wasn't really about the buffalo like it seemed to be for others. It was more about the loss of culture stuff, that their tupuna would've been in that place for generations, all that. Things I can't really articulate. I liked it up by the medicine wheel too, watched an eagle sailing on the wind, and for some reason didn't tell my mates, just totally indulged myself watching it float high above the river until it disappeared somewhere between the plains and the sky. It was a gentle space. Nice.

Monday was last call for drinks in Saskatoon. So I had a pleasant walk in the sunshine, met one of the Native Studies dudes for lunch, and watched a bit of the Aboriginal People's Televsion Network, before crashing. Tuesday, Catherine and I were up by six to get to the airport by seven. So it was an early start to our day, and we were able to take in the Museum of Anthropology, at the University of British Columbia where I'll be staying (and researching) for the next week or so.

The Museum of Anthropology was interesting. The focus of the main hall seems to be the West Coast/Salish peoples, so it has a particular look, which is unlike what I've seen in other parts of the country. The museum itself is a fab building, and its reputation as a must-see is well-deserved. I guess that means it attracts lots of overseas visitors (like myself) and lots of cameras also, as you can see below.

Imager-takers at the Museum of Anthropology, UBC. Doll in the carving doesn't look too impressed.

It's back to work for me this week - there are a couple of archival collections I want to check out. Plus there are a couple of people I want to touch base with before I leave. And only seven days to do it in.

Winnipeg to Saskatoon

2008-06-20T00:05:00.000-07:00

Hiki on a buffalo hide at Lower Fort Garry, down river from downtown Winnipeg. There were lots of fun and games to be had at Lower Fort Garry.

I only had two sleeps in Winnipeg but had an absolutely jam-packed, fun-filled, mad time. And yet Winnipeg is one of those places some people had suggested avoiding. I couldn't quite make out why but I think it may have been a race thing. MaryJane and Kiera, like Sabrina and Sue at Six Nations, and Danielle in Ottawa, and all their friends and family that I've met and hung out with have totally spoilt me. So Winnipeg was more food and laughter and conversation and tiki-touring and learning and more shopping. It's the kind of stuff that leaves me speechless when it comes time to say thank you and au revoir.

One of the places MJ insisted on taking me was Lower Fort Garry which was a trading post, fort and site of the signing of the first of the Crown's eleven treaties with the First Nations peoples. It's now a natinal park and contains some of the best examples of early (lime)stone buildings in Western Canada. The fun part of the park is that the interpreters or guides are all in 1850s costume and in role-playing mode. And no matter how much you bait them they stay in character the whole time. And they play real characters. No matter how much I cringed, I had so much fun there.

The thing is that this is an early western north american fort, and part of the original fort wall remains. It's a site of colonial violence against the indigenous people. And yet when we asked about things like whether natives would've really been welcome guests in the big (governor's) house we were assured that race and class were not issues at Lower Fort Garry. I asked what period we were talking about, and was told 1850s. We got a similar response at the trading store when we asked whether the natives got the same prices as the whites. MJ insisted that Kiera and I were harassing the poor uni students that take on the jobs of interpreters. But I insisted we were just asking questions. The whole place had this surreal peace and love vibe about it. One of the nice ironies was to do with a couple of school groups that were there when we visited. Some of them got etiquette lessons in the big house, while others played croquet, while others still did military drills with wooden guns. Is learning to handle a gun 1850s etiquette? I felt we should've line up against the wall and feigned execution. Apparently the costume and role-playing is what the Canadians do in their national parks, it's a way of educating the public to love Canada's loving and peaceful a-colonial past. Fabulous.

Kiera's choice: Hiki climbing through the fort wall.

Hiki and Queen Viki. I have to say I don't think I've seen a pic of Queen Vic at such a young age. Unfortunately there was no date in the details of the image, and I wished I had my women in the 19th century notes so I could try and date the pic according to the period in which the dress would have been in vogue. Oooh, what an historical feat that would have been.

Hiki on one of the wagons at Lower Fort Garry. MJ and Kiera said I was endangering her by letting her balance precariously in such a dangerous place. I said she was catching the wagon to school and would come home all whitened up and assimilated, and replete with the benefits of colonisation.

After Lower Fort Garry and another amazing feed, MJ and I high-tailed it to Saskatoon - an 800km drive away. I did a lot of the driving while MJ played with her new A5-sized pink laptop that I have been coveting. Well, she didn't really play with it, she took notes while her and I talked about this chapter we're writing together. The drive was across the plains, in a manual car with the gears on the right-hand side, and everytime I went to indicate the wipers came on. And a couple of times when I had to make a left-hand turn I turned onto the right-hand side of the road, and my dear friend MJ just laughed at me. I was so pleased to be able to entertain her. The drive took us through the Manitoba and Saskatchewan plains, which can be boring if you're not into that kind of landscape, but we were fortunate to be treated to a spectacular lightning storm, arcs of pink and blue light forking from the sky to the ground. Loved it.

The last of the conferences I'm attending started today, and four of us who have been working on some of the iwi projects did a workshop. I think it went well. It wasn't as tightly prepared as I usually prefer, especially my part, but we got plenty of questions and met some wonderful people. It's a good conference so far. The University of Saskatchewan seems to be up to some good stuff, especially where indigenous scholarship is concerned. And there are lots of good people to meet. I give an academic paper in the morning - still milking the PhD research - and in the evening we're off to the Neville Brothers who are opening the Saskatoon Jazz Festival. Sounds like a plan, yeah? I'll let you know soon enough if it's a good one.

Ottawa

2008-06-16T08:52:00.000-07:00

Fabulous views of part of Ottawa's CBD from the hotel room

And so it begins... the PM's apology for the residential schools had barely passed his lips when one of the Tory MPs had to apologize for saying that indigenous Canadians need to learn the value of hard work more than they need compensation for abuse suffered in residential schools. He's in big time trouble - not. Canadians are divided over how classy his words were, with the usual criticisms coming through about paranoid political correctness. I'm not sure how long the media will spin the apology story for - from what I can tell it lost headline status within 24 hours. Meanwhile, the smear campaign against Obama has turned its attention to his wife, Michelle, accusing her of using the term 'whitey' in a fiery sermon some years ago - like that's a major crime.

As for me, this week I returned to the research agenda. Library and Archives Canada is an easy walk from where I'm staying, along 'Confederation Boulevard' which is a route through the city that takes in the key government and related sites like the National Arts Centre, Parliament, the Supreme Court, Federation Square, the War Memorial - you get the picture. The Library and Archives is near the Ottawa River, and I keep half expecting to glimpse the sea, just because of the way the land falls away in that part of town. The Museum of Civilisation is across the river and therefore across the state border in Quebec. Hopefully I'll get time to visit on the weekend, but they're so civilised here that the Archive and Library is open on Saturdays and Sundays. Service is pretty good. You can take your handbag (or manbag if you're a boy) in, but most things are on microfilm and original files are held off-site and take days to bring in. I've got plenty to look at on microfilm (yuk - headache material) but it means copying can only be done on the machines at 20 cents a sheet. Interesting stuff, more indigenous snap, this time about the Indian Homemakers' Clubs which were very similar to the Maori Women's Welfare League.

Ottawa meant I was back to getting stared at and misunderstood in this grand multi-ethnic city, where most people seem to slip easily between French and English. The most honest response was from the woman at the deli who said "what!?" when I asked for a bagel and cream cheese. When I asked again, she laughed. Spent Sunday out and about in the very beautiful Gatineau Hills with Danielle who I met in Vancouver. The Hills are over in Quebec where the bilingualism ends and all the road signs etc. are in French. We lunched at a little village called Chelsea; again, very French. While we were there we were treated to a spectacular storm - thunder, lightning, hail, downpours. It stayed warm though, and sunny in between storms. We were still happy to not be one of the hundreds of hikers and bikers that were out that day, not to mention the many people swimming and canoeing at Meech Lake (not only pretty, but also historical: the site of negotiations for the Meech Lake Accord, basically a failed attempt to amend the Canada Constitution. The Accord was opposed in numerous quarters but really fell dead in the Manitoba legislative assembly where the First Nations protested an attempt to bypass public consultation and Native MP Elijah Harper famously raised an eagle feather to record his opposition in a vote that needed to be unanimous). My last dinner in Ottawa was at a Mexican place where Danielle and I were joined by another friend, Marlene. The restaurant is called Ahora - another thing for my name to get mixed up with. The area we ate in was v. nice, an older part of town but all tarted up for the 21st century; a pretty place for a late night stroll under a nearly full moon and a sky clearing after a day of storming.

I like Ottawa, and think I could easily come back here. It's a big city but apparently has a population of less than 800,000. It looks like a diverse city to me - or at least it's not a standardised city, or it's got no defining characteristic that I could put my finger on. It has different kinds of architecture, and different nationalities (Jamaican, North African, Middle Eastern, Asian) and languages and foods. The embassies are here, but they're not obviously lined up in a single neighbourhood like they were in DC. Even parliament and the national museum and some of the government agencies are spread out in the city rather than in one precint. So though Ottawa has got all the components of a capital city, it's not obviously a capital city.

Here's Hiki at one of Ottawa's war memorials. This one was built c.1950 from memory. It's an arch between two buildings and one of the buildings was to house the Veterans' Affairs Department. It's an interesting French-like look.

It's Monday morning now, and I've got to pack my stuff (again) and catch a plane to Winnipeg. I'm going to hang out with Mary Jane for a couple of days and then I think we're driving to Saskatoon for the last of the conferences I'm here for - better write that conference paper then.

Second Summer

2008-06-11T22:14:00.000-07:00

Kia ora all. Thanks for the few emails of support regarding the demise of Piki. Special thanks to Melissa for not filing a report with CYFS. (Mind you, it was only because she couldn't figure out whether I should be considered abandonned or Piki. But at least she didn't suggest that Piki absconded from my (poor) care). A couple of you noticed that I've never explained why Tiki disappeared off the scene. Well, he's safe and in a box with a pile of business cards. He wasn't very co-operative with the camera, unlike both Piki and Hiki, who are very photogenic, don't you think?

Anyways, Ontario is doing heatwave (with tornado watch thrown in for good measure on Sunday). It means I'm having second summer - sweetcorn, watermelon, strawbs, and temperatures that are meant to head into the low 30s. Loving it! Well, kinda. The humidity is unlike any I've ever felt before, and the mosquitos so thick I think I should never complain about mossies in NZ again. When it's that hot and humid steam rises up from the paddocks and trees after the rain like a light fog in some places. While all that's going on, the lightning puts on a display flashing red and blue from behind thick silver clouds. Cool, love a good storm.

My inner girly swot has resurfaced, and I've been at work on an article and a funding application, while also eating extraordinarily well thanks to Sabrina and Sue. Judging by the emails, I think some of you (Haley, Robyn) are turning into girly swots too - asking if the end-of-blog test will be open-book, and listing off the things you remember from your catch up reading just to prove you have been reading. I never thought setting an exam could be so much fun.

Monday night Sue gave me the patented tour of the Rez, with comparative insights provided by going off Rez here and there. Went to her Long House, and the local village of Ohsweken where we had kai at the local Chinese restaurant. An interesting experience, the place had a kinda retro look, the food was good, and you can smoke there. I can't remember the last time I went to a restaurant that allowed smoking.

The touring continued on Tuesday. I spent a little time with Sabrina at the Ohsweken public library and then we went to Brantford to the Goodminds Bookshop which is an Indigenous North American store, and I love it. It's got books for academics, educators, children, general readers plus DVDs and CDs. It stocks all my faves: Sherman Alexie, Thomas King, Louise Erdrich. We need a bookshop just like it in NZ I reckon, and funnily enough the store owner asked if we had a similar bookshop in NZ. I said not that I knew of. I mentioned Huia Publishers, though, and he said he'd heard of them. He had Patricia Grace's Potiki in stock too. I reckon take that concept and put a little wine bar in it with some good music playing and I've got me a retirement plan.

At Brantford I also spent a bit of time at the Woodlands Cultural Centre First Nation Resource Library, which is located in a former residential school for Indian boys and girls. I think I mentioned American residential schools in an earlier blog. The one that houses the Library closed in the late 60s, and inside it is scarily like the old part of St Joe's, with the wooden staircases and the convent-looking square rooms. They're all offices and library space now, but there's something about the dark timber joinery and the poorly-lit hallways and the lines of fluorescent lighting in the rooms that had me expecting a nun to walk through the door at any moment. Sue and I also did the Museum while we were at the centre, which had a contemporary art exhibition in one of the galleries. Really nice facility, and it was good for me to see the the libraries, Goodminds and the museum given that my mob is on the cusp of settling and we've already got plans for some kind of cultural and resource centre.

Last night was my last on the Rez and Sue took me to a pot luck dinner with a women's singers group. Man, feels like we just ate and laughed and laughed and ate. One of the women made a comment about someone's Indian donuts being the world famous. "In Six Nations?" I asked. The come-backs were thick and fast: "Where else is there?" "What does she mean - the only person at the table not from here, sitting in the middle of the Reservation?" I could go on and on with the funny one-liners on a whole range of topics, but I don't want to implicate anybody, like the mutual friend, not at the dinner, who slept in a carwash on the Rez one night. One of the most interesting things I found out on my last night was that to the indigenous ear my name sounds like Erhar, the Mohawk word for dog. Hmm, nice to have that pointed out, especially as someone earlier in the week had commented (not to me) that it pays to be careful how you say Aroha.

Overall, I had a fantastic five-day detour. I had some great conversations with Sue and Sabrina, about being indigenous in the university system, researching for government policy-makers, iwi libraries and archives, all that stuff. Oh yes, there's a whole lot of indigenous snap going on. In one of our conversations Sue said it's funny how someone you just met from the other side of the world gets you in a way that the people who have been your neighbours for hundreds of years are unable to. It's so true - true and sad.

This morning I did the train ride thing from Brantford to Ottawa. It took pretty much all day. It was a reasonable ride on a beautiful day, with a short stopover at Toronto. Outside the train station there was this (shall we say interesting?) sculpture dedicated to the ideals of multiculturalism. The plaque refers to: the United Nations international covenant on civil and political rights, 1966; Prime Minister Trudeau's official statement on multiculturalism, 1971; and the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms, 1982. Trudeau's statement reads: "There cannot be one cultural policy for Canadians of British and French Origin, another for the original peoples, and yet a third for all others. For although there are two official languages, there is no official culture. Nor does any ethnic group take precedence over any other. No citizen or group fo citizens is other than Canadian, and all should be treated fairly." Hiki was not impressed, she just rolled her eyes sideways, just like Piki used to.

Here's Hiki at the base of the multi-culturalism sculpture.

It's late and I'm only just settled into my room for the next five sleeps. The Canadian Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, apologised to former students of the Indian Residential Schools for the damaging impact of the schools on 'Aboriginal culture, heritage and language'. The apology was offered on behalf of the government and all Canadians for a 'sad chapter' in Canadian history. Harper said "Today, we recognise this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in and has no place in our country." Hmm. NZ could learn something, a Prime Minister willing to see the harm of a policy as a whole, rather than looking for evidence of specific incidents of harm, as if policy has no role. Harper also asked for the "forgiveness of the Aboriginal peoples of this country for failing them so profoundly". Well, I don't know if everyone will forgive them. Certainly there seems to have been a range of reactions from First Nations people, at lest on the mainstream media. Some have talked about accepting the apology and moving on with the healing. Some are cynical and are reserving judgment till they see the follow through. Others are still angry, and one woman was on camera asking if the Prime Minister was now going to come and teach her her language. It'll be interesting to see how it unfolds over the next few days, and also to hear indigenous responses outside of the media frame. I'm also looking forward to some good weather (mid-20s and less humid than it has been) and getting out and about in a very pretty looking city.

The Truth About Piki

2008-06-08T14:59:00.000-07:00

I have to start this blog by coming clean about Piki. I have such an intelligent readership I am sure you have already guessed that Piki didn’t go native on me, although it is true that she was last seen at the Badlands, South Dakota. I hear she’s been adopted by a family of prairie dogs, so I’m confident she’s fine. And the interesting thing (or coincidental thing) is that I got Hiki before I lost Piki, so it’s not like I did a deliberate replacement thing. I was going to buy a new Piki when I got back to Auckland, but I’ve been talked out of that plan – too dishonest and all that. I’m just glad I haven’t been reported to the authorities for being an unfit mother, doesn’t bode well, does it?

Hiki has been out and about with us since the conference finished. And she’s so lucky to have some new aunties to watch over her (or watch over me). They have already raised a number of welfare concerns with me like: locking her in the car in the heat when we stopped for gas north of Toronto; leaving her on the car roof where she took a tumble when we were on the island: and the general practice of putting her in my handbag which is why she is now suffering from handbag hair. We reckon we should do an Indigenous Planet travel guide series with Hiki as the tour guide – ‘Hiki gives it two thumbs up’, redneck businesses to avoid, etc.

Thursday was practically a perfect day all round. Susan, Mary Jane, Sabrina and I went to Vancouver Island for the night, so it was full on food and laughter again, and not enough sleep. We drove through Stanley Park, where these totems are (above), and then – ooh – we got some relief from the rain by shopping for silver jewellery at a native arts store on one of the Vancouver reservations that specialises in West Coast and Inuit art.

I think I liked everything about the island, even though it was rainy. It reminded me of home – the way the cloud sits low and it drizzles non-stop and the mist comes up through the trees. It’s definitely rain forest territory. I got to see a loon (had no idea there was such a bird) diving for fish. And my sense of direction was temporarily restored while I was on the island. It made me wonder if there’s something about the space of the continent that disorients me. I got two really special treats – or extra-special given how privileged I feel to be hanging out with these women and to be so well-looked after – out of the trip to Vancouver Island. The first was that I tasted strawberry and rhubarb. Mmm. A taste too perfect to be described and I don’t know why I haven’t tasted it before given both foods are so readily available in NZ. The second thing was the pod of orca that we saw on the return ferry ride, including one orca that came so close it was literally right below where we were standing watching. Amazing.

Flew to Ottawa on Friday, and climbed straight into Danielle's car and she drove us for six hours to Susan’s house on the Rez. Despite a big fat sleep-on on Saturday, I still suffered with a mushy, over-stimulated, over-tired, post-conference brain. I went and veged out at a yard-sale, fundraising for the Long House. Got a taste of corn soup, which uses white corn. Mmm. One of the biggest sellers at the yard sale I think.

Dancing With The Historians

2008-06-05T07:53:00.000-07:00

Since I got to Vancouver I’ve spent most of my time hanging out with a bunch of first nations brothas and sistas. Great people, great times, lots and lots of laughter. Last night we went to a seafood restaurant for kai, awesome, my first feed of kaimoana since I left NZ, and well-deserved by all of us, but especially Rob, Mary Jane and Susan whose panel discussion about indigenous historians in history rocked the ivory tower. Yes, it was a great day, indeed, to be indigenous (to mis-quote Sherman Alexie).

It’s been a good conference overall, and I’ve enjoyed a number of the papers. The highlight, though, has to have been the dance. We've been having this running joke about historians with a capital H (trained in history), and historians with a lower-case 'h' (trained in other disciplines but doing history). When we arrived late for the dance, after missing the pre-dance formalities, we decided that some of the dancing historians seemed to have a little bit of rhthym, and thought that maybe those ones were part sociologist or political scientist (or maybe had a great-great grandmother who was one-sixteenth Cree). But when they crowded on the floor for Walk Like An Egyptian and started walking/dancing like Egyptians we knew they were Historians all right.

Oh, those Historians, they're so cute when they dance, aren't they?

Short blog today, thought I'd give you plenty of time to contemplate the dancing historians. It was far too funny. Today a carload of us are off to Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, and a ferry ride away on Vancouver Island. Tomorrow I fly to Ottawa and then drive (with Danielle) to the Six Nations Reservation for the weekend. Oh, yes, I can see myself getting behind in my work as we speak – I’ve still got two conference presentations to write. I must be too tired to get nervous about it.

Chicago to Vancouver, Spanish to French

2008-06-03T07:54:00.000-07:00

I’ve liked pretty much everything about my travels so far, except the bit where you actually travel: the long queues, the long waits and the long faces of the people queuing and waiting do nothing for me. Chicago saw me off with a free search and swab. Yay, I love surprises. It wasn’t quite like the special treatment I got when I left Athens. When I was told I’d been randomly selected for a special screening (yes, for the second time in less than six weeks, how random is that) I was personally accompanied to security, taken to the front of the line and put through the usual routine of shoes off, jacket off, laptop out, gels and liquids in a plastic bag etc. Then when I got walked through the metal detector the security guy radioed for a female assist: “female assist at security 2, I need a female assist at security 2”. Unlike Athens, there was no semi-private area, I was basically on show, shoeless, for the entertainment of all and sundry, which meant I got to watch my stuff get swabbed. The female assist who showed up five minutes later was a loud ‘Merican, and she called out to the metal detector dude – “is this her here, this one? Did she alarm?”

He yelled back “No, she didn’t alarm”.

“Well just bring her over here and I’ll pat her down” said the loud ‘Merican.

So I put on my best possible stroppy face, with pukana eyes and grumpy lips, because all the other passengers are getting an eyeful, so it may as well be a good show, right, and frankly I was stroppy and grumpy about the whole random affair. So she pats me down, and I’m thinking, once again, the only time I actually want to have my photo taken I’m not allowed, because I’m not allowed to touch my stuff. And it was such a public performance I don’t know why they didn’t have it up on a screen, that way at least all the other passengers who were slowed up could be entertained while they waited. And then security could ask if I want to buy a copy of the recording, like when you do a bungy jump or something. When the loud ‘Merican female assist finished patting me down she told me in no uncertain terms not to touch my stuff till the dude who was not only touching but also swabbing my stuff said it was okay. Meanwhile, my stuff, including my passport, my wallet etc. etc. was sitting at the end of the screening conveyor belt, in easy reach of some swift pick-pocket, until the dude said “your stuff is good”. He didn’t need to tell me that, I already knew my stuff was good, I’m only capable of good stuff. I noticed a number of the security people had noticed Hiki in my handbag, and they watched me as I deliberately took a moment to check on her welfare and pat her hair into place. No one said a word. I’m going to have to work out a way to make her head spin, because that would’ve been a perfect moment to use that little party trick. When I got my checked luggage into my room in Vancouver, I was expecting the little note from customs to say they’d been searched, which is what happened in Athens, but no such calling card for me. What a disappointment, no sweet little note with the instructions on how to pack to make searching easier so that I could ignore and send straight to the bin. Instead, the only calling card I got was the carnage in my bag including spillage from some vitally important toiletry like nail polish remover.

Oh well, at least Vancouver is nice. And they get top points for the ease of getting through their airport, including the customs procedure – they just snatched that declaration card right out of my hand and I was away to the luggage carousel, and then straight out to grab a taxi. It’s bilingual here too, officially rather than informally like in Chicago, French rather than Spanish. So I’ve dropped La and El for La and Le. No one’s tried to speak to me in French though, so I take it I don’t look French, the way I looked Spanish in Pilsen, and native in South Dakota.

I was told before I came here that Vancouver is quite like New Zealand, and maybe Auckland in particular. For me it is and it isn’t. Coming into the University of British Columbia (UBC) it might be a little like Epsom, One Tree Hill, old Mt Eden – quite a moneyed leafy suburb, big homes of a certain era or with modern renovations, that kind of thing. But the trees that make the area leafy are very different trees. They’re a hell of a lot taller to start, and lots of different sorts of pines but all in that classic Christmas tree shape. It’s cold here at the moment, apparently they’ve had a wicked winter, and they’re just now coming out of a late spring into summer. It’s an icy cold, like Wellington in a southerly or maybe like Dunedin (been a few years since I was in Dunedin in the winter). It’s right on the water, and apparently there are some good seafood places to eat, though I don’t think I’ll be trying any of those places this week.

I’m pretty much on campus for the whole time, at a history conference, hanging out with a bunch of natives (or following them sheepishly, more like). I’m finding it a financially dangerous conference. Not only do they have a bookstore, but they have a book fair. And on the main floor of the main building there’s a whole lot of market-style stalls tempting me with jewellery, clothes, handbags, and various accessories. All I can say is thank goodness there are no shoes. The natives here are calling themselves IHC, pronounced "ick", an acronym for Indigenous Historians Conspiracy – just an informal banner under which to meet and eat and laugh and talk seriously about problems in indigenous histories and other stuff that can’t be randomly searched at airport security. One question I have, though, is how come Maori women have a reputation (all the way over here, amongst the native Canadians); who spread that viscious strop-provoking rumour; how come they don't have that Maori princess rumour instead, like at Pine Ridge?

I’m continuing the theme of changing my plans, so I have already accepted an invitation to change flights and accommodation to go and spend a night and a day at Vancouver Island (not even sure where that is, but what the hey) and then to fly to the Six Nations Rez in Ontario. Then I’ll get back to my original plan of checking out the government archives in Ottawa, Ontario before heading to Saskatoon via Winnepeg. I hope to see a bear at some point, apparently they’re just waking up. So that’s what I’ve got to look forward to doing, and what you’ve got to look forward to reading about, ‘cause I know you’re all such dedicated readers and dying to get an A on the end-of-blog exam I’m planning.

Blog # 35...

2008-06-01T09:23:00.000-07:00

... wherein La Blogetta (to borrow simultaneously from the idea of her maaate, Hirini, and the vernacular of the Mexican Chicago neighbourhood, Pilsen, where she has been staying for some six weeks) takes time out between cities (Chicago and Vancouver for those readers who have not kept up-to-date) to contemplate her wanderings thus far and make some random sweeping statements about the US and Chicago based on very flimsy evidence (to the extent that evidence exists at all), while also pushing the boundaries of rambling long-windedness in an attempt to imitate the style of So Far From God by the Chicana poet and novelist Ana Castilla, though not before mentioning her dad's 66th birthday on 2 June.

I think I’ve read four novels while I’ve been in Chicago (what a luxury!) and all of them wonderful in their own way, the most recent being the above-mentioned Ana Castilla’s So Far From God, a very funny story told in a strong Chicana voice about Sofia and her four girls and their crazy, tragic, extraordinary lives in the sleepy New Mexico village of Tome, and a book I recommend so highly I’ll be bringing it home with me to pass around. (Who wants to go first?)

Home: seven-and-a-half weeks down, and four-and-a-half to go before I come back home, for just two sleeps, because I’ll be heading directly across the ditch to Melbourne for a week. Home: land of fish and kumara, more than 13,000 kilometres from Chicago, a place I can say with confidence I have enjoyed, despite its various dysfunctions and inefficiencies. Chicago: it’s big and dirty, though not in the same way that Auckland is big (by New Zealand standards) and dirty.

After we got back from South Dakota, Chicago gave me everything I’ve had to date in just a couple of days: a dramatic drop in temperature, rain that poured down by the monsoon bucket, heat, humidity, sunshine, thunder, homeless people panhandling for small change, and Spanish, lots of Spanish. The boom boxes in people’s vehicles seemed louder, the cops’ sirens more frequent and aggressive, the dogs more unsettled, and I’ve had to admit that the smoky grey mist that so often veils the view to the Sears Tower is in fact pollution, and not some quirk of Chicago’s weather.

There was this one woman, this one day, a kuia, who was talking away to me in her reo and when I said I spoke no Spanish she nodded, kinda exasperated, like she already knew I didn’t understand, and waved me over to “come see” anyway. What we were looking at was a mannequin kitted out – or barely kitted out – in a tiny pair of cut-off jeans shorts, and occupying pride of place in the window of a second-hand vintage clothing and accessories store run by a couple of gay boys. Well this kuia gestured, and tut-tutted, and rolled her eyes and I knew without a word of her language that we disapproved of the mannequin with the skimpy shorts, which shared the window with a statue of Ave Maria/Hata Maria. (In fact the boys have a number of such statues for sale). She walked off with just one more attempt at English for my benefit, “ha, saxy” she said. I wasn't sure if she was dissing modern ideas of 'sexiness' or if she was going to report the offending mannequin to SExY.

I must’ve gained some confidence from the exchange because the next day I got my hair cut and coloured almost entirely in Spanish. It was a matter of having to, really. I had time (unexpectedly) and my hair was getting that over-long afro look it gets when it doesn’t get cut, not to mention the hina, the mist that occurs only on lofty mountains, or so they say, which was showing and spoiling my reddy, blacky whatever natural colour it is that comes in bottles. I figured, who needs language? We’re all brown girls with thick hair together, and I’ve seen these mamacitas, their hairdressers will understand my unruly Maori hair and know instinctively that the only way to cut it is ruthlessly. I think I was right, even though the hairdresser was surprised that (a) I didn’t speak a word of Spanish (and she only had a few words of English) and (b) I didn’t want blonde highlights, which must be all the rage in Pilsen. The grey hair is just a nasty rumour again, and all is as it should be.

There's a little bit of sorrow around leaving Chicago. I don’t know when I’ll see Miranda again, she’s scored a flash job at the University of Michigan that starts in July, but will visit NZ before then. She’s been a fab host. I’ve gotten used to the nice people at the Newberry, like Tyrell and the crew on security, and the archivists on the fourth floor, and it’s been a bit of a disappointment that I couldn’t get second meetings with some of the people I met at the conference in Athens or the Settler Colonialism symposium here in Chicago. But being the organised freak that I am, I wrote thank you cards for a number of them, the task made somewhat easier because La Doctor prescribed a stash of Maoriana blank cards before I left Aotearoa. (Fledgling researchers take note: if you get good service at a research institution, acknowledge it nicely and keep the archivists on side for your next visit).

I am going to miss The Onion. Some of you might know it from its website theonion.com, or from other newspapers that use it as a source. It’s a free weekly newspaper, with made up news. It has articles like ‘Women Increasingly Choosing Dead-End Careers Over Dead-End Relationships’ which reports: 'Avoiding dying alone at all costs is no longer the primary goal for many of today’s women... Every year millions of educated females discover that they can be just as unappreciated and ignored in the workplace as they can while doting on loutish and inattentive boyfriends'. (Actually, I think Americans are obsessed with being in relationships, and single women seem to get singled out. Miranda reckons it's because people see single women as vulnerable - I think people with that view are the vulnerable ones. I've never been asked so much about my marital status, like it's a part of usual small talk when you first meet someone. And a woman I met in Madison said when she travels (within the States) she keeps a fake wedding ring handy. I'm not sure what the message is - hook up or die? The way couples argue in public around here, whether in person or on the phone, it's hard to know what the motivation is).

But let's get back to The Onion. I liked an article they did on Obama: 'Obama Practices Looking-Off-Into-Future Pose' about a pose Obama has been working on tirelessly with his strtegists. His looking-off-into-the-future pose is believed to be 'vital to the success' of his campaign. 'When performed correctly, the pose involves Obama standing upright with his back arched and his chest thrust out, his shoulders positioned 1.3 feet apart and opened slightly at a 14-degree angle, and his eyes transfixed on a predetermined point between 500 and 600 yards away. Advisers say this creates the illusion that Obama is looking forward to a bright future, while the downturned corners of his lips indicate that he acknowledges the problems of the present'.

Yes, it's a good paper awright, Te Onion.

I don't think I'll miss the Chicago shopping necessarily. It's too overwhelming for my taste, the stores are too big, the choices are too many, the shelves and racks are too packed. I've been to one Walmart and lasted about five minutes. The US shopping scene, as far as I can tell, is large and plentiful, maybe obscenely so. Nobody seems to do boutique, small, simple or discrete. So, despite the easy-to-get brand names, there's a certain lack of elegance in my humble opinion.

I might miss the west and mid-western brand of hospitality and service, depending on how the Canadians do those things. But I have been wondering if US public politeness (which is unavailable in New York, according to Chicagoans) is a psychological invention created to assure Americans that they are not the same as their violent forebears who dispossessed the native nations of their lands and their freedoms - nations, as far as I can tell, that are barely noticed in daily American lives. I think, too, that despite its apparent confidence in being a world leader, America ironically knows little about the world it is supposedly leading. People seem to lack a general knowledge of where things are in the world - and I don't mean specific places necessarily, like New Zealand, but large land and water masses like the Pacific or Europe or Asia or the Middle East. It's a strangely inward-looking country, even one of the native historians I met, Ned Blackhawk, said they don't get 'trained comparatively' in the US. Yet so many of the people I've engaged with don't seem to know that much about they country they look inwards to, those lads in Sioux Falls who insisted we didn't want to go to Pine Ridge are a good example. I've become quite the judgemental tourist, haven't I?

I did choose one last touristy thing to do before leaving Chicago - I took in a Broadway show, the performance of choice being the Tony award-winning Jersey Boys, which is the story of The Four Seasons (including Frankie Valli, of course). It was a great performance and I'm glad I went. It was at the La Salle Bank Theatre, in the heart of Chicago's theatre district. The La Salle originally opened in 1906 as The Majestic. It's one of those ornately decorated theatres in golds and rich burgundies, and the audience at the session I went to was appreciative and attentive and engaged, noisy without being a nuisance, (except for the nana behind me who insisted on singing along, off-key, once or twice). Some of the nanas were like they were at an actual Four Seasons show, calling out and waving at Frankie. I like a show with a good audience, and I got that in the section I sat in, which seemed to be where the folks from New Jersey sat, i.e. we were up high in the cheap seats. But they had really thought about the stage and the audience so we didn't have to crane our necks or anything horrible like that. I was surprised that the show's dialogue was really well written so it didn't have to rely on spectacular song and dance to carry it. It had some good jokes, and even had themes like loyalty and belonging and mateship. And I learned stuff, like Walk Like A Man - their third number one hit in a row in 1962-3 - was an anthem for all men who had ever found themselves wrapped around a woman's finger. Well, that's what their producer said, the composer said it was about the passage from boyhood to manhood. Whatever, there must've been some crisis of masculinity in the American 60s that Frankie and the boys felt the need to address.

The singing was excellent too, Frankie Valli has such a distinctive voice, it must be a hard part to hold down. But the audience loved him - the actor/singer I mean. When the lights went down after the break-up of his marriage and he broke into 'Myyyy eyes adored you...' Wow. Spine-tingling. I'm sure La Doctor is rolling her eyes right now, I know how you hate those lying lyrics from those soppy songs, P., but I am sure that even you - like many of the grown men around me - would've had a tear in your eye, and a lump in your throat (oh, okay then, and a pain in your neck). Things were ratcheted up even further when he did Fallen Angel on finding out about the death of his twenty-two year old daughter. Grown men in the audience did in fact cry, and not quietly to themselves either. Yes, a good choice of last-minute touristy thing to do, especially as I pretty much did none of the things that were recommended to me. All that's left for me to do is get on the plane and fly to Vancouver.

Vermillion, Amana and Back to Chicago

2008-05-29T10:41:00.000-07:00

Where were we at? I think we'd gotten to Vermillion - the town, not the colour - in South Dakota. We had a day to kill - Monday, Memorial Day - so we walked around, discovered Vermillion was mostly closed except for the National Music Museum, which was v. cool, and drove to Sioux Falls to check out the action, and it was mostly closed too, except for a Dutch tea shop. But there were a lot of people around, enjoying a warm sunny day and the flag flying and chest beating that is Memorial Day, USA. The streets were adorned with flags, so were many parks. Motorcycle clubs were out doing runs, some for fundraising purposes, and all flying flags. In Pine Ridge they do an annual Crazy Horse ride - one hundred miles in four days by horseback. It all takes place over Memorial weekend, which doubles as the first weekend in summer.

I liked the Music Museum, but I'm a bit over the way all things native tend to be cast as belonging to an unreachable past. At the musuem 'non-western' music was presented as restricted by the available natural resources, tending towards percussion, spiritual, and highly revered in cultural terms. But not 'classical' like European music and not a great contributor to the development of cultures and societies. So, points off for making me roll my eyes about that stuff, but points on for the multi-media guides that let you hear the instruments being played, and give otherwise good and interesting commentary.

These are apple-head dolls - yes, those are dried apples. These particular dolls are Appalachian mountain musicians. They are the freakiest looking things, and an interesting choice of exhibit for the National Music Museum.

The museum also had a number of custom made guitars, like this Chet Atkins number by Gibson.

After a quick zoom down the highway for an encore visit to Sioux Falls - we like it 'cause it's hip - we treated ourselves to a big night out in Vermillion: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull at the Coyote Theatre. Verdict? Movie popcorn is better in NZ, and the movie would be better on a big screen. This cinema must have the smallest screen I've seen since the 80s, it was barely bigger than some of the big-screen tvs you can get nowadays. The theatre must've seated about 100 people, and I think I was the only person-of-different-pigmentation at a three-quarters full session. Right up my alley.

Tuesday was spent at Vermillion too. I met some of the University of South Dakota staff at the Native American Cultural Center. I was misdirected there by one of the Careers Advisory staff, but once I was there, well of course I had to stay and have coffee and a good old chin-wag, and explain what on earth I was doing in South Dakota. It's funny, in Vermillion and Sioux Falls people cracked up that we chose to visit South Dakota, the natives included. The woman who runs the Dutch tea shop was even more surprised when we said we didn't go to Mt Rushmore - 'the only thing South Dakota's got to offer' according to her.

I told the ones at the Cultural Center about my little inter-cultural exchange in Winner. I said I accidentally went into the whites only supermarket. They asked me which one. When I described it, they rolled their eyes, then one of the kuia said 'actually, it wouldn't have mattered which one you went to'. It was interesting: at breakfast we got talking to a white South Dakotan and when I told her about what happened she said 'because they thought you were native?' And later in the conversation she said 'I'm really sorry you had to experience that'. And then she gave some context - about 'troubles' between Indians and whites in Winner, especially at the schools. I wondered if her apology (which is a cute little thing Americans seem to do on behalf of fellow-Americans) was about my being mistaken for a native rather than the incidence of racism per se. I guess I'll never really know for sure, but the ones at the cultural center had a different way of giving me the context for Winner: about ten years ago, an Indian stole a can of weenie beanies. I have no clue what they are, something to do with beans and hotdogs. Anyway, the Indian got a life sentence. A few weeks later, two white boys ran over and killed an Indian man and got six weeks or six months probation, something like that. And, apparently, that's Winner. The postscript is that when a new Governor came in, he commuted the Indian's sentence to five years - for stealing a can of beanie weenies. But, again, that's Winner, that's it's nature, if you're Indian.

After my coffee at the cultural center, the sharing of some native jokes, and swapping of business cards, I got on with what I was really there for: checking out the Oral History Center's impressive collection. Wow. I need to go back there. All I had time to do was a bit of a scoping exercise, and take a few notes from about half a dozen transcripts. One interesting snippet is the way that there seems to have been a generation of Indians (aged in their seventies in the late 1960s) who could speak or understand more than one dialect. I noticed it first with one or two interviews I read at the Newberry in Chicago, and then picked it up again at the oral history center. In'eresting, and no idea what to do with it. Actually, no idea what I'll do with a lot of the research I've been up to, just happy researching.

We left Vermillion and South Dakota on Tuesday afternoon and drove 550 kilometres of highway to the Amana colonies, Iowa. We weren't expecting to find anything to stop at, I had already heard Chicagoans speak disparagingly about Iowa farm boys. We're talking Field of Dreams country, nothing but cornfields as far as the eye can see. But then, the woman at the Sioux Falls Dutch tea shop - who was kinda like Julia Child on speed - told us to stop in at the Amana colonies. And so we did. At a fabulous B&B, in the cutest little historic village, with a bakery that opens at 5.30 in the morning and is usually sold out within four hours. An excellent choice of accommodations (as the Americans say) for our last night on the road, and a mere 395 kms from Chicago.

The Iowa Amana colonies were established in the 1850s, by a group of German Pietists who broke away from the Lutheran Church, initially in the early 1700s, and became known as the Community of True Inspiration. In 1843 a group of them left Germany for Buffalo, New York, in search of religious freedom. They established themselves as the Ebenezer Society and formalised their communal way of life with a constitution. They later moved to Iowa, and established the seven Amana colonies - Amana, East West and South Amana, High Amana and Middle Amana. We stayed at Hasta Amana - nah, we stayed at Middle Amana at the groovy little B&B. The name Amana is taken from the Song of Solomon, and means 'remain true'. The B&B was in one of their historic buildings kind of shaped like one of those old two-storey barns with the upside-down u-shaped roof.

We were upstairs with little attic windows that I peered out of to see the first stars I've seen in seven weeks. They weren't quite the same as our stars. I thought I saw a constellation like the pot in the sky, but with a couple of stars missing, and turned the wrong way. The rooms were crazy, in a good way. There were exposed rough sawn wooden beams, and one of the other guests wondered if the house was a converted barn. A desk in the lounge had old cut out paper dolls that you could dress, and old Christmas cards and used envelopes with date stamps going back to the 1920s. Our rooms had a baby basket made up with little embroidered linen baby clothes all ironed and laid out, a woman's linen night shirt, white kid gloves on one of the dressers, and high, old, quite possibly hand made beds that had been attacked by a Laura Ashley country flowers theme. It was like sleeping in a decor nightmare, or a Holly Hobbie doll house. Mostly, though, the whole Amana experience was just too, too twee to pass up.

And the stay over all was like staying with someone's nana. The hostess served our breakfast at eight sharp - even knocked on our door to say it was ready - coffee, some major German sausage pattie thing baked with eggs, onion and cheese on an English muffin, a fruit compote thingy, and a coffee and blueberry cake. That's some serious breakfast, that is, and part of my German heritage, apparently. Also a part of that German heritage, or the Amana rendition of it, are jams, stone hearth baked goods, wools and woollen goods, wine, wooden furniture, toys, crafts etc., sausage and smoked meats, and fridges, freezers and microwaves. There's a big plant in Amana that makes the renown (in the USA) Amana fridge and freezer. And there's a wool mill also. People seem to confuse the Amanans with the Amish or the Hutterites. They are a Christian group that lives by a code of communal living. They're kind of separatist (a word their own publicity uses) but they don't disengage from the outside world and technology (and money) and they don't preach. And they're a bit of an Iowan must see, otherwise I think it really is all corn fields.

Here's Hiki at the toy store in Amana, The Red Wagon.

After a roam around Amana on Wednesday morning, it was back on the road for the last leg home. We went via the Quad Cities - four cities that straddle the Mississippi River where the states of Iowa and Illinois meet. Very pretty, but we didn't stop except to swap cars because our windscreen had been hit by a stone a couple of days earlier, and the crack had gradually been working its way further and further up the windscreen as we drove. Our lunch stop was at Starving Rock, about 145 kms west of Chicago. Then it was home, James, home.

As we drove into Chicago you could see this grey haze sitting over the city, smog I guess. There was a vague grey smudge in the distance for about the last one hundred kilometres, and the closer we got the more we had to admit it was the smog. But you drive into it and it eventually merges with the blue sky, and before you know it you're back in Pilsen, dragging your junk up the narrow stairs and into Miranda's apartment.

Now it's Thursday morning. I've had a big fat sleep. I've got washing up to my eyeballs. I'm broke. I don't know how I'm going to fit all the crap I've bought into my luggage. And I've got one last collection I want to check out at the Newberry before I leave for Vancouver on Sunday, for the Canadian Historical Association conference. Not sure you'll want to be blogged about that stuff, although I'm looking forward to catching up with the first nations historians that'll be there.

One for Nana

2008-05-27T00:01:00.000-07:00

Nana died at home in Mangamuka on 27 May 2004. And I had this whole idea that I could do a blog for and about her, and save myself from giving my money to the Herald for a memorial notice. Then I chickened out on that idea because I couldn't find the words and couldn't figure out what I really wanted to say, even though I worked up a couple of pages of notes, which I deleted. Then I had a back-up idea where I'd finish a poem that I started for her about eighteen months ago. But tonight, when I sat down to write, I couldn't find the poem, although I swear I brought a copy away with me. So what you get is me writing off the cuff, with nothing particular to say, except Nana died four years ago today, roughly twenty-five years after Grandpa died.

One day I'd like to write something deep and meaningful about who she was and still is to me, and why, and how she has influenced me, but without getting maudlin about it and without being dishonest about the tensions and debates and differences between her and I. One day I hope I do that - for me, for Nana, and maybe for other mokos who want to be able to express that inexpressible relationship. One day, but not today, four years after Nana died.

Instead, in the spirit of creative expression, I give you Ode to Fry Bread a poem composed at Te Hu on 6 January by Kahu Piripi, with some help from Tiana Otene, and - of course - their favourite aunty, me. (I think Nana would appreciate this).

Ode to Fry Bread
Paraoa parai
how beautiful you are to me
the way you smell
the way you taste
it’s impossible to wait
when I see you get fried
I think to myself
I do, I do, I do love you
paraoa parai
I love you with jam
I love you more with golden syrup
but my greatest wish is to toutou you in Bidz’ raw fish

(FYI: Bidz is the shop at Ahipara that makes the bomb raw fish. And I'm not saying anything about the 'get fried' line, that's one Kahu came up with all on her own).

I'll get back to the business of travel blogging next time, including why I like Sioux Falls despite this paru waterway being a key scenic attraction.

Also in the next blog, find out why I have photos of guitars - like these two sweet things that once belonged to Johnny and June Carter Cash.

This post sponsored by the First Baptist Church of Vermillion, SD.

Good Girls, Badlands

2008-05-24T23:17:00.000-07:00

Grab a coffee, this might be a long one. I'm in Vermillion now, in the south-eastern corner of South Dakota, close to Iowa, Nebraska and Minnesota state lines, and about 600 kms from where I wrote the last blog. We've just been been treated to a lovely sunset after our long drive, and it's wine o'clock again (again). In just two days we've been to the Badlands and Wounded Knee. And we've driven down highway 18, its crazy 50-mile long straights, and through the Rosebud and Yankton reservations.

Above: A section of the Missouri River, at Fort Randall, just before we crossed into Yankton reservation. Gorgeous looking on a hot day like today, and sooo tempting to jump in, but I reckon the water is still cold because it was still snowing just three weeks ago. Might find out for sure tomorrow.

We stopped at a place called Winner, where I inadvertently went to the white's only supermarket and connected with the racial hostility of one of the checkout operators. I asked for the wharepaku (or restroom in American) and she (a) wouldn't look me in the eye and looked at Miranda instead who wasn't even standing that close to me and (b) gave the most venomous response she could. So I told her she was ugly and her mother dresses her funny, and walked off. Nah, I didn't do that. She wasn't worth it. And we still had a lot of fun in their store, and their town, which was all dressed up in red white and blue for Memorial Day tomorrow (roughly the equivalent of our Anzac Day). But it wasn't a place we wanted to stop at, so we grabbed what we wanted for lunch and hightailed it out of there. We were going to stay at Yankton, especially since they had a sign up for me on the way in: 'Inactive Catholic Welcome Home'. But we decided to head to Vermillion instead. The University of South Dakota is here, and I'll spend some of Tuesday at their oral history center which includes more than 2000 interviews with American Indians gathered between 1967 and 1973. We're not sure what we'll get up to tomorrow, but swimming looks good 'cause it's hot here. And if it's cool tomorrow, then I think the new Indiana Jones movie might be the go. We're free agents with wheels, we've got options.

The Badlands, 24 May

In Treaty terms, the Badlands belong to the Oglala Lakota nation, and they do operate one of the information centres. But from what I can gather from the maps and publicity, the Badlands are in effect a National Park, run by the National Park Service, a division of the Department of the Interior (incidentally the parent department of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, I think I’ve mentioned that before). The native Americans have known the Badlands or Mako Sica for thousands of years. The landscape, though, took millions of years to form into canyons and gullies, cliffs, spires, pinnacles and buttes, carved out by wind and water. Early humans hunted mammoths here about 11,000 years ago, and the earliest bones found here date back 33 million years. Cousin Lu I think you could’ve fossicked here all day long and into the next. Me, I did a couple of short walks (although one included scrambling up a crazy ladder), took a couple of pics, and drove the Badlands Loop Road.

This is the view from the end of a trail called the Door. It's hard to capture the vast distance to the horizon, and just as hard to describe it in words. It's kind of like some giant scalped the earth and left her insides exposed.

The landscape is how I imagine the moon might be. I'm not sure that the images capture that, or the extent of the area, how cratered it looks, and how high and deep and broad it is. Up close, the rock formations are carefully striped in different shades of red and pink and yellow and grey, that change with the light. There’s not much animal life, but we were lucky to see a couple of chipmunk looking things and some vultures circling overhead (possibly looking for rabbits). I was pleased to see no snakes, and the park ranger said it’s too early in the year for rattle snakes anyway. It’s an eerie landscape in some ways, especially when you get into some of the quiet, windless spots at the bottom of a canyon. But I also kept thinking of cowboy movies and couldn’t stop whistling the theme music for The Good The Bad and The Ugly.

There’s something cliché about the tourism publicity for the area, which constantly portrays the natives as extinct – confined to their reservations and displaced by European pioneers, their ways and their technologies. According to the National Park Service, ‘only the Lakota paintings, drawings and artistic crafts remain’. It’s as if the people aren’t still here to keep those things going. And I guess that’s why the cowboy movie comes up for me. It’s a genre I can admit to enjoying a whole lot, but the Indians always lose. The white cowboys always win. And it’s a motif that seems to have carried into the banter for tourists, like in the way that the reservation roads don’t appear on any of the maps. And nor do many of the Lakota tourism initiatives. Interesting, but not in a good way.

The prairie grasslands have their own history. Even though I’ve said they’re unrelenting, what remains today compared to what used to be are just ‘patchwork remnants’. I found out why they have so few trees around here: it’s because prairies are too dry to support trees, and too wet to be a desert. But they support more animal life than the canyons – buffalo, prairie dogs (cute), deer, antelope, coyotes and bighorn sheep. Miranda and I took a gravelled back road and got treated to an up close and personal view of a couple of buffalo. Very cool.

Buffalo, just beyond reach through the car window.

And I guess this pic tells you what the buffalo thought of us and our excitement to see them.

Big news of the day though, is the effect of the Badlands on Piki. We did one walk, called the Notch, and she was quite happy to pose (see below). But while we were on the second walk, called the Door, she up and went native on me. She got a complete native makeover and now wants to be known as Hiki Cries For Freedom.

Piki as she we all came to know and love her, at the start of the Notch trail...

...and Piki reborn, now known as Hiki Cries For Freedom (i.e. from the antique store in Chamberlain), but we can call her Hiki.

The first walk we did was the Notch. This pic is taken from near the beginning, when the walking was nice and flat and easy.

Eventually, the Notch trail went upwards. And once we were up, we also had to go down. There's Miranda, almost at the bottom of ladder-type stair we climbed, not as easy as she makes it look, especially on the descent.

Here's another view of the ladder, this time from nearer the end of the trail. You might be able to make out a couple of people at the top waiting for their turn, and a guy in a red top on his way down.

The second walk was an easy boardwalk number. Yay. It opened out into acres and acres of this kind of landscape, where tourists are known to flock in numbers close to a million a year. They speak in tongues and while away the hours taking photos of each other with which to bore their friends and family when they get home - unlike myself, who prefers to bore friends and family as I travel.

Wounded Knee, 25 May
We called in at Wounded Knee before we left Pine Ridge. In December 1890 the US Army's seventh cavalry killed nearly 300 Indian men, women and children who had, in fact, already surrendered under the leadership of Chief Big Foot. They lie in a mass grave at the site and their people, including descendants of the survivors, still live nearby. It's a tragedy that has pretty much been written into the coloniser's history as the beginning of the end of Indian resistance. Officially described as the Battle of Wounded Knee, the Lakota Oglala locals refer to it as the Massacre of Wounded Knee. The site was also occupied in 1973 in a dispute that pitted the American Indian Movement and reservation members against a 'corrupt' reservation government.

Locals have stalls at the site and sell bead-, porcupine- and leather-work, t-shirts etc. to the people who stop by. For most of them it's their only way of making a living, and the whole whanau gets involved. Unemployment on Pine Ridge is at eighty percent according to a woman who sells at a trading post up the road. And this weekend was the warmest for a while so there were quite a few visitors. The Rez is just coming out of winter, and the locals are looking forward to the summer months to earn some cash, although they have to fork out to buy their traders' licenses from the tribal council. I found it a tough spot to visit, even with the resonances with our own histories back home, and I was crying within moments of the first of the locals coming over to say 'Welcome to Wounded Knee'. So I was even more tangitangi by the time I climbed up the hill to the wahi tapu to touch the headstone.

It's mostly women at the stalls, and they each have their korero to give you: their interpretations of what happened, who lives there now, what life is like on the Rez (much like Once Were Warriors according to one of them). The ones that were there this morning knew about Maori people, although one of them also said I could pass for native. Apparently someone - 'a princess' - had been to a sweat lodge there some time before and taught them to rub noses. I nearly said, "really, one of our princesses came here, well, I'm her Queen". They also give good korero about the meanings of the symbols in their artworks and who of their kids and mokos help them. I'm loving their mana wahine symbols, like the tipi which is a strong woman symbol because the tipi is put up by the woman and everything in it is her property - I guess that includes her husband. Yep, heard some good yarns at Wounded Knee and overall the experience at Pine Ridge couldn't be further removed from what I've received at places like Chamberlain and Winner (Loser more like). And FYI, we've only seen one African American for four days, or two if you count the pictures of (Obama) Barack Black Eagle. (Thanks for the heads-up, Margie).

Te Haerenga ki Dakota ki te Tonga

2008-05-24T08:05:00.000-07:00

I’m writing this from the Lakota Praire Ranch Motel, a little west of Kyle on the Pine Ridge Reservation, South Dakota. Miranda and I have driven about 890 miles (1430 kilometres) to get here. That’s further than Auckland to Wellington return. Coming to Pine Ridge is a diversion from our original plan to head to Yellowstone Park, but we thought this way we could be more leisurely and stop to explore places rather than just drive straight past. Anyway, here we are on the reservation, home of the Oglala Lakota and Wounded Knee. We’re handy (in American terms) to the Badlands National Park, Black Hills National Forest, Mt Rushmore and Rapid City. We’re going to flag the tourist hotspots in favour of a walk in the Badlands and checking out some of the local arts and cultural heritage on Pine Ridge itself. Personally, I was keen on checking out Wall, a cheesey western theme park/mall/adventure place where they do shootout re-enactments. I was hoping I'd land the role of the sniper on the saloon roof. As it turns out, in South Dakota you can find western cheese just by taking a random exit off the interstate and spending a night amongst the locals of Chamberlain. I’ll get to that later. I should really rewind four or five days to when we first hitched our wagon and left Chicago.

Chicago, Illinois to Madison, Wisconson
Miranda drove us from Chicago to Madison on Tuesday. That’s 146 miles (235 kilometres). This is a big country, and Chicago is a big city located on a humungous plain or series of plains (I have no idea what the right terminology is). North of Chicago, there were parts of the interstate that were very much like New Zealand, especially where the embankments were planted, and where there was a bit of contour to the land (like a rise or a sweeping corner). One major difference, though, was the road kill - huge, like everything else in the States. I'd hate to hit a deer or a cougar or something, they leave a big mess on the road and I guess cars must get damaged too.
Mostly, to get to Madison, there is a lot of long straight concrete driving through a vast flat land that seems to go on and on and on. I was so relieved just south of Madison to see some bush-clad hills on the horizon. I must’ve wanted something to break up the landscape, like mountains or the sea. I like the sky out on the open road. It’s enormous, uninterrupted, the biggest sky I’ve ever seen and I don’t really have the words to describe it. But it feels like the sky is curved to wrap around the land, which is broad and flat.

Madison is a lot greener than the parts of Chicago I’ve been hanging out in. It's a pretty town or mid-sized city as it likes to be known. It’s a university town too, and my impression after less than twenty-four hours was that it is predominantly white. We lunched with some of the native scholars based at the University of Wisconson, and they gave us some tips on things to do while in the west, and some contacts for a couple of Canadian Indian historians for when I get to Vancouver. So, it was a short stop in Madison, but it was pretty and sunny and the food and company was great.

La Crosse and Albert Lea
After our lunch we drove for about 140 miles to La Crosse, which is just on the western border of Wisconson, alongside the Mississippi River. Lacrosse is a game that originated with the north-eastern Native American iwi in the 17th century. The guys we met in Madison said Indians used it as a means to settle inter-tribal disputes, a last attempt at resolution before resorting to war. No one we met in La Crosse talked to us about that, although we only met two people, in a Tea House run by a couple of hippies, including a former navy seal who ended up in La Crosse after his Cadillac was stolen in some complicated story he was trying to tell us about driving to Washington. Anyway, apparently when you’re a navy seal in trouble you head straight to the nearest navigable waterway and that’s what he did. And he’s still there because Wisconson has a really good Veteran’s benefit programme and you only have to live there for a year to qualify. As soon as the dude stopped for a breath we excused ourselves, crossed the river and state line into Minnesota, and drove the next 125 miles which got us to Albert Lea. Whew.

Albert Lea looked like another pretty town, tucked around a little lake. It looked like a town with money – large homes on the lake front, that kind of thing. But it was also a non-descript place to me, with not much going on. The bottle store was already closed (at 8 pm). But on the drive out I had seen cows for the first time in more than six weeks and, consequently smelt cow crap too. I don’t think there’s anything to say about Albert Lea. It’s where we slept one night, and there was a Harley shop next door. (See the pics in the previous post).

Sioux Falls and Chamberlain, South Dakota
We did another 300 or so miles on Thursday, which got us into South Dakota, where rodeo is the official sport. Apparently hunting and fishing is big in these here parts as well. I like Sioux Falls, another university town just inside South Dakota’s eastern boundary. We really only stopped for lunch but ended up shopping as well, and getting some advice from a couple of locals about places to go. Funnily enough they recommended Wall the cheesy American attraction and said ‘don’t go to Pine Ridge’. They obviously didn’t realise who they were talking to, but nor did they recommend we stop at Corn Palace, Mitchell. According to the billboard hype all along the interstate, Corn Palace is a feat of A-maize-ing Ear-chitecture and corn-ceptual art. I am not kidding. There was billboard after bill board of corny one-liners, but none good enough to encourage us to call in. No, it was onwards to Chamberlain for Miranda and me.

And what can I say about Chamberlain, South Dakota? That’s a hard one. I can say I knew we were in the West. The rural poverty was easy to see in the closed businesses, the housing and the vehicles, and it had that undercurrent of racial division. Before we left, Miranda went for a walk and discovered that the richer Chamberlain folks lived on the other side of the river. Ain’t that always the way in towns divided by rivers or railway tracks? They haven’t introduced smoke-free legislation in South Dakota so the Chamberlain bars were smoky and people were even smoking in the liquor store. And if you took away the tarseal and the modern cars, parts of the main street would look like a made-for-the-movies olde western town. It was quiet (apart from the occasional Harley or boy-racer). It was mostly closed when we got there about five, and I half-expected to see tumble-weed blow past me at any moment. Shop hours included a notes like 'please forgive us if we're not here' or '9.15-ish to 5.00-ish'. Hardcase.

I guess at the place we stayed they don’t get many NZers calling in. The poor young woman on the desk probably only understood half of what either Miranda or I said, and could barely contain her laughter about it. Miranda asked for an ethernet cable and she offered shampoo. But it was a fun town. Authentic American cheese, and without getting milked for our tourists dollars like I expect we would at places like Wall and Corn Palace. They had an incredibly cool antique and taxidermy shop that I could’ve stayed in for hours.

Below: the Chamberlain City Hall, a very cool building but it looked abandoned inside.

Chamberlain was surreal on some levels. It’s on the banks of the Missouri River. It’s one of the stop-off places for the Lewis and Clark expedition (1804-1806) which was basically a search for passage to the Pacific. It’s Dances With Wolves territory – a home where the buffalo once roamed – not to mention elk, antelope, and deer. According to one of the shopkeepers – who informed me that I look like a native ‘from here’ except my tattoos are different – Chamberlain still attracts hunters and fishers, though the prized prey these days is pheasant. There’s an Indian School there – St Joseph’s – just out of town and tucked away, and we only saw a few Indians in town in the grocery store. So Chamberlain looked and felt like a pioneering frontier town to me, with a history of violence and settler colonialism that gets glossed over somehow. It’s hard to put my finger on it exactly, and maybe I shouldn't judge after such a short stop, but let’s just say that my so-called looking like a native didn’t make me feel confident or safe. Despite the stereotypes, it didn’t feel like a look that would attract benefits – not in that neck of the woods, anyway.

Below: Camp Pleasant on the Lewis and Clark trail, above Chamberlain, with the Missouri River in the background. It wasn't very pleasant - cold gale force winds and a thick murky sky.

Kyle, Pine Ridge, is not Chamberlain, and Chamberlain is not Sioux Falls. But all three places are South Dakota. To get to Kyle you have to do some interesting driving – through hundreds of miles of unrelenting monotony, straight roads and grassy plains and blue-grey sky with no beginning and no end. When you're on the interstate, grassy plains have few trees, and fewer creeks and swampy marshes and ponds. When we turned off the interstate to head towards Kyle it was a nice relief to get onto a country road and see some of the rocky spires that feature in the canyons and flood plains in this part of South Dakota. We had a kai in Kyle – an Indian Taco which is a fry bread the size of a plate with mince, beans, lettuce, tomato, cheese, hot sauce and sour cream. Hard work to eat it all.

I was told I looked native within hours of arriving, by the young native brotha on the desk, but again the kiri ta was a bit of a give away. I said I am native but of New Zealand not here. It was nice to meet someone who had not only heard of NZ but knows where it is. The dude at the Harley shop back in Albert Lea had no clue. Mind you the old fulla at the Chamberlain antique store said NZ is on his list of places he wants to visit. Anyway, by the end of our first night the young fulla on the desk asked us to take him back to New Zealand with us, he needs to get away from the Rez. That boy is sure earning his tip. They had fresh fish on the menu for dinner so I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try it despite the giant taco lunch. It was a walleye – the state fish. It’s a much sought-after game fish caught in the Missouri and some of the lakes, and very nice – nothing like trout which is kind of what I was expecting. I’m not sure how to describe it, had the texture of a snapper maybe, and was cooked like the chef had borrowed my mum’s recipe for pan-fried fish. And fresh, just like the waitress said it was. Mmm.

The Praire Ranch Motel is opposite the Oglala Lakota College. That's the main building in the photo below. The college featured in some of my research at the Newberry. Their historical centre isn’t open yet – many things in these parts only open for the summer months, and we’re a week too early. But we roamed around the grounds and said hello to a couple of people who were up there. Someone had put flyers for Obama on people’s windscreens. It’s the South Dakota primary here in a couple of weeks and it looks like the Indian vote counts.

Well it’s time for breakfast at the ranch, and after that we’re off for a bit of a kotiti haere to the Badlands and various other parts. Read all about it in the next blog.

The Harley Davidson Special

2008-05-22T23:35:00.000-07:00

Someone's idea of heaven: a whole warehouse of Harley Davidson's in Albert Lea, Minnesota. This is just one row.

E hoa ma, it is with deep regret that I must let you know that this will be a short blog, mainly because I am having far too good a time to be bothered keeping y'all up-to-date with my wanderings. I hope you'll be content for now with this little interlude containing pictures of little interest or relevance to anything interesting or relevant, suffice to say that Miranda and I left Chicago on Tuesday and are now hundreds of miles away in bogun-redneck territory. The funny thing is, Americans don't even know what boguns are and it's a difficult concept to translate from NZ to US. And yet this town, where we've decided to spend the night and tomorrow morning, is in fact the original birthplace of the bogun. I can tell by the cars and the fashion sense and the clientele at the bar up the road and the attitude and... Well, I can just tell, and I reckon there's a fantastic anthropological study to be had right here - 'the whence of the bogun'. Anyway, normal blogging transmission shall resume at some point during our brief sojourn in the cowboy west. In the meantime, it's dvd and Bailey's night for the girls, while y'all get this enthralling episode of Tiki Haere.

From what I've seen, American towns and cities do pretty good public sculpture. I liked this roof-top one in Madison, Wisconson.

We lunched at Sioux Falls today, which is a pretty hip town with a whole sculpture walk to take in while shopping. Piki took it upon herself to teach an old dog a new trick while we were there.

Piki was most excited to find that the hotel we stayed at last night was right next door to some kind of Harley Davidson Supercentre, and couldn't wait to strike the pose of Piki the Bikie Chicky. Here she is, looking quite the part with her helmet hair, on a striking white number.

And here she is again doing her handle-bar trick. Can you spot her?

This was my fave - it's such a pretty colour.

We spent Tuesday night in Madison, about three hours drive away from Chicago. It's a very pretty, mid-sized mid-western city, and the capital of Wisconson. Apparently every capital gets a Capitol - building that is. Here's a view of the roof of Madison's - I like the golden lady Liberty.

Things To Do When Not Researching

2008-05-19T16:39:00.000-07:00

I think it's time for me to get back to the original kaupapa of blogging. In other words I’m going to say something about what I’ve been up to for the last little while, besides the obvious, researching at the Newberry. I’m also going to quit the shameless self-promotion about voting for me at http://www.nzbookmonth.co.nz/.

So, big event last week was the Powwow Miranda and I went to on Thursday night at the American Indian Centre, North Chicago. The centre was set up in 1953 (also a big year for Maori land legislation), an initiative of Indians who were relocated at that time to parts of Chicago. The powwow was to welcome some New Zealand and American artists (including Lisa Reihana and Wayne Youle) who are involved in an art exchange and were having a hui at Ruatepupuke at the Field Museum. Arapata Hakiwai and Eru Wharehinga were with the artists’ group as well, so it was nice to see some friendly Maori and Indian faces. We also met Winnebago artist/sculptor Truman Lowe who is based at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Miranda and I will be lunching there on Wednesday, en route to Yellowstone Park. We’re going to do a Thelma and Louise road trip, but without the flying off the cliff bit at the end.

Anyway, back to the American Indian Centre. Pow. Wow. What a great night. The MC was real funny. He was with the artists group and they were late arriving. He explained that they were stuck in traffic, and said “I don’t know why they call it rush hour. No one was goin’ anywhere.” He was a hard case, entertained us while we ate, and kept it up throughout the night. He was like half DJ, half calling the housie: “Welcome – to yoour – American Indian Centre – Chicaaagooo!” He made jokes about New Zealand, and a few about Maori and our similarities with Indians, and then he made us all get up and we had to join the first dance. Some of the key dancers led us into the main part of the hall and around the drum. After the MC’s jokes I tried to play the ‘Maori card’ and said I was going to lurk at the back of the hall with my arms crossed, but those other Maories weren’t gonna let any of us get away with that.

Can’t believe I co-operated so easily. Must be because I’m way on the other side of the world and hardly anyone who knows me saw me. I tell you what, though, it’s harder than it looks. And there seemed to be quite a few different ways of stomping and stepping. I wondered if some of the differences were tribal. At first I tried to follow this old fulla’s steps, but I just couldn’t get the rhythm, but by the end of the night I had sussed out this kuia and her way of stepping. Some of the little tamariki were fantastic. They were so in to it, and I was thinking it looked like a good way to tucker the kids out. They must crash when they get home. They had some young guys on the drum too, just learning according to Truman.

The little girls in red were all rev'ed up and ready to go well before the drum was ready to sing. They just couldn't wait to start dancing - one of those wonderful infectious moments that adults get to enjoy about young children some times.

There were a couple of things I really liked about their tikanga at the centre. I liked the way they had all their tribal flags hanging from the ceiling. It looked cool, and it's laden with all that symbolism of flags and tribes and identity and self-determination.

I also really liked the fact that first order of business was kai. What a brilliant idea that is. Wish we did that. That way the fry bread is still warm when you eat. Mmm. They do some good fry bread: similar, but not quite the same as ours, and definitely not like my mummy’s paraoa parai. Hers is the best. After kai, the first song from the drum (which is in the centre of the powwow and played and sung by about eight guys) was for the ringawera and the kai. Nice. Then it was our turn with the first dance of the night, which I guess was like a welcome too. The MC was commentating the whole time.

The other tikanga I liked was how they did this young women’s birthday. She had just turned 21 and her and her whanau were there with their regalia on, including her kuia in a wheel chair who is a long-time associate of the centre. So they were called onto the floor, and everyone had to go and hariru the birthday girl and give her one dollar – “no more, no less” – and hariru her whanau as well. After the hariru you stayed standing around the drum, and when everyone’s done their hariru the whanau leads the next dance. It was cool, and short and sweet, and no long speeches involved, and the birthday girl got quite a few bucks. Now, I could do a birthday like that. And it takes the pressure off people getting all anxious about choosing a good present.

Some of the feather and bead work in the regalia was awesome, especially close up where you get to see the detail and the incredible amount of work involved.

The girl in the pink (below) is Junior Miss American Indian Chicago, 2008. You can make out the drum and singers behind her, and the MC on stage at the back.

All in all, it was a very cool night. People were really friendly. I came home with a full puku and aching legs. Then I spent Friday making my legs ache more. I went out to the University of Chicago, mainly to hear Ramon Gutierrez give a seminar on the beradaches of the American Southwest (or Mexican North, depending on your worldview). The beradaches were men who dressed as women and ‘serviced’ other men, generally warriors. They were prisoners of war, and tended to be owned (and pimped out) by chiefs. Ramon’s argument – partly, anyway – was that the lives of these indigenous transvestites have been romanticised in recent decades by scholars looking for models of gay liberation by holding up examples of societies that embraced homosexuality. And he had all this evidence of how harsh the lives of the beradaches were. It was really interesting. And I’m glad I went, not just for the seminar, but also because Ramon was the discussant on the panel I was on at the Settler Colonialism symposium and he was really, really good to me and gave me heaps of useful feedback afterwards. It’ll all be put to good use when I get on to publishing.

I had a couple of hours to kill before the seminar, so I did that by visiting about four bookshops in as many blocks on campus. They sure do good bookshops in the States. One of the bigger ones is in the Theological Seminary, which is an interesting concept: first time I've ever wondered if I should cross myself and genuflect on the way into a bookshop. That's the lobby in the pic. The doorway into the bookshop is just on the left and it takes you down into a basement area which is kind of dungeon-like but with good lighting.

The Chicago Tin Man, Michigan Ave
After Ramon’s seminar I went back to town and did yet another stroll down the Magnificent Mile, hence the continuing aching of the legs. But it was all worth it. I got to see the Chicago Tin Man, who you might be familiar with already. I think he’s been to NZ before (for a buskers’ festival, pea?) He stands perfectly still till a koha activates him. Then he does that robotic movement stuff with sound effects. He’s really good, excellent, and cheeky too, especially to people who try and take his photo or something without giving a koha. I liked that.

On Sunday I did some more roaming, this time to the National Museum of Mexican Art. I am loving that place, and will definitely visit again before I leave Chicago. It’s got plenty of crazy, crazy Catholicism to keep me amused. A lot of the art works with the mix of traditional religious beliefs and Catholicism. And I reckon it is also the most colourful and animated museum/gallery I’ve ever been to. None of that white-washed wall business for this place, no. It has pink walls and bright orange walls and avocado green walls.

See, look at the colour in this. The background colour is the colour of the walls in this particular exhibition 'Horns, Hooves, Wings, Fins and Tails: animal imagery in the permanent collection'. The earliest pieces in the museum's permanent collection date to the time of the Aztecs.

This (below) is the middle section of a modern work (2000) called Retablo by Alejandro Garcia Nelo. It's based on a typical retablo (art works that occupy the wall behind the altar) found in
Mexican churches (not to mention some of the altars they make in their homes). This Retablo has elements of Aztec religion running down the left side, and Catholicism down the right. I guess it's a comment on the blending of the colonised and coloniser's religions.

I like Mexican interpretations of things like Diablo (Hatana), and Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). This pic below is of a contemporay depiction of Diablo. I really liked it, it's out there.

Day of the Dead is a native celebration that commemorates the dead, that apparently used to occur in the ninth of the Aztec months (roughly equivalent to August, which I guess is the end of summer). It's now celebrated coincidentally with the Catholic's All Saints and All Souls Days at the beginning of November. So, either the native Mexicans shifted the celebration date to hide it from their Spanish colonisers or their Spanish colonisers imposed the Catholic celebrations to replace their pagan ones. I'll let you decide.

And then there was this: the 'Baby Jesus', wooden, from the 1700s. But don't you reckon he looks like he's about to bust a move? Too cute though.

Sisterhood of the Extraordinary Yarn (SExY)

2008-05-16T19:26:00.000-07:00

Stop the press, e hoa ma. I have such important news I don’t even have time to remind you to vote for me (or vote for poetry, at least) at http://www.nzbookmonth.co.nz/.

I have made the most amazing discovery at the library this week – an ancient mana wahine manuscript! It was buried amongst the records of the Indian Council Fire, which are actually unprocessed and usually you have to jump through many rings of fire before you can see them. But the archivists here have been so good to me that they gave me unfettered access.

Let me go back to the beginning. As I’ve worked through the various records held at the Newberry, I’ve been really impressed with the extent to which Indian women’s knowledge and power seems to have stood its ground in the face of colonisation. I should be clear here that I’m speaking in tribally-specific terms, similar to our own iwi-specific contexts back home.

Anyway, I’ve been noticing the strength and influence of Indian women’s world in a number of documents, coming right through to the tribal print media of the late 1960s. We know that early white men were shocked and in awe of the so-called ‘petticoat fighters’ (warrior women) of some tribes. I read the other day about ‘Beloved Women’. They held a very high place in tribal society, and were revered as women among women. They occupied the central place in the lodge, nearest the fire, and were sought for council and as orators. I also read about the primacy of the female descent lines in some tribes, the influence of which continued into the mid-twentieth-century. In other tribes, chiefs could only hold office on tribal councils with the approval of the women, and men were often required to farm the lands of their mothers.

Meanwhile, several sources pointed out that ‘the male knew his role as warrior, hunter and provider’. A man was measured on the basis of his individual attainment. His ability as a warrior and hunter was important. His wealth, [now that’s what I’m talking ’bout] his oratorical qualities, [hmm, that’s wide open for interpretation] and personality were likewise significant. A man’s worth was measured in these terms. The only point of difference assigned by his gender was that he might father (and not mother) children.

Something I really enjoyed was the Indian women’s spin on taumau, like this from a women’s column written c.1969:

There was never just one ‘set’ way that two people were married. Love? Well that’s difficult to say. [I guess Tina Turner’s right: what’s love got to do with it?] Love sometimes entered into the subject, though this was not usually taken into great consideration unless a big fuss was made about it. If a woman found she did not care that much for her husband, she simply ‘split the blanket’ and sought a mate elsewhere. Women would seldom tolerate any ‘foolishness’ from their hubbies [note the use of the plural], so when wifey figured that hubby wasn’t doing her right, she picked up what was hers and split. Hubby could act as big as he wanted, until wifey lost her cool, at which time she would very likely wrap the lodge poles around hubby’s neck. [I kid you not, that’s a direct quote, that is]. The early whites were dumb-struck at the manner in which these women ‘went through’ husbands. Some times it has been said (in good and honest humour) that Liz Taylor must have had an Indian ancestor somewhere.

So, how did I get from Indian women’s korero to the mana wahine manuscript? Well, let’s go back to the Indian Council Fire. It was set up in 1923 – the year before Indians were made US citizens. It was a Chicago-based organisation for Indians and ‘interested friends’, and was basically concerned with ‘Indian affairs’, mainly social services, legislation and education. It inaugurated the Indian Achievement Award in 1933, the same year Chicago hosted its second world’s fair, the ‘Century of Progress Exposition’. Long-story-short: some of the ‘Indian village’ documents from both the 1893 and 1933 world’s fairs are amongst the Council Fire archives. Great stuff to go through and it’s been a long, long time since I worked with nineteenth-century docs. And – to help you with the ambience – I’m talking about eight archive boxes of ledger books and cards and letters and minutes and photos and newsletters and programmes and posters and you-name-it. And apart from a couple of viewings in the ’90s, this stuff has been sitting on a shelf waiting for an archivist to organise it since 1982. So I made a real mess of myself and my work area in the reading room. The documents are so brittle that the edges of pages just broke away as soon as you lifted them, and all the tape and glue dried away years ago. Staples have rusted, and rubber bands disintegrated as soon as I touched them. I’ve been leaving the library most days with nineteenth-century dust all down my front.

I cannot tell you how shocked and surprised and overwhelmed I was when I got to the bottom of one box and saw a stiffened, yellowed sheaf of papers, half rolled and half folded, with the words ‘Kete Korero Tika’ scrawled across them. I got all goose-bumpy. I’m shivering now just thinking about it. I didn’t know if I was seeing things, or if the apparently Maori words were coincidentally Indian. But I picked the papers up, opened them carefully, and pressed the folds to the table. And there it was, the full title: Nga Kete Korero Tika a Ngai Tu Wahine. And there’s a logo too, MWMW in a kind of taniko pattern – mana wahine, mana whenua. I tell you what – I was dumbfounded.

Before I get into the contents – because they are sooo good, in a ground-breaking way – I have to share my theory on how the manuscript ended up amongst these Indian archives. I’ll admit to doing the historian’s version of putting two and two together to get eight, but I’m confident in my piecing together of the clues and remnants of information at the Newberry. So, we know that Maori women were part of the Maori village in the 1893 South Seas Exhibition at the World’s Fair. So that puts some key Maori women and Indian women at the same place in the same year for an extended period of time (six months). It’s easy to imagine, then, all the exchanges that would have occurred between all those indigenous women involved in the fair. I reckon the Kete Korero Tika manuscript was either written by one of the women while they were here, or it was brought over and left here. I think it was part of the korero exchanged during the native women’s sweat-lodge that the Indian women hosted while the fair was on. I understand that that’s when the Sisterhood of the Extraordinary Yarn (SExY) was established. The details will have to be left to our historical imaginations, but the fact is the manuscript is here, and I’ve been working my way through it.

The Kete Korero Tika is fragile and hard to read and, unfortunately, it’s been tampered with. There has been a definite amateur attempt to disguise the tika as teka, and I don’t mind saying I suspect a couple of our own men, known to have spent time at the Newberry in recent years. I won’t name names here – I can’t afford the law suit. But think of an iwi, any iwi. Is it one with misogynist tendencies? Then I think these guys are from there. The thing is I know that Maori women – especially the EWOTs (Embittered Women of Taitokerau) – have known intuitively that such a record, such a manifesto, must exist. So, it is with great pleasure that I give you the first three lessons of the Kete Korero Tika. Please teach them to your children and mokopuna. And, wahine ma, use them as inspiration for your next karanga, fuel for your next debate.

1. Maori women are indeed the original tangata whenua of Aotearoa
We grew up here in Aotearoa with the land, and are born of Papatuanuku. All Maori women descend in some way from the ancient Ngai Tu Wahine tribe – or NTW. Note the TW initial, which is our sign and evidence of our tangata whenua status. Another of our signs is the upraised hand scissor action, which we used during the now defunct Bobbit cutting ceremony.

The most enduring symbol of our tangata whenua status is the karanga. The karanga is a remembrance of the fact that the mana wahine, the descendants of Ngai Tu Wahine, did karanga Maori men to our shores when they first arrived in their waka. On that first occasion, however, the karanga began with the words ‘haere atu’. But the newly arrived men, proving the limited capacity of their listening, thought the women said ‘haere mai’. Since that fateful day we have used the three times formula for the karanga (as in: kia ora, kia ora, kia ora). The three times formula ensures that male listeners get the message right.

2. Traditionally it was the duty of Maori men to row women wherever we chose
One of the innovations Maori men brought with them to Aotearoa was the waka. After the men settled among our foremothers, Ngai Tu Wahine quickly adapted to the waka, and the custom of men serving us while at sea. Generally, there were two classes of waka men: kaihoe and kaiwhakangahau. The kaihoe had an obvious physical and technical role of rowing the waka. The kaiwhakangahau had a complex role based on keeping women entertained while at sea. Entertainment ought to be understood here in its widest sense, to include physical, spiritual and intellectual amusement as well as catering and beauty therapy. Rowing and onboard service was strictly the domain of men. In recognition of their tangata whenua status, women only ever boarded the waka as VIP – very important passengers. A remnant of this tradition remains with us today. Notice how women are so often prohibited from boarding waka these days. This is because contemporary waka are built for kaihoe only. To put it simply, women don’t row so women don’t go. We fly Koru Club instead.

3. Traditionally women were the orators
The paepae is another male innovation, and a male domain that Ngai Tu Wahine initially accepted into society. Men first built the paepae as a comfortable sunny place to sit while they listened to the women make speeches on the marae. This third korero tika explains perfectly why women today do not sit on the paepae. The paepae is entirely an invention of men who, in the eighteenth century, appealed to the women for some small comfort after centuries of sitting at their feet. Initially the women said “put your big boy pants on and get over it”. But, they hadn't earned their big boy pants yet, and in a moment of weakness Ngai Tu Wahine relented and the men built their first paepae.

Well, as Piki is my witness, there they are: three tika from the great Kete Korero Tika. The challenge for us now, my sistas (and Brothas Offering Invaluable Support or BOIs), is to have Maori women throughout the motu examine the tika and get rid of the teka. As an academic, my contribution will be to reconstruct the tika and expose those who conspire to prevent it, and therefore our tino mana wahine, from being reasserted. I’ll share more of the tika whenever I can. In the meantime, to aid our commitment to the good work of SExY, a nice little historical tangent to enjoy about Indian influence on 1960s American fashion follows.

Below: Cathy (Chinook) Dahmen, Chippewa Model
Cathy was something of a modelling sensation on Paris and New York catwalks in the late 1960s. This pic was taken in 1967, a time when flower power and Indian design worked well together to influence fashion.

Designer Betsey Johnson won an award for a range of dresses (like these, above and below) that used Indian beading, leather work and fringing which Cathy modelled in Paris.
Interestingly, 1967 was also during the period of the 'War On Poverty' (see post for 12 May). And renown Cree singer Buffy Sainte-Marie criticised the white penchant for Indian design, saying that the women who paid up to $700 (and that's 1967 dollars) for some of the top designs could try and get interested in other aspects of Indian life, like - oh, I don't know - poverty maybe? [I'm thinking that with a bit more research this could be turned into a nice little article].

A Vote for Aroha is a Vote for Poetry

2008-05-15T20:35:00.000-07:00

That’s right, if you vote for me you’ll be telling the nation that poetry does matter, and that it can be as popular as fiction, if not more. (Only two of the ten finalists entered poetry). Surely that’s a worthy cause in its self. So, the voting’s open at http://www.nzbookmonth.co.nz/. The authors are anonymous. Fortunately you all know me well enough to be able to recognize my work/words. And that’s all I have to say about that.

I guess you all heard that Hilz trounced ‘Bama in the State of Denial. Ae marika, yes, I should stick to the poetry alright. So, moving right along... a couple of posts ago I introduced our friend WM, the 60s anthropologist. (Take careful note, kids, AN-THRO-PO-LO-GIST – definitely not for that list of things you want to be when you grow up). Anyway, he and his wife did this research project on Indian education, which included written questionnaires for the kids (all done in 1962). I’m not going to do the whole analysis about dodgy research, the problems with ‘60s anthropology and all that palaver. I’ve just taken a thin slice from the kids’ questionnaires for... well, I’m not sure what for, but I’ve done it.

So, the children (and young people) who answered these questionnaires were aged between eight and seventeen. Most of them were in the twelve to seventeen age group. No one had an education above twelfth grade. (Sorry, I don’t know how to convert that to the NZ system). And most of the older ones were DOs (anthro-speak for ‘Drop Outs’). The questionnaires asked them to ‘finish the sentences’ by saying ‘what you feel is right for you’.

One of the sentences they had to finish was If the teacher could talk Indian... This is what they wrote:

* The Indian children will learn a lot more things.
* Children will behave better and understand the words better.
* It would’ve been easier to understand the teacher (x5).
* It might help a little.
* It will help maybe I could learn something.
* I would prefer to talk to them to clear up an expression or something which I cannot in the English language.
* It would benefit some of the children who do not understand English too well.

There were more comments along this line, which I found really interesting when read against their oral interviews and interviews with adults in their communities. There was a strong call for the teachers to speak Indian in schools, and it wasn’t couched in terms of a right to language (which did happen, but I think later). It was more about a desire for bilingualism, and a bilingualism that gave meaning and not simply vocab and grammar and translation – if that makes sense. In reading this collection of files I just got a strong sense of native tongues disappearing in this specific time in history. And while losing their native tongues they weren’t necessarily mastering English, so you see kids leaving school feeling like they’re no good at either language. It’s hard to describe and yet quite clear in my mind, and I can’t help but think of what our situation back home may have been like. It helps make sense of my dad’s generation I think, or at least people of my dad’s generation who share his schooling experience. For some of the kids in this Indian study, school was the most traumatic experience of their lives. Anyway, enough of my sermonizing, there were other answers like these:

If the teachers could talk Indian...
* It would be alright in the lower grades such as in the first and second grades.
* It would be a lot of help to the little kids just starting school.
* The students would probably have a hard time with English after they got out on their own.
* It would be nice but a student may not be able to learn to speak English well.

The interesting thing about these kinds of answers is that they were primarily given by girls. Only one boy is represented among them. I don’t want to get into that ‘what little boys are made of’ scenario - oh, okay, yes I do. Look at these answers that some of the boys gave:

If the teachers could talk Indian...
* It don’t make any difference to me (x2).
* I would talk Indian too (x2).
* That be the shits.
* I’d be pretty good in talking to Indian girls.

Need I say more? Only boys gave the smart arse answers, like these ones:

* In the classroom I am usually... sleepy.
* The worst thing about school ... is when it begins.
* The worst thing about school ... is the school.
* The nicest thing about school... the girls you look at and it makes the work seem easier.
* The nicest thing about school is... the women. [Now I hope this boy is ahead of his time and calling his female classmates women, because otherwise he’s got a thing for his teachers].

And how about this fifteen-year-old boy, with a seventh-grade education, in an oral interview (in 1962 also):

I used to speak Indian when I was a small boy but now days I don’t... White people are nice in bringing new things, new equipment and better things to learn and things that can help you. But I wouldn’t want to be a white man. They might kill me [laughs]. I like being Indian. That’s the way they should stay if they’re Indian. Since Custer came along there’s hardly any Indians left. Pretty soon the whole world will be covered up with white people... before Columbus Indians used to kill wild animals and buffalo. Now Indians drink too much...

Oh, now. There was some interesting psychology going on back in ’62. Check out these answers to the sentence When I talk to white men...

* I am usually dumb.
* I try to do my best in talking to them (x5).
* I don’t know what to say (x2).
* I mind my manners / am polite (x4).
* It doesn’t bother me much but I’d rather talk to an Indian man.
* Usually asked about life on the reservation. [I thought that was an astute answer for a ten-year-old].
* It don’t bother me any.
* Sometimes I make mistakes / I get mixed up (x3).
* I try to talk to make him understand what I’m saying, and it also depends on what kind of white man he is.
* I get nervous.
* I’m shy / can't speak up (x3).
* Nothing happens.
* I speak English to them.
* I stutter and get mixed up. But the white men I talked to are all easy to talk to.
* I try to use good grammar, answer and talk normally (x2).

Speaks for itself really, even the cheeky boys slotted right into this set of answers. Interesting. Reminds me of some of my thesis interviews when people said they didn’t really talk to Pakeha till they moved to town, or the only Pakeha in their home towns were the teacher and the shop keeper, or only the head of the whanau talked to Pakeha.

Hope you haven’t gone to sleep there. That wasn’t my intention. I found this stuff fascinating, but I guess I’ve got the benefit of reading everything in context – a particular context, for sure, but a rich and detailed one even with its flaws. Plus it appeals to my love of all things 50s and 60s, including the shoes and handbags (and some of these kids talk about clothes a lot). They seem like such bright and insightful kids, especially on the language stuff. They know what their needs are, I guess. Meanwhile, the schools were just scary, in any decade. Check this out from the 1962-3 ‘statement of purpose’ from one of the community schools in South Dakota:

A democratic government is organized as the ideal for group living in America. The school curriculum contributes to the maximum realization of democratic ideas in actual living... The pattern of school life is organized so as to foster democratic values.

And if that didn’t put you off staying in school, how about this from the same school’s handbook for boarding students:

Like any other home, this is a place to grow. You will all grow physically; become taller, or heavier, or stranger.

Yes, ‘stranger’. Let’s hope it’s a typo and should say stronger. But would you really want to go to a school that had this on the cover of their student handbook?

A Vote For Aroha is a Vote for Love

2008-05-12T21:00:00.000-07:00

Let's just blame the slogan on my campaign manager, shall we? But, it's true, I’m not letting go of this voting thing until the day voting closes. I’m gonna be as tenacious as Hilz about it. I might even blog more often just to get those votes in (nah, that’s not likely). And if you don’t know what I’m rambling on about here, then shame on you for not reading my last blog. Actually, to be honest, I’m a bit pissed with the organisers. First the voting was meant to be live yesterday, then it was meant to be today, and now I see it’s going to be ‘mid-May’ whenever that is. I presume they mean this year though. Oh well, on with the blog I s’pose.

Anyone who knows anything about the Hahi Katorika knows how much we revere Jesus’s momma, Mary, and all her virginality and immaculateness. But clearly, Kiwi Catholics have got nothing on hailing Mary compared to Chicago Catholics. I have seen images of Mary in many, many places that I could never have predicted. For example: she is immortalised in tiles at the train station down the road. You can buy her on a t-shirt. I’ve seen her tattooed on some dude’s arm, and even in a wallet tucked in with Mami and the kids. Now there’s a thought.

It’s true, I may not be missing Catholicism or Hata Maria, but there are some things I miss enormously about Aotearoa. I really miss the sound of birds. I would be happy to hear the song of a couple of pesky sparrows right now. I would probably feed them to keep them around. All I’ve really heard since I left Aotearoa is the cooing of a couple of pigeons – and not the kukupa (which must be fattening for winter about now), but those ugly city pigeons. Yeah, I really miss birdsong.

Speaking of food, I mean feeding, I really miss kumara too. In fact, that might be the first thing I go hunting for when I get back. Kumara: mmm, one of those big, fat purple ones. And fish, fresh fish, fresh anything from the sea. And the funny thing about missing the seafood is that I don’t necessarily need to have it to eat, I just need to know – for psychological reasons, I think – that I can go and get some fresh seafood if I want to, even if I have to pay too much for it like we do in Auckland. Chicago is so far from the sea that people just don’t get fresh fish, and I think a lot of the fish being served up in restaurants is either frozen or freshwater fish or bottom feeders, as some people at the Settler Colonialism symposium said. (I said that fish-eating people know how to make even the bottom-feeders delicious). First stop in Canada is Vancouver, on the West Coast, so I imagine I’ll be doing what I can to eat fish while I’m there.

Something I miss, that is not related to food, is the sound effect that lets you know you can cross the road. They don’t have that here, they just have a walk or don’t walk image and you keep your eyes peeled for it. So sometimes, if you’re distracted, as I often am, especially when there are shops around, you can miss the crossing and have to wait for the next one.

And something I don’t miss, and yet get my kicks from when they come along, are blasts from the past. You tend to attract them when your discipline of choice is history. Take this one for example. It’s a comment from Hildegard Thompson in April 1964. Hildegard was Chief (yes, Chief) of the Branch of Education, Bureau of Indian Affairs:

In his state of the union message, President Johnson declared war on poverty in this country. Much is now being said and written concerning the best methods of attack in this newest kind of warfare... On one aspect of poverty... all agree; namely, the kinship between low educational achievement and poverty... The schools of this country, without question, will occupy a front position when the battlelines against poverty are drawn. Educators will be called to active duty. Their ingenuity, their leadership, their courage, and their boldness of purpose will undergo the most rigid tests. Can they measure up? Will this newer call to duty be their “finest hour”?

Bureau employees have long been waging war on Indian poverty. Education has opened up good opportunities for countless individual Indians... The beachhead has been established. Are we ready to take the mainland of Indian poverty? Will this be our “finest hour”? [Apparently not. I guess that’s another war the US lost. I wonder if there’ll ever be a war declared on racism, or at least red-neckery? Or what about a war on leg warmers? I think there should be a war on leg warmers.]

It’s a short blog tonight compared to my usual long-winded drivel. But fear not. I’m mulling over a few things to post, including more of my great research finds at the Newberry, like – oh, I don’t know, this pic from a 1958 cattle sale. I’m not saying anything, I’m just posting it. But any comments?

Forget 'Bama and Hilz, Vote For Me!!!

2008-05-08T20:10:00.000-07:00

I’m serious now. Y’all could help me a lot by heading to the NZ Book Month website and voting for mois ‘cause I’m a finalist in this year’s Six Pack competition – which could mean I get some of my poetry published. You remember poetry, right, that favourite little dalliance of mine, that even gets to surpass wine some times? Anyway, I know I’ve got at least three regular readers, so if you each told three people to vote for me, and they told three people to vote for me, and so on and so on and so on, then lots of people will have been told to vote, but only those that actually vote will have voted. For what it’s worth, here’s the link: http://nzbookmonth.co.nz/. And voting will go live on Tuesday. Vote for me and I’ll write you a poem, or not, if that’s your preference.

Anyway, back to blog business. Pilsen, in fact Mexico and Mexican-American communities, celebrated Cinco de Mayo on Monday. It’s a commemoration of the Mexican victory over the French in the Battle of Puebla, 5 May (Cinco de Mayo) 1862. In Pilsen, that meant a lot of noisy, fun-loving revelry and music in the local bars and on the streets. One of the things I like about this neighbourhood – and I think I’ve said this before – is the kids. But yesterday, on the walk home from the bus stop, there was a bunch of them playing at being gangsters. I guess they’re going to play gun games whether they get toy guns to play with or not. They’ll just use sticks if they have to. But these kids all had plastic pistols and rifles and they were chasing each other on their bikes – boys and girls – and having shoot outs from behind cars. And that was kind of okay, but I got really freaked when one of the boys grabbed a younger girl and used her like a hostage. One of the kids tried to chastise them all about the nature of the game and one of the boys yelled out “But it’s fun, we’re shooting each other and nobody’s dying!” Hmmm. How do you argue with that? Needless to say I was happy to see them playing soccer today – still competitive and even a bit aggressive, but no guns.

I’m going to lunch with the Director of the D’arcy McNickle Center for American History tomorrow. The center (look I can spell in American) is one of the research centres within the Newberry Library, so it’s good to have the contact and do the schmoozing. It’s just a shame that I didn’t get invited to the soiree they’ve got on tonight – a $400-a-ticket benefit for the library. But I probably haven’t got the right diamonds with me to have been able to dress the part. Tables are $5000 or $10,000. The library closed early so that the banquet hall could be fluffed up for the event, and with nothing better to do with my time I did an encore walk down the Magnificent Mile, stopping to pretend I could afford something at Chanel and Gucci and Hermes. I even got all Audrey Hepburn at Tiffany’s, moped around the outside taking in their window displays of diamond rings and ear-rings, and wondered if I could get some engraving done on a something from out of a cereal box, just like she did. Well, not her, but her character in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Holly Golightly, who coined the phrase I’m crazy about Tiffany’s. See:

I don’t want to own anything until I find a place where me and things go together. I’m not sure where that is, but I know what it’s like. It’s like Tiffany’s.... I’m crazy about Tiffany’s.... Listen. You know those days when ... suddenly you’re afraid and you don’t know what you’re afraid of? Don’t you ever get that feeling? When I get it, what does any good is to jump into a cab and go to Tiffany’s. Calms me down right away, the quietness, the proud look. Nothing very bad could happen to you there.
Speaking of celebs, look who else was killing time on the Mag Mile:
Well, I’m way off the kaupapa of what I planned on blogging about today – the research. Oh yes, folks, I’m going to be sharing my research findings right here. That’ll be about as in’eresting as shoes and handbags. First, an old but very familiar poem spotted in pride of place in a scrapbook belonging to Elbridge Ayer Burbank, American artist famous for his portraits of Indians, and (I think) the only one to paint Geronimo from a live sitting:
A wise old owl lived in an oak
The more he saw the less he spoke
The less he spoke the more he heard
I wish I could be like that wise old bird

That’s a good poem for the kids to learn, I reckon. And speaking of wise old birds, who remembers a Nana like this old kuia: Mrs Bald Eagle, ‘a lady of 70 renowned as a wit’. According to a visiting anthropologist – oh let’s call him WM, short for white man, who ran a research project amongst Indian communities in the early 60s – Mrs Bald Eagle had severe rheumatism, but she looked ‘hale and hearty’ for her years and was ‘astonishingly alert and outspoken’. WM’s field notes read: ‘She is broad rather than fat, though they did try to put her on a diet in her last severe illness. Only one fry bread per day they told her. “Sure” she replied, “just one as big as this” stretching her arms to the size of a vast frying pan... She was openly proud of her past, her Indianness, her grandchildren, and her knowledge of white ways.’ Lovely, eh? Well not WM, of course. But the nanny. She told WM that her mokos would learn better at school if the teachers could speak better Indian.

There’s so much in the material that I’ve been going through this week that is familiar. Who hasn’t got a photo of their uncles hanging around a car, looking cool, like this one?

Surely even the cowboy hats and boots have a familiar ring, and still now in the 21st century - at least where I come from - and not just in the past. But hang on a minute, I wonder where the women could have been while the dudes were hanging out? Oh, let me think now, maybe they were at the rug exhibition with the babies:

Photoshop these women into a Maori Women’s Welfare League weaving display, or vice versa, and we got us a game of indigenous snap.

I’ve actually found it hard going through some of the images. I can’t help but want to liberate a lot of them, especially the ones with the kuia and kaumatua. I know they belong to someone, that they’re someone’s nana or papa, the last in a generation, or a great orator or whatever. And it’s hard not to want to reunite them with their descendants.

There are heaps of anecdotes that are as Maori to me as they are Indian, and I imagine them all woven together into a novel or a screenplay. Like the story of the ‘crazy cousin’ who was attending carpentry school. He got drunk the night before a test and fell asleep with his head on the desk and his class mates had to wake him up so he’d write something. Well, of course he got an A. And the kuia who told this story said it must be “kind of wonderful to be so smart”. And her daughter said she heard that if you got drunk then the next morning you could ‘remember everything’. Overall, in that particular household, there was ‘a universal admiration for anyone who could get drunk and then get an A on a test’. Now who amongst us didn’t go to uni or wherever with someone just like that? (And substitute the beers with whatever substance works for your reality).

And let’s see, how many of these quotes you can say ‘snap’ to. They’re all from people in their fifties or older, interviewed in the early 1980s:

“My mother spoke English, but my grandmother didn’t. Only when my parents didn’t want us to know what they were talking about they would talk Indian.”
“On my father’s side, they were strictly Catholics and on my mother’s side, they were all strictly Episcopals. So it didn’t make any difference which church we went to, so we just went to Episcopal. If we stayed with the other grandmother, we went to Catholic.”
“To me, it seems like all the Indians are crippled or diabetics. I’m one of them. If it’s just the Indians themselves, or their diets or what, but all those old Indians you talk to, they’re diabetic.”

And then there are these comments that various Indians threw to WM as he went about his research interviews:

“Come into my poor Indian tent”
“You must be the same as those ones that dig up the hills” [Archaeologists, I guess].
And my fave: “Are you federal case worker or FBI?”

Hmm, yes, funny and ironic and telling and poignant, all rolled into one. Much better material for fiction than history I reckon. Oh, but that’s right, I’m the one that said history is fiction.

Saturday in the Park

2008-05-05T21:14:00.000-07:00

One of the problems with writing – and therefore blogging, and probably life – is that some days you just don’t feel like it. You wake up, and your mojo is gone, disappeared, kua pau. And the funny thing is, the more you have to write, the less you feel like doing it. Engari, but, I shall blog on anyway.

So, it’s Monday night (Tuesday in NZ), and the weather’s back to cooking again, after a couple of days of fine but freezing on the weekend. On one of the cold days I got warmed up by getting all domestic at the Lavanderia. While I was there someone tried to sell me CDs and someone else tried to sell me ‘laundry bags’ (i.e. black rubbish bags). Doesn’t sound like much of an event, but it all happened in Spanish which makes it so much more fun.

I nearly got hit by a beer can too. And no, I didn’t smart mouth someone to attract it, and I wasn’t at a sports game either. The neighbour didn’t see me about to walk past his place and he just biffed an empty can – apologized and said he was “sick of them throwing beer cans in his yard”. By ‘them’ he meant the men that gather on the street corner to drink their beers.

There’s a bit of social activity that goes on in public – on people’s stoops or on the street. I gather that people don’t have a backyard, and parks are few and far between. The kids tend to play on the sidewalks, and sometimes on the road I’ve noticed. Men sit on each others’ stoops or lean against walls and fences, just yarning, sometimes drinking, and occasionally making a night of it apparently. I haven’t really seen any women joining in, but who knows, maybe they do. Miranda says that as things warm up families will cook (barbecue I think) on the street.

Despite having to dodge the beer can, I do like Pilsen. I’m getting used to being spoken to in Spanish. The folks at the Jumping Bean Cafe have all figured out that I don’t speak Spanish, but the checkout chicks at La Casa Del Pueblo haven’t. There is a lot of loud Mexican polka music blaring out of apartment and condo windows, and from pick up trucks cruising the streets. It just gets more and more Mexican every day.

On Saturday Miranda, her friend Rosa, and I went to the Chicago History Museum. Unfortunately I forgot to take Piki. Hopefully she doesn’t get all Chucky-doll about it, and start asking if I ‘wanna play, wanna play?’ There are many museums that I could visit in Chicago, and it’s interesting that the locals have tended to recommend the History Museum rather than the Field. The exception has been the suggestion that I go and see Ruatepupuke, the Whanau a Ruataupare (Tokomaru Bay) whare at the Field.

The History Museum was interesting, good shop. Everything was bi-lingual: (American) English and (Hispanic) Spanish even though Hispanic communities are poorly represented, I reckon anyway. The interesting thing about bilingualism in Chicago is that it’s all unofficial, and yet very visible and, I expect, accepted. On the other hand, the tangata whenua are virtually invisible at the museum. A couple of exhibitions admitted to racism against blacks (for example, in housing in the mid-20th century) but it seemed to choke on any admission of colonisation of the tangata whenua. Indians were portrayed as having ceded ‘Chicagou’ to their colonisers, only to return as fur traders in later years. Their participation in the Civil War is depicted as supporting the Brits rather than fighting for their land. And there seems to be no Chicagou Indian history after about 1820. On the other hand, there’s quite a strong African American narrative at the History Musuem. There’s coverage of the 1968 riots that followed in the wake of Martin Luther King Jr’s death; the Chicago blues scene (great vid by the way – Muddy Waters, Koko Taylor, a young Buddy Guy); and late 19th and early 20th-century black activism etc. Hmm. In’eresting in’it?

The main temporary exhibition on at the moment is Catholic Chicago, a subject deserving of its own museum I’m sure. There was Catholic high fashion – nun’s habits and priest’s vestments. There were examples of altars, statues of Mary, images of the Mexican’s re-enactment of the stations of the cross every Good Friday, images of the Filipino’s annual Queen Carnival, and examples of support for various causes like the civil rights movement, no nukes, anti-war campaigns – you get the picture. Basically, it was a big, fat pat on the back for the Hahi Katorika – well-deserved, and a deeply moving and oh so truthful exhibition. Not a part of the exhibition, but part of the museum building was this former church door panel:

I could really use some help interpreting this. It’s obviously Jesus at the top, and it's the dove of peace at the bottom (lighting in the pic is no good, sorry). But what’s up with the white light, milk flow or whatever it is? Any thoughts any body?

Mexican Chicago was mostly represented in the Catholic Chicago exhibit. It was also included in another exhibit selling Chicago as a united collection of ethnic neighbourhoods. But the Mexican piece de resistance has to be the 1978 Monte Carlo Chevrolet which currently has pride of place in the museum lobby.

The slogan on the bonnet, Ranflas Built Chingon, means Cars Built Tough.

Gotta do the view through the window. The steering wheel is a chain.

It was hard to get decent photos of it ‘cause of there are all these neon lights above it. The work on the bonnet is by muralist Ruben Aguayo, and is based on a real photo of Mexican revolutionaries sitting on the front of a locomotive in 1912, which is also the logo for the Amistad Car Club. Amistad means friendship, and by car I think they really mean low-rider. If it’s you (or not you, but maybe your son or your nephew or your bro) you might want to look at some of their vids at: http://www.amistadlowriders.com/ or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrO5SLLxQXk.

Finally something for the boys, I hear you say? Finally, a blog with no shopping for girls? Oh, don’t be silly. Of course the History Museum was followed by shopping – and where else, but along the Magnificent Mile, which is a whole shopping and architecture experience rolled into one. Actually, I find the shops here quite overwhelming. They’re so big and they have so much choice. I don’t think there’s a shop in Chicago that does minimalism. The Niketown store is a single shop on three floors. The Levis store seems to be a similar thing. One brand, three floors, so don’t even get me started on the department stores like Bloomingdales and Nordstrum. The Magnificent Mile is probably a great walk even without the shops. There’re some awesome skylines and buildings and public sculptures to take in, including ones that mark out the orignial site of Fort Dearborn, like this:

It's on the northern end of the Michigan Ave bridge. It shows an ‘Indian scout’ leading some of the white folks to safety (away from the ‘massacring’ Indians is how I think the story goes). Apparently there has been some public debate about how these kinds of representations depict Indians, and so there should be, I say.

At the end of the M. Mile is Millennium Park, home of ‘The Bean’, which is a way cool piece of art. It’s proper name is Cloud Gate, and was designed by Bombay-born sculptor Anish Kapoor. It’s 66 feet long, 33 feet high and 42 feet wide. It weighs 110 tons and cost $23 million to build.

It’s made of steel, but behaves like liquid. I reckon it’s like that liquid metal that the T-1000 robot dude is made of in the Terminator 2 movie. And it’s good fun, not like the T-1000.

Bringing Stroppy Back

2008-05-02T19:18:00.000-07:00

I went roaming again yesterday, looking for a shoe shop, which I didn’t find. My shoe radar must need adjusting. And I wasn’t lost. I just thought it might be like DC where there are two shoe stores on every block. Mind you, when I finished roaming and decided to look for a bus, someone had moved all the bus stops and I had to walk all the way back into town to find the right one.

I did find something else while I was roaming though, the Rainforest Cafe. And even though I didn’t have any kids with me to share the love, I decided to have lunch there. Basically it’s a pretend rain forest with pretend elephants and pretend gorillas and pretend noisy, colourful birds and real fish. The animals all move. The elephants trumpet, the monkeys do whatever it is monkeys do. There are even fake lightening storms, the works. I missed the kids a lot. I think all those monkeys reminded me of them. I nearly borrowed a couple of kids from the next table to help me through the pouri. I was going to ask them to annoy me and demand money while I tried to enjoy my meal and read another chapter of my book. Then I would’ve felt like I had some of the nieces and nephews with me – eh kids: I bet y’all would’ve put up with me teasing you about being monkeys in return for emptying out my wallet before we left. Never mind, get your own PhD and you can bring yourself to Chicago on research leave and go to the Rainforest Cafe, or you can settle for getting your kicks from the pics below.

Here's a picture of the elephant at the Rainforest Cafe. Those aren't blue bananas on the left, it's a bird's tail. Sorry the pics of the gorillas didn't come out (too dark).

There were about four aquariums like this one, one was huge.

Apparently, in Chicago, it can be six degrees one day and twenty-two the next. It’s hard to keep up without a level of wardrobe confusion setting in. It’s thunderstorm season here, and on Thursday afternoon you could feel and hear and smell it coming. It was kinda like up north when it’s hot and muggy and you know a big rain is coming. A few fat drops dissolve into the ground and you wonder if it was really rain or not. But the big rain doesn’t arrive till first thing the next morning. There’s a mix of blue and grey and black skies. The skyscraper horizon in the distance gets all murky, and you can hear some far-off rumbling which does seem to come from the sky rather than the earth. And before long it sounds like it’s in your roof. And when the rain drops, everything and everyone gets drenched. The gutters overflow and water comes up out of the ground and settles around intersections and bus stops – everywhere that you want to be walking. And then it stops. The air warms up again, we all lug our coats and umbrellas around, and the wind starts, just like a balmy Wellington northerly. We all put our coats on again and lean into it. You just get in the door and the thunder and rain start again. So, in summary, the weather is here, wish you were fine.

I’ve been toying with the idea that, with its mid-western culture of politeness, Chicago might socialise me into being less stroppy. I haven’t lost my temper once, despite getting on wrong buses, buying the wrong postage, being served the wrong food or coffee (mainly because people can’t understand me). I haven’t even got impatient about anything really, not even the men. Bern has asked if they’re as brazen here as they were in DC. They might be in Pilsen, but I’ll never know for sure because it’s all Spanish to me. Language differences aside, the men here do all that politeness and chivalry stuff, like holding doors open, offering their seats, and commenting on how good you look today, stuff that in NZ can be received as either creepy or patronising or both. So far no one’s threatened to get all Barry White on me, like in DC. But that veneer of gentlemanly manners does make it harder for me to read. It’s not what I’m used to; I am from the north after all. It means I never know if someone’s just being nice or trying it on. There have been a couple of exceptions – the dude who waved and called out from a taxi was pretty obvious. I assumed he was calling to someone else, and when I realised there was no one else around I stood hand on my hip and said, “oh no you di’n’t. You aint got no bizniss hollerin’ at me ‘less you hollerin’ from behind the wheel of a silver Porsche, boi.” Nah, of course I didn’t do that, but I did think it. And, again, I didn’t get stroppy, just thought it was amusing.

Less amusing was the pimped out dude with the big suit bag slung over his shoulder and the ghetto blaster in his hand, who came up to me at the bus stop and asked if I wanted to get any action. I said no, and since I don’t understand Ebonics, I didn’t catch everything he said after that, but he did at one point say “you sho’ you don’ wanna get any action?” I don’t know if he was offering to help me get a crack habit started or if he had some pimp regalia in his bag for sale. I still didn’t get my strop on though. He got the message fairly quickly and went and accosted a couple of people coming out of a restaurant instead. So, Bern, Chicago men – they're still more forward or attentive or something than what I’m used to in NZ, but not borderline creepy like it got in DC. Meanwhile, it looks like I’ve come to the big city – America’s first city, the locals tell me, the real America – and gotten all zenned out. Doesn’t seem right somehow, doesn’t seem tika.

But some things about Chicago aren’t quite tika, like the fact Chicago River runs backwards, was made to run backwards by some tino kerewa fullas in the early 1900s. Chicago River used to run into Lake Michigan. Pollution along the river had been problematic, and in 1885 it came to a head when a severe rainstorm led to sewage polluting the water supply, and a major outbreak of cholera and typhoid followed. Repeated epidemics set the tone for the rest of the nineteenth century until some clever engineering fullas came up with a solution. “Let’s stop polluting”, they said. Actually, they didn't say that. They built the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, made the river run backwards and re-directed all that pollution into the Mississippi and eventually the Gulf of Mexico. Hmm, wonder what the Mexicans thought about that shit.

A River Runs Through It (Backwards): Chicago River, looking eastwards from the Clark Street bridge.

Things are still going well at the Newberry. I finally struck ‘that archivist’. Every library has one: the one who had to see my reader card, who wouldn’t let me choose which box of goodies I wanted to go through first like the others had, who told me which table to sit at. It meant I had to sit opposite happy white dude, and with other people behind me. Hate that, I always want the power table in the corner. But happy white dude was fun to watch. He got a folder of the good oil, smiled all over again every time he turned a page, and racked up that photocopying order.

I’ve been trying to play ‘look-a-likes’ with the photo collections I’ve been going through. It’s been happening a bit on the streets – seen an Edward James Olmos here, a Blair Underwood there, no Benicio del Toro yet. With the photo collections at the Newberry I reckon I could play look-a-likes with friends and whanau – see how many of us had twins amongst the Indian population in 1950s and 60s America. The photos are certainly posed the same way ours were back in the day: nuclear families in new state houses with new furniture. Mum doing the domestic goddess routine in the kitchen with one or more of the kids at her feet, Dad down the pub – oops, I mean at work. And how dare she begrudge him a well-earned drink after work, anyway. Sorry, I can’t share any pics online. It’s against the rules of digital camera use at the Newberry. But I’m a devout historian. I've got my references at the ready. Gee, am I too into this researching bizzo? Are there only two of you who stick with me on this part, while the rest of you scroll to the end? Don’t really know what to say about that, but I shall contemplate the situation.

Okay, done with the contemplation. If you’re wondering how you can make a dick of yourself on a bus from downtown Chicago to Pilsen, let me help you out. First, go totally silly over how cheap the books are here and buy so many so often that you have to send parcels of them to yourself in NZ, which is tacit acceptance that cheap books might get you into trouble. Then, one day, buy a novel by an acclaimed new African American writer. Make sure it’s an obviously African American book – clear by the cover, the characters’ names (Odessa, Towanda, La Vern), and the setting (1970s West Side St Louis). Get engrossed in the book immediately, so much so that when you sit down on the bus you pull it out without a thought and start reading, totally oblivious to the demographic of the bus until it stops a couple of blocks from Pilsen to let a third of the passengers off at the local housing estate. And, to really entrench that feeling that you might be academically perverse (or ironic, perhaps), do this on a day that you’ve been at the Newberry reading all about how in the early 60s the Bureau of Indian Affairs promoted St Louis as a ‘relocation’ destination by showing how slums were being replaced with new, modern apartment buildings. Hmm. Could they be the ones that eventually became the Projects? Apparently, Chicago is doing a similar thing at the moment. There is a lot of construction and demolition. Some of the poorer suburbs are going through a bit of a gentrification, and some of the larger, cheaper housing estates are now standing next to sites that have been levelled, while flash, yet-to-be-built townhouses and condos are advertised for sale. It’s an interesting look, and not one I want to capture on camera. Luckily there are plenty of churches here to help with all the pastoral care.

Meanwhile, things are very happy at Miranda’s pad. It’s nice to have a bit of routine and familiarity in this otherwise foreign environment. And thanks for the couple of consoling emails about the homesickness. The prognosis is good now ‘cause I’ve been to a shoe sale that needed to see me. Miranda and I have both got work to do before we can reward ourselves with our road trip west. She’s on the last couple of months of her PhD. I can’t believe she isn’t mental like I was when I was finishing. She’s been threatening me with camping. Girlfriend needs to come to Te Hu and check out the poster just inside the door: ‘I Love Not Camping’. I haven’t come all the way to the States to set myself up as tornado bait – not to mention the snakes, coyotes and cougars. Camping, that’ll bring my stroppy back.

Return of the Girly Swot

2008-04-30T23:24:00.000-07:00

Nana often said I had no sense of direction, which used to offend me. But now I think she might’ve been onto something, because I got lost trying to get to the Newberry Library. I have a defence, of course. The Newberry is two bus rides from Pilsen, and one of those buses isn’t running to its usual route because of road closures. It only took me about five minutes to get my bearings, and I got to the library eventually, even if I did go in through the back entrance. Everything’s upside-down here. But it’s not so bad getting lost. I knew I was still in Chicago, and I got to walk down Michigan and then Madison Avenue. Very cool, especially when you look up, like in this photo (below) taken on Madison. Mind you, you know what they say about Maori people looking up (especially to the Lord) – that’s when your land will get taken. Lucky I don't have any over here (land I mean, you can get good Lord on every corner).

There are other things about Chicago that are very cool, besides the weather, which has been sitting at four to six degrees, dropping to zero the other day. I'm thankful to have benefited from the spoils of OPDs (Other People's Divorces) which means D. gave me a fab cashmere and wool matrimonial property coat. It's one that I would never have paid for myself, but fortunately for me her ex-hubby did. Anyway, back to cool about Chicago. The buskers here are very cool. There was this dude under the Metra out at Hyde Park yesterday playing some very sweet saxaphone (below), including those Maori standards Whakaaria Mai, E Te Atua/Amazing Grace (played with their groove on), and My Cherie Amour. But I do love the sax, reminds me of New Year’s parties in the hall at Mitimiti when we were kids, and David Bowie’s Sorrow.

Today I saw these young African American fullas playing some buckets. They were way cool, used these sticks that they'd painted up all colourful, and spun them in the air. They had all their tricks and banter sorted. Very impressive, but I wasn't quick enough to get a photo. I did get a photo of this puppet show just a bit further down the road. That was fun too.

Last night a friend of Miranda's cooked kaikai for a bunch of us from various parts of the world but not Chicago (although all but three of us are living here at the moment). The meal was amazing, four courses - or five if you had cheese. And the table was all set up properly, so I had to wait for someone else to start eating their soup first because I didn't know which spoon to use. Dessert was crepes with either almond sauce, or lemon and icing sugar or - wait for it - Nutella and banana. (Actually, Tiana, I reckon you'd like it. The next time you make pancakes, ask Mum how to make them into crepes by making your mixture thinner. And then try the Nutella and banana filling.) The hosts were really great, and so was the wine: he's quite the connoisseur.

One of the other guests is an Aussie, with Scots and Maori ancestry he pointed out a few times, who has been living in NZ for a long time, like twenty years or something. He was a bit of a boor, a bore and a boar: a bald-head - literally and figuratively. It was like he struggled to believe anything that came out of my mouth, like when we got on to the topic of war and I talked about Waikato and Taranaki opposing conscription during WWI and the Waikato men who were imprisoned because of it being treated worse than the Pakeha conscientious objectors. I got a similar reaction when we got onto that old motif of Maori being undisciplined - whether on the battle field or the rugby field. You know, natural warriors and rugby players, but never strategic or intelligent. And he seemed put out that I wasn't that into Once Were Warriors either, which someone noted was an 'important social document' (unlike Whale Rider which was a sweet movie, I said). Anyway, it seemed incredible to me that I came all the way to Chicago, Illinois, to have one of those "lecturer opened her mouth equals lecturer is biased" moments. Oh, what a sweet reminder of home.

There were some fun moments too. The Brazillian dude teased us about a doco he watched on the plane on his last trip to NZ. It was about the All Blacks and included a line that went "What is New Zealand without the All Blacks? What is a man without a soul?" Just a man, I guess. And we swapped stories about airport security. It was interesting that my experience of airport security seemed to be somehow different, but I didn't want to mention the R-word. It was a nice clear night, so on the way home, driving alongside the lake, I got my first clear view of Chicago city by night. Very pretty. Hopefully I'll get some photos when the weather warms up.

I've put in two fairly solid days at the Newberry Library. At the moment I'm going through some Bureau of Indian Affairs records from the mid-50s. And, snap. It's all trade training for the boys, home-making for the girls, relocation off the rez and into the city, and churches, housing, health and education. Heaps of photos, and I reckon I could drop in some of our Maori Affairs trade training pics and no one would notice. I'm enjoying it. I really am a girly swot, sad but true. But the Newberry is really easy to work at, and I wish the staff could come and teach their wonderful ways to Archives New Zealand. They have the usual form-filling and reader registration and pencils only rule etc. But they also have your photocopying ready in a couple of hours not a couple of weeks. You're allowed to use your digital camera (and at this point I should thank Leanne for recommending one to me that has worked fantastically on the docs, text and images). And, they don't make you view the docs folder by folder. You get a whole box at a time (sixteen folders in the first box I looked at). And if you order a collection and it has two or three boxes, that counts as one item. Plus, they take about five minutes to go and get the stuff you ordered. At the Newberry Library, the staff know how to serve.

I went and got the lay of the land at lunchtime today, and turns out the Newberry is in a very swanky part of town, just at the northern end of what's known as the Magnificent Mile - a reference to the best shopping on Michigan Ave. A mile, that's 1600 metres, that's sixteen rugby fields of shopping. And just a couple of blocks from the Newberry is 900 Shops, which is supposed to be the creme de la creme of the Magnificent Mile. Just five minutes from me is Prada, Yves Saint Laurent, Chanel, Gucci, Jimmy Choo, Bloomingdales - name it. A girl could lose her head, not to mention an arm and a leg.

Still, after watching all that money at that end of town, it's nice to get back to Pilsen after a day's work. It's cold but fine, and it doesn't get dark till after seven, so the kids were still hanging around on the street when I hopped off the bus; a little girl on her bike riding up and down 19th Street calling the boys 'stoopid'. And the younger boys telling her to go away, and trying to be all cool with their baggy jeans and hoodies, especially when the older boys come past. And the little girl in her pink t-shirt just riding up and down pestering them for no particular reason except that's probably how they spend their time until they get called home for tea.

I’ve been trying to make myself a local at the Jumping Bean Cafe, and thought I was getting close because the main woman there has started to recognise me. (I think I’ve been in four or five times in less than a fortnight). But one of the guys was serving the last time I ordered a coffee and he asked me, in Spanish, if I wanted to take it away or have it in. When I said pardon, he asked me the same thing in Spanish. I guess with a Kiwi accent ‘pardon’ sounds the same as their ‘perdon’. I’ve come home on a lot of days to look up the Spanish that gets spoken to me while I’m out. I’ve been thinking about using a few phrases, but I’m worried that I’ll just attract more Spanish. Freakiest thing was probably getting called ‘Mami’, as in, ‘oh, you're ready to pay, Mami?’ At least it wasn’t ‘oh mammy’ with minstrel hands. Now wouldn't that be a fun moment.

Settler Bolonialism

2008-04-28T10:19:00.000-07:00

Brrrr. I think everyone gets to freeze something off today. I can’t believe the temperature can change so dramatically in such a short space of time. It was in the mid-20s three or four days ago and now it’s six degrees. And it’s a different kind of cold here, a chill-to-the-bone cold. Oh yes, I can hear the King’s melancholy tune right now:

As the snow flies
On a cold and grey Chicago mornin’
A poor little baby child is born
in the ghetto…

I dunno ‘bout the baby being born, but I am in the ghetto. Songs take on a new meaning and context here. At the symposium the other day one of the Professors put on his cowboy hat, and one of the native brothas from Canada starts singing Ghost Riders in the Sky:

An old cowboy went riding out one dark and windy day
Upon a ridge he rested as he went along his way ….
Yippie yi ohhh
Yippie yi yaaay
Ghost riders in the sky.

It was hard to keep a straight face, and it reminded me of one of Dad’s truck-driving mates from when we were kids, I’m sure that was one his favourite guitar-party songs. Then yesterday, there was this whole ‘north to Nebraska’ thing when a couple of people were talking about heading that way. Funny.

I s’pose I should say something about the Settler Colonialism symposium I went to on the weekend. Thanks to Melissa – who’ll email but won’t leave a comment – for suggesting Settler Bolonialism as an alternative term. The original meaning of symposium is ‘a drinking party’ or ‘merry feast’, and we did do that each night, which maybe did raise the baloney factor.

Anyway, D., I have gossip of the kind you ordered. I have it on good authority that at least one person failed to sleep in his or her assigned bed one night. Unfortunately that person made a special pleading and has a cone of silence pass, at least till I get back and spill all the beans immediately. Meanwhile I’ve got a good two months to torture and bribe the poor bugger.

I was really impressed with the presenters and the discussion and it was a nice small group. There were some super-smart people there. But man, what hard work keeping up with all those big brains. I won’t spend too much time lashing myself about my paper. It was a bit experimental for me. Well, it had to be really given it was a symposium about theory, that academic thing that I love to hate. I probably should’ve asked a couple of you to read my draft so you could’ve warned me off it. I did the ‘home’ stuff that quite a few of you will recognize without me rehashing it here. But I tied it to the ‘whakapapa of experience’ idea from my thesis (which a few of you might recall), and I wrote it in a slightly different register than my usual, so I had trouble gauging how it went. I felt better after I got a few wines down me at the conference dinner and had a korero with the discussant for the panel I was on. But I really am going to give up on that whole academic practice of peddling the big idea, and I’m just gonna stick to the research and history-telling stuff that I like. Later to all that hard brain work – for me, anyway.

Some of the highlights included meeting some famous brainy people (from sub-altern studies, American Indian history and anthropology), and hearing some really interesting and challenging and new ideas, and the conference dinner – goes without saying really. It was held at a genuine speakeasy from the Al Capone days, which is now an Italian restaurant. You could see the speakeasy aspect, I reckon. We were in a private room in the back, which was where they used to store the sly-grog. It had these big bolted doors and I reckon that’s where the delivery trucks would’ve backed up to unload. The whole thing was really cool. I liked the bookshelf on the doors to the main area. When they were closed, you’d think there was just a bookshelf not an exit. I especially liked these sketches that were around on the walls (below), took me a while to figure them out, but I guess they’re all of the Al Capone types. Some people thought they were a bit creepy looking.

One of the cool things that happened was that I met this German woman called Claudia and got talking about the Burkhardt side of the family. She kept asking if we’ve kept in touch with our German side so it was hard to explain that the German side is now a Maori side and all the Burkhardts I know are Maori. Could've complicated it even more by saying that's the part of the whanau that most looks like the Mexicans I've been seeing. But she was really helpful. Said the ‘dt’ at the end is typically German, said Burkhardt is fairly common, a first name and a surname (like Andrews, Peters, Williams), and probably rural. I told her about the first names we’ve kept going like Walter (Vaata) and Eugene which is pronounced Oi-gin (with a hard ‘g’ not like the soft ‘g’ in gin and tonic). Apparently Eugene is currently a popular name in Germany, but wouldn’t have been at the time that our Burkhardts came to Aotearoa. So if any of the Leef whanau want to go to Germany and do some research, there’s a few clues for you.

This is s’posed to be a research week for me (at the Newberry Library) but I’m too scared to head out into the cold unless it’s just to grab a coffee from round the corner. But I better get into the work side of things, which may mean there’ll be less blogging going on, for a while anyway. There are quite a few things to look forward to, though: been invited to a powwow in about two weeks time; Miranda and I are going to hitch our wagons and head west to do a bit of a circuit through Wisconson, North and South Dakota, stopping at Madison, Fargo, Yellowstone Park, Sioux Falls and a few other places no doubt. I want to go to the University of South Dakota where they’ve got this major Indian oral history archive – something like 5000 interviews conducted in the 60s and early 70s. Woohoo, that’s my feed.

Aue Te Mamae

2008-04-27T22:18:00.000-07:00

I can’t believe I can get to my age and get sooo homesick. Even had a few tears this morning when Haley (sister, potiki) sent through the pics of Anzac Day at Mangamuka. Looks like it was one of those days when it takes ages for the fog to lift.

If the truth be known, I was feeling homesick before the pics arrived. Not sure why, because it’s not like I’m having a bad time or anything. I think I just realized how far I am from home and how long I’ve decided to stay away, and it’s not like we’ve got any whanau over here. It might be karma too – come-uppance for teasing Melissa when we went to Canberra and Melbourne last year because she spoke to her family every day and we were only there for a week, plus my smart-aleck attitude to working on the honours board.

So, yeah, I’m really missing home right now, wishing I had my feet up watching the tide somewhere, anywhere, but preferably Taikarawa or Te Hu. But rather than dwell on it I’m going to share the grief – or the joy. I decided to give this post over to the Corks Road girls, who had each left me a comment to tell me about Anzac. They’re notes are so cool I decided not to get all vicious and edit them. I have cut in here and there with comments that help to understand what the girls are talking about. And in defense of their parents, they do help their kids with their written work, but with the blog and emailing I hear that the girls won’t (a) help each other or (b) let their parents help. So there’s no spelling or grammar check happening. (But girls, you could learn to do your own spell check on the computer, or I could I could send you for some tutoring at Kip McGrath).

Anyway, here they are: Tiana, Hinemaia and Kapua commenting on Anzac Day 2008, at Mangamuka. (By the way, girls, what’s up with the brothas, why haven’t Beavis and Butthead written me anything? Is Mohi trying to lose his favourite nephew status or something?)

Hae Hae Hi HelloTalofa Kia Ora Doctor Aunty Aroha Harris

Its ''ME'' Tiana
You Might Already Know That Uhm The Guns Were So Loud, Atiria Started To Cry. We Had Nice As Foood There Was Potato, SeaFood Chowder, TaKaKau, Ham, Veges Of Course!!! AnyWays Passing On Now Too DumDumDumDaaa One Of The Girls And It Is...''Hinemaia''

Miss Ya Doctor Aunty Aroha Harris
...fReZzZe...
''Tiana Banana Rox Ur Sox Off Hard Not Ur Toe Jams Or What Ya Said''
...CYA...

Miss you Doctor Aunty Aroha Harris

GUNS
The gun were loud I didn't like them that much. The food was yummy and the chochlate cake. We saw alot of people.

Hinemaia xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
Now Kaps

When thay did the guns Atiria was about to cry. Mum was annoying because we had to get a photo with army people.By Kaps

Above: this is what you can achieve when you annoy your children into a photo. Here's Kapua, Hinemaia and (I'm guessing) Atiria with some of the soldier boys.

So that was one comment/letter. And then there were these:

hi aunty its me Kapua.on thurday i went to the dentil clinit.I got my thooth pulled out.thay had to do two shots.it was huge.i got two doller. now i got sixs doller now.it was scary. i got a thooth brush. i got a stiker. it said please dount let me bite my lip. it is num. bye now im tyed. from Kapua

And how many of your six dollars would you like to bank, Kapua? If you let me know I can get mum to do the banking for you. I hope you're not hurting from getting your tooth pulled out. From Aunty.

Hi Aunty

On Thurday we went to mangamuka we got there about six thirty anyway. Atiria was there it was fun she started cried when whaiora brshed her theth. Whaiora said she only likes it when troy dose it becuase he dosen't brsh them properly. It was funny. On Friday Mohi and Dad went pig hunting. [How big was the pig? Any good tusks? From Aunty.] We went down the marae at nine o clock but the powhiri wasin't until ten o clock. Uncle Flukey did the haka and shot the gun. Me Kapua and Atiria got a photo with the soldils Tiana didn't want to have a photo. We meet a girl her name was Heart but she said she dosen't like her name we play rugby with the boys but hafeway throw our game we had to go.

Lots Of LoveHinemaia xoxoxo

And that would be Uncle Flukey (above) with the gun.

Hae Hae Hi Hello Doctor Aunty Aroha Harris

[Girlfriend, you need to ask someone to explain what haehae means. Ask your Papa or Aunty Api or one of your teachers].

So Im Good...We Going To Auckland On Monday, I Cant Wait. Then That Way I Wouldnt Have To Ring Up Nana And Ask Her To Send Your Mail To Me. [If you're wondering, Tiana's my assistant while I'm away, and part of her job includes taking care of my mail and bills.]

Uhm We've Got Reading Competition Coming Up. Im Reading A Book Called ''The Silken Road To Samarkand'', It Includes Wishes, Fantasy, Voyages, Travel, Magic And Friendship. Have You Read It? If You Have Tell Me About It So I Dont Have To Read It. [I think you know the answer to this one already, girlfriend].

Im Getting My Cellphone At The End Of The School Holidays I Cant Wait. Uhm Ive Been Going Crazy As In Mean And That Because Mum Wouldnt Take Us To Mitimiti Because We Ran Out Of Time After THe Haps In Mangamuka [HaHaHa]. [Crazy mean girls shouldn't get phones. But maybe I can take you to Mitimiti when I get back. We'll leave Mum and Dad behind.]

We Went Up North On Thursday. When We Got To Nanas Whairoa Was There. Atiria Is Looking Great, Shes A Tutu. When Shes In A Grump She'll Slap You But You Just Hold Her Hands But She'll Shake And Shake. That Is So Cool That Fries Are Considered As Breakfast.

I Found Out That Uncle Wins Brother Is Buried In Italy. He Died In The War. Hes Buried Next To Aunty Kates Husbands Uncle.

Tomorrow On Monday Nana Kate Has Been Gone For A Year.

Anyway Miss You Doctor Aunty Aroha Harris

...fReZzZe......XxX...oOo...Bye Bye!!!

Tiana Banana Rox Ur Sox Off Hard Not Ur Toe Jams Or WhatEver You Said!!! [Rocks Your Frock Off, haha]

...CYA...

March to Victory

2008-04-25T08:25:00.000-07:00

Anzac Day – well it will have been and gone in Aotearoa by now. And here there’s no such thing as Anzac Day. But there is a 25th of April, which started eighteen hours after yours.

So, did y’all get up at dawn, as soon as the bugle called? I know they would’ve been up and at it in Mangamuka. One of my little side projects for the last couple of years was helping to research an honours board for all the Mangamuka men who served in WWI, WWII, and in Japan, Korea, Malaya and Vietnam. One of ours even went to the Boer War. It wasn’t really my kind of project, certainly not one I would’ve chosen myself. (Gee, how many of those projects have I done now?) All I offered to do was help my uncle write a funding application. I s’pose I should’ve known I’d never be let off that easily.

Anyway, after many hoops and eighteen months of sorting through long lists of names, many of them bearing the surname Harris, we got our final list of Mangamuka men who went to war. There have been a lot of them – more than 120. While we were working on the board, I developed a little sermonette about how it was inappropriate for someone named Aroha to be working on a war project. But when we finally dotted the last I and crossed the last T it struck me that 120 men is a lot of people for our little ol’ settlement to send to war (to fight for our coloniser), a most poignant moment. And really, I’m impressed by the commitment and energy a couple of the uncles in particular put into the project. It wasn’t an easy job for any of us, and quite a heavy responsibility to carry at times. (Feel free to send me any pics if you were there and are reading this).

Meanwhile back in the jungle... I got spoken to in Mexican again, this time by the check-out operator at La Casa del Pueblo (the supermarket, I think the name translates to something like ‘the house of the people or town). It took her a moment to realise I didn’t speak Mexican. After that I walked straight into a lovely little incident on the street corner – three cops had a couple of young Mexican boys bailed up, threatening them with arrest, a bunch of kids just out of school hanging around watching, and the cop cars (three of them) looking like they’d screeched to a halt to surround the young fullas. There’s a clear police presence in this neighbourhood. They cruise the streets and the service alleys, and they really do eat donuts. I’m not sure if it makes me feel more or less safe.

On Anzac eve Miranda and I went into the University of Chicago where the symposium I’m speaking at starts later today. (It’s called ‘Conditions of Settler Colonialism’). The uni is in a suburb called Hyde Park, which is where the Chicago World Fair was held in 1893, (to acknowledge Columbus’s ‘discovery’ of the US). So a lot of the architecture in the area is from that period and has got this whole gothic look about it. Hyde Park is not Pilsen. I didn’t hear any Spanish spoken in the streets. I don’t think I even saw any Spanish signage. I didn’t see any cops or hear any sirens. I think I saw the most white people I’ve seen since I got here. So, Hyde Park is not Pilsen. But both places are Chicago.

We had to drive along Lake Michigan to get to uni. That’s pretty impressive. It looks like the sea, it’s all water to the horizon and Miranda said on a clear day you can see around the lake a bit but after five years she’s never seen the other side. The shame about it is that apparently it’s polluted as. We checked out a lecture as well, by a Professor of Anthropology. She’s going to be speaking at the symposium too. Anyway, she is a major brain, and I liked her lecture but really had to work with the terms and the big words and the complex ideas. It was one of those theoretical lectures that make my head hurt, (and most of you know I prefer the ‘theory schmeory’ theory). So, it was the perfect way to intimidate myself about being cheeky enough to join the impressive line up of speakers that is at this symposium. Check them out online: http://ccct.uchicago.edu/settler.html. I still get nervous every time I speak, but I can’t remember the last time I was as nervous as I am about this one. I’ll be glad when it’s over with (apopo). In the meantime I'll focus on the pleasure of meeting famous brainy people.

Pilsen, Chicago

2008-04-22T17:36:00.000-07:00

I think I decided I would like Chicago a lot even before I hopped off the plane, maybe even before I boarded it. The airport is sooo big. We drove over top of the motorway to get from where we landed to the actual terminal – and there are several terminals to choose from. Until 2005 O’hare (the airport) was the busiest in the world in terms of take-offs and landings. It’s still apparently the second-busiest in the world in terms of passengers (more than 76 million a year). And if that wasn’t thrilling enough, on the way to the baggage claim you had to go through this way cool (or sooo kitsch, depending on your point of view) area that was all moving sidewalks with these neon lights above, hard to describe but they came on and off a bit like a Mexican wave, and reflected into these glass walls at the sides. If I was ten years old I would have been running back around for another turn. I don’t know if you get that from the pic (below).

Anyway, my mate Miranda picked me up – I’m sleeping on her fold-down futon for a while. We went for a bit of a tiki tour before coming back to her place, and it wasn’t long before I felt like I was driving around a gangster movie, mainly because we were under ‘the El’ (elevated train). You know, those roads under the train track over-bridges, where on movies drug deals get done or people go into a pizza place or bar and set up a hit, that kind of thing. Chicago has some pretty amazing architecture and has been used as a backdrop for a number of movies, including The Untouchables – have a look for yourself: http://www.movie-locations.com/movies/u/untouchables.html. There’s also a good encyclopaedia of Chicago history which has got some easy reads and good pics – better than any that I’ll take: http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/2477.html is the page about Pilsen, the Mexican part of Chicago, where Miranda has a very cool pad. We can see the Sears tower and a couple of other Chicago skyscrapers from her window and from the street outside. Pilsen is really interesting, a working class Mexican suburb since about the 1940s. So there’s a lot of Spanish spoken, across all generations. They have all these fab murals on the buildings throughout the neighbourhood. I’ve been a bit self-conscious about taking pics. I’m well off the tourist track here and don’t want to make myself look like one by pulling out the camera on the street. But I’ve taken these two:

This mural is opposite the lavanderia (laundromat), and it’s huge.

And this one is on a church wall. You can check out some of the other murals here: http://www.ditext.com/murals/murals1.html.

There seems to be a couple of Catholic churches on every block, and all the signage for the shops and things is in Spanish too, makes for some interesting shopping experiences. I like it though. I saw a mariachi band, a couple of kaumatua who reminded me of Uncle Wina (same dress sense and everything, right down to the polished boots) and had a fun time at the lavanderia. A couple of people spoke to me in Spanish. I think one dude said buenos tardes (good afternoon). I got such a fright I just kind of looked at him and said nothing. But mostly I think the locals here pick me for being not Mexican. Yesterday we stopped off for a drink at a local bar, run by some Mexican women. It was different – no sign outside, really dark inside, Americana music playing, Mexican decorations and ornaments, a photo booth, and they served my wine in a tumbler and Miranda’s beer in a wine glass. It was pretty much how I’d imagine a speakeasy (from the prohibition days). Mexican men push these refrigerated carts around, ringing bells and selling Mexican ice-creams. Others have stalls on street corners and sell tamales and churro and different kinds of melon. I’d love to take photos of some of these people, especially if they’d pose with Piki, but I don’t want to feel like an ethnologist treating them like a cultural curiosity. Mexican is obviously the first language, so I haven’t tried to buy anything yet. I already got the wrong postage at the Post Office – even though the salesperson and I were both speaking English we somehow had trouble understanding each other.

Anyway, I’m enjoying myself so far. Miranda tells me that all that palaver I was getting with the men in DC shouldn’t happen so much here, despite the Mexican machismo thing. Also, if it does happen, it’s quite alright to slap them down. So far so good and I’m pretty happy about that. I found some great coffee at Cafe Jumping Bean just around the corner today. Had to get past the language barrier but eventually ordered a soy milk cafe latte. I also found a way cool hokohoko shop with heaps of those retro track suits that the kids seem to be into at the moment, plus vintage dresses, bags and shoes. It’s a shop that could give me a lot of trouble, in a good way.

Pilsen has also been overwhelming in some ways. I’ve never felt so much like an outsider in all my life. I look different. I speak different. Even English-speaking people have trouble understanding me. It’s really obvious that where I am is not New Zealand, but the funny thing is it’s not an America that I’m familiar with either. (In other words, it’s not an America that makes it to the tv or movie screens). I think it’s Mexico in Chicago.

Things to Love and Hate About DC

2008-04-18T22:44:00.000-07:00

My last night in DC: been out for a bit of a reconnoitre. I think I get the ‘don’t walk alone at night’ advice now. There’s a lot of drinking, and a lot of it on the sidewalks outside bars, a consequence of going smokefree I s’pose. I reckon most of them are interns and uni students. And there’s more homeless panhandling for change for some reason, and to me they seemed pushier than previously. Maybe it’s part of the Friday night scene here. Plus it’s really hot – 27 degrees, which is apparently not really hot by DC standards. But it’s one of the warmest days of spring so far and I think people are taking full advantage of it. Loads of them are out and about.

I actually did some writing today, but not before spending some time at the Department of the Interior (DoI) – recommended by Chad. It’s another great building, with some pretty cool art works throughout it. I wasn’t too impressed by the museum. Native peoples were included in one part of the exhibition, but almost as if they were part of the land and resources that the DoI [pronounced Doy?] is responsible for managing. Everything else – apart from a Vietnam vet exhibition – was about animals and geology and opening up the west for (white) settlement. The library was pretty good though, and I’d probably find heaps of worthwhile things to research there. Today I just contented myself flicking through a couple of newly released books, and picking through the reviews section of an American History journal. (The pic below is the DoI logo on one of the library pillars).

Plenty of fun with indigenous snap today, the DoI includes the BLM. I didn’t even need to be told what that stood for – Bureau of Land Management, right first time. And from what I could tell that meant managing the land away from the natives and towards the colonisers. Snap.

One of the reasons Chad recommended the DoI is the cafe, which has this whole Navajo aspect – in the tiles, the furniture I suspect and the murals. The lighting’s not that great, but here’s part of one of the main murals (below).

And this pic (below) is of a light fitting at the cafe. I couldn’t help but think it looked like an Indian head dress. Don’t know if you can see it.

The other thing I did today (or tonight) was the bar thing. And two things were confirmed for me: (1) If I didn’t do history I’d be a great lush; and (2) I’m too drunk now to remember what the second thing was. Oh no, now I remember, it’s that suspicion that while I’m over here by myself I can tell anyone anything about NZ and Maori. There’s no one here to correct me. I can just totally make stuff up. Not that I have, but someone has. According to Jen – she’s the bartender, and this is her last night – one of her former ‘clients’ (I didn’t ask, I assumed it meant the same as punter or customer) when you meet a NZer, you have to say ‘kaikaira’ and there’s this whole eyeballing thing that you’re meant to do and something about pressing noses. I told her she was right, of course, but she might want to be a little selective about whose nose she presses.

Anyway, that’s boring. I’d rather talk about being a lush. I’ve suspected for a while now that I’d be a great lush, and judging by the numbers of bottles of wine I’ve attracted as gifts over the years I think a number of you agree. And I wouldn’t be a park-bench, brown-paper-bag lush. I’d be a perched-at-the-bar, scintillating-conversation, spectacular-shoes, wine-list-committed-to-memory, bar-fly kind of lush. It’s my calling, or my retirement plan. And it would get me writing more. So much to see then write about, just perching at a bar, watching the convertibles and the hummers and the sirens go by as the temperature drops from 27 to 23 and eventually to 13 degrees, eavesdropping on the interns’ conversation about whether or not Hillary is a racist. "No she’s not racist. Well she’s not old-time racist. And she’s not colour-blind. But she’s not a racist". Hmm.

So that was me today, visit to the DoI, nice long walk in the sunshine, a few drinks at the neighbourhood bar. Plenty of time to reflect – things to love and hate about DC:

D: we’ve already established that you’d love the Phillips (not to mention the other art galleries in town).
Donna: you’d love being able to jog around the national mall at lunchtime with all the other joggers, and you’d be faster than them and better dressed.
Doctor: you would love the spring gardens – tulips, and other flowers that have names, and tulips, I even saw fuchsia tulips, and I swear they’ve got koromiko here. But people keep their gardens real nice here. I only saw one garden that looked like one I’d be responsible for (i.e. ‘really nice weeds you’ve got there lady’).
Bern: I think you’d like all the choice of shows and theatre and live music and comedy and take your pick really.
We’d all like the cheap Italian wines, wouldn’t we? Not to mention the free wine every night at the hotel.
All you mummies and daddies would love the free stuff for kids, but one way or another they'd still get you to part with your money.
Tamariki ma: you’d love that fries are considered a breakfast food. And Corks Road kids, I reckon you’d go nuts over the oranges.
Boys – Mohi, Jesse, Te Arahi, Taeroa, Milt et. al. (oh, and your dads) – you would’ve loved this motorbike I saw today. A Harley Davidson put together from donated parts for a Vietnam Vets exhibition. Fully customised, chopper style, all chromed and leathered and painted up. I really wanted to take a photo for you, but there was a ‘no photography’ sign and I was going to take a photo anyway till I spotted the security cameras, and I’d already had a bit of an exchange with the security dude on the door. I can’t even find a pic of it online for you, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.
We’d all hate the coffee – there are only two kinds, foul or disgusting. I’ve developed a tolerance for foul.
I love and hate the way Washingtonians toot their horns all the time, any time, whenever they feel something isn’t quite right on the road. I swear you can just hop in your car and start tooting, you don’t even have to start your car up.
I wish I had some recording gear with me. This place is really noisy – you can hear the subway, tooting, sirens, loud Americans, music coming from vehicles and shops, some pretty cool busking (old dude on a saxophone), a protest line with drums and other percussion, tv crews all over the place. Busy, loud, and non-stop.
I’m over being self-conscious about the kiri ta/whakairo thing. I had sleeves on today, and people will stare regardless. Good on them.
Funniest sign I saw had to be the one by the escalator that read 'Narrow Heels Use Elevator'. I think it meant use the elevator if you're wearing stilettos. I don't think it was a fat ankles versus skinny ankles thing.

Having said all that, would I come again? Absolutely, yes. But there are some things I’d do differently. I’d stay somewhere cheaper, though no further out of town than where I am now. I’d read the train and bus information more closely before boarding any of them. I’d wear a wedding ring (I’m just about choking on that one, and not because I’m cynical about marriage, but because I so deeply respect that particular holy sacrament). I’d make sure that the people who I know who live in DC are actually in town while I’m here. I’d stay for longer, and of course I’d do more work.

D Day

2008-04-17T19:56:00.000-07:00

Yay! Congratulations to me for not getting lost today. Not only did I not get lost, but I also discovered that there are four shoe shops within ten minutes walk from where I’m staying. So I strolled around them all, trying not to drool too much. But I was very restrained, narrowed my desires down to three pairs, and decided not to buy any for now. Instead I’ve decided to come up with a shoe acquisition strategy that will fit better with my travel plans. I can’t be loading up my suitcase with shoes when I’ve only been here for ten days and have more than ten weeks of shoe discoveries to come.

There’s a reason I didn’t get lost today: I just stuck to my own ‘hood in a deliberate attempt to avoid all things Papal. I managed to avoid the crowds, but the Pope still came to Du Pont Circle, emblazoned across the t-shirts of people who’d probably been to mass. And I presume the choppers overhead and the military presence on the streets is something to do with security for him. The media coverage of his visit is interesting to watch. There’s been some lengthy analysis of a couple of his speeches – especially his acknowledgement of the ‘deep shame’ brought on the church by the sexual abuse scandals here in the States, and also some of the comments he made about secularism to a gathering of American bishops. On one hand he praised the US for allowing secularism to co-exist with strong religious belief. But on the other hand he warned the Catholic bishops to beware the ‘subtle influence of secularism’ and its ability to ‘lead even Catholics to accept abortion, divorce and co-habitation outside of marriage’. He reckons that religion must be treated as a public and not a private matter; that is how Catholic leadership will enable its people to resist secularism. I don’t know why I’m going on about this stuff. It might be because I’m curious that I haven’t seen or heard a single bit of media coverage on some of the protests I’ve seen. And I know I’ve seen protest. I know I’m not making that up. I think another aspect is that I kinda hoped I’d be more interested in all things Catholic while the Pope and I were in the same part of the world at the same time. I think it started at St Matt’s the other day when I hoped something would move or appeal to my inner Catholic. But I guess my inner cynical historian chased that away a long time ago.

So, the highlight for the day was the Phillips Collection (http://www.phillipscollection.org/ if you’re interested). I don’t know what happened to my mate Purcell who was meant to join me. Mind you, it may have helped if I waited for his phone call like I said I would (oh yeah, ‘cause that sounds like something I’d do). Anyway, the Phillips Collection, it’s a museum of modern art – the first in the country apparently. It opened in 1921 in the mansion of art collector Duncan Phillips, and reading between the lines I take it there is some competition between the Phillips Collection and the National Gallery. I must’ve been there for something like three hours, which is pretty good for me in an art gallery on my own. I kept thinking of you today, D: I really needed your art brain here. You might’ve encouraged me to spend more time at artworks I didn’t like, and you would’ve asked my why I did or didn’t like something, and I would’ve given you really brainy answers like ‘the colours are pretty’. And you would’ve known Renoir’s Luncheon of the Boating Party without having to read the label. And you would’ve recognised the Van Gogh’s and Monet’s and Cezanne’s and the other famous long-time-dead Europeans. And you would’ve done all that without judging me for going through Phillips Collects, the current special exhibition, ‘backwards’. (I couldn’t help it, the place is like a rabbit warren, and it’s across two buildings, and apparently you’re meant to do one building then the other, but I went floor by floor through both buildings which meant I started the special exhibition at its exit. I didn’t know there was a right way to view art till one of the guides pointed out my mistake. I just blamed it on coming from the upside down southern hemisphere). D., if you were here I know you would’ve encouraged me to do more things that aren’t allowed – like taking photos with a flash, and touching the art works. And then when we left you would’ve told the security people what I did and we would’ve left laughing, straight to the nearest wine bar – or maybe we’ve both matured and don’t do those things any more. But mate, I think you’d love the Phillips. And if you’re still planning on chucking NZ in to go work in a Starbucks somewhere that’s not-NZ then I highly recommend DC. But it wasn’t just the art that made me think of you today. For some reason I was also reminded of when you decided to go travelling while we were at uni, when we were sweet young things just a few years ago, and I asked if I could come with you. I don’t know if you remember, but my memory is that you said ‘no’ and something like you couldn’t trust me not to get homesick, and that I’d be crying to go home within a month. I see your point now, and not because I’m homesick or tangi-tangi. I’m sure I’m not the home-girl I was all those years ago. But I could leave here and come home and not feel like I missed anything. And that’s probably the other reason I missed your company today – you would’ve told me to snap out it.

So, at the Phillips, they have this courtyard that features these sculptures, and one of my favourite parts of the Phillips Collects exhibition was this time-lapse video of two sculptures getting installed. Eight men taking what may have been hours to position a single piece of art. I found it really amusing – there was no sound, but lots of hand gestures and men obviously instructing each other and debating the best approach. I just kept thinking to myself ‘why don’t they go get a woman to help?’ It was funny. But I seemed to be the only person that sat down and gave it any time. Like many of the things in DC, I also found I was a little uncomfortable about some things at the Phillips. I didn’t see a single thing native. I saw some artworks by non-natives that seemed to be about native country – like uninhabited Indian landscape, but let’s not mention the displacement of the tangata whenua. And then there’s the mansion itself – ridiculously huge and rich. The main fireplace was taller than me. It was hard for me to be in that part of the Phillips without imagining the hustle and bustle of black servants doing the bidding of their white masters. And that thinking was kind of confirmed when I got upstairs and saw that the one African American artist on display was confined to two walls in one of the smallest spaces in the gallery – not that I understand anything about how those arty decisions get made. But I also noted that the artist – Jacob Lawrence – did a Witi on his work and changed the title and captions for a series now known as The Migration Series (it used to be called The Migration of the Negro). Hmm.

One of the artworks I liked was this one (above): Wassily Kadinsky’s Succession. It’s not my usual thing despite the pretty colours and the use of pink. But I like it because it’s called Succession, and to me it looks like succession in Maori land terms – passage down the generations, similar but different, whakapapa pushed into lines that read left to right, all that stuff.

One of the things I noticed at the Phillips is that the labels include a line that says 'Acquired' and then gives the date the art work was acquired. The Phillips Collects exhibition included some artworks that haven't been 'acquired' yet but have been negotiated. (My guess is they have to wait for the donor/owner to die). That little word - acquired - said so much to me. It's a word I'd apply to much of what I've seen in DC - acquired. Land of the tangata whenua - acquired. Slaves - acquired. Democracy, the best in the world - acquired. Other people's art - acquired. It's more than unrepentant consumerism. It's acquisition, collection - proof not only of ownership but of the capacity to own. Kind of creepy, and I think I'd take some comfort from being proved wrong.

And then there was this (above), a sculpture at the corner of the Phillips mansion. It’s called Two-Faced Guy but when I first read the label I thought it said Two-Faced City which, of course, I reckon is a much better title. Two-faced people are a dime a dozen, but a public admission that DC might be a two-faced city seemed really apt to me. I’ll see if I can explain what I mean here. I think it’s got something to do with the different truths or different lives I’ve seen in DC. And I’m not trying to be a DC expert after just a few days, I’m really just reflecting on what I think I’ve seen. I’ve had men leer at me or spin those cliché pick up lines that make me want to crack up laughing. But today, hanging around upmarket Du Pont Circle, the men that approached me had actual conversations to contribute. Two of them knew where New Zealand was and one of them had been there (twenty years ago). They wanted to know about NZ. They wanted to know where in the States I’d been and what I think of it so far. They asked what I thought about the Phillips. None of that ‘how you doing’ bullshit.

I’ve seen poverty and riches, and there are parts of that particular equation that I can’t get to add up. So, the Pope’s visit will cost DC $4million. But five percent of all sales at Target is applied to charity – according to its own advertising that’s $3million a week. The radio station I’ve been listening to does an annual fun run event that raised $3million last year. This is a rich city in a rich country, complaining about an amount of money it can raise in a day, and yet it seems so content with its homelessness problem.

And I have to also ask about race. This probably isn’t the right thing to say, but I have wondered if the African Americans here are still the servants. All but one of the bus drivers I’ve seen were African American (and the one that wasn’t was Mexican I think). The people working in the stores are mainly black, as far as I can tell: the courier drivers, the hotel staff, the taxi drivers. And I’ve seen some white people be downright nasty to them. And because the African Americans are in service jobs – and they probably quite like earning a regular income – they respond with politeness, which might also be read as deference. And I know that some of the suits I’ve seen around town probably work in the White House or at one of the universities or what ever, but those ones have tended to be one or two amongst a group of white folks. Anyway, I’m just saying.

Still, there are things I can admire about Washingtonians. Like, they are amazing multi-taskers. I watched these two women having breakfast together, and what sounded like a business meeting, while also texting and talking on their cell phones. Then there was the dude (white) who picked up his parcel from a courier driver (black) while talking on his cell phone and abusing the courier driver ‘if you drive up while I’m standing here, I swear to f*n God I’ll sue you’. Ah, lovely.

I decided today that I might be spoiling you all with these daily blogs. I mean, aren't I basically writing you a letter every day? I should probably spend more time on my work-related writing, like the paper that's due tomorrow. Also, a couple of the nieces have requested blogs for tamariki, and I have said I'd give it a go, although the truth is I have to think harder for them because I have to think about the language a lot more. But that might be a good thing for me to try for my next blog. We'll see.

DC Emancipation Day: Something to Cry About

2008-04-16T20:25:00.000-07:00

Things started today much like yesterday. In other words I got lost in a good way, again. I went in search of a particular bus stop only to find it was unavailable due to roads being cordoned off and flag-waving crowds gathering to watch the Pope-mobile make it's way to the Catholic university. I sat around and watched the people for a little while, some of them have a definite entertainment value. But hanging out for the Pope isn't really my thing, and my plan for tomorrow is to stay well away from downtown where he has two engagements including a national mass. So I did my usual thing of catching a bus to somewhere I wasn't really expecting. Engari, something I can say about Washington is that it is very walkable. If you get a bus that's going in the general direction you're heading, you can walk the rest of the way. In fact, if you dick around with buses and bus stops the way I have been it probably is just easier to walk: haere ma raro.

Anyway, today is DC Emancipation Day, which means it is the 146th anniversary of the day that the Washington DC slaves were freed. So I went along to a couple of lunch time events at the Historical Society of Washington, D. C. at The Carnegie (HSW). That's the Carnegie (Library) building in the pic below, orginally the Washington Public Library, and promoted as the 'University for the People'. It's funny, the area (Mt Vernon) is supposedly the next big thing in DC and there's a lot of construction happening in the neighbourhood. But though the Carnegie is a wonderful building, it seemed sparse and starved of resources on the inside.

It was an interesting crowd that gathered. There were a couple of school groups. One group had come as a protest rally, with their teachers shackled and dressed as slaves. I eavesdropped on one of their conversations which was about freedom - social, political, economic and psychological freedom. Then there were your kuia and kaumatua set, your professionals set, and your married couples. These groups - all black - were complimented by small numbers of whites, including the granny-hunter types that we get at historical society gatherings back home. And then there was me, feeling more self-conscious about my kiri ta/whakairo than I ever have before, and not because of the blacks but because of the whites staring. We'd come to listen to Michael Baytop, blues musician and historian, and Michael Mack, actor (as seen on Star Trek: the New Generation).

Anyway, I thought Michael B. was fantastic. He started with the most sorrowful sounding tune on the harmonica, didn't say a word until he finished playing. And when he did speak, he just said something like, 'you know, when we got here we didn't really have instruments, we just played what we had until we began to make our own instruments and then we developed instruments that became available to us'. So off he went, taking us through songs and instruments - spirituals and blues and old slave songs; clapping and stamping and 'bones' and harps and banjoes and guitars. That's him playing the bones in the next pic. They're cow bones - which is a relief, I was a bit worried for a minute until he explained them. They reminded me of the spoons, but in a ghetto cool way. I've seen some mean spoon players over the years, but those bones were pretty special. He did 'When the Saints Come Marching In' with them. And yes the audience joined in, with just about every song, in fact. But not in a cliche 'can I get a witness' way. It was very laid back and sedate, and I felt like a bit of a cultural voyeur. But it was also really moving because I managed to sit in the seniors row with an old kaumatua who had to bring his wrist up to his nose just to read his watch. And he knew every song, even an old spiritual that Michael B. said he had researched. He just closed his eyes, and kept time with his hands to his knees, and sang along softly. And the three kuia alongside him sang too. I'm not ashamed to say I cried. And I'm pretty sure one of the fullas in front of me wiped a tear or two from his eyes as well. It wasn't just the songs and the singing, it was the memories that you knew were coming up for the older ones, probably including memories of family and friends who aren't on this earth anymore. What a privilege. I don't think I'll ever be able to listen to 'the Saints' or 'We Shall Not Be Moved' in quite the same way again - apart from the fact that I got to hear all of the lyrics properly for the first time.

It wasn't all sadness and blues though - and I note that Michael B. (when pulled up about when the blues began) said 'there's always been blues, and there always will be till the last one of us dies. It's just that we didn't call them blues until a particular point in our history.' I thought his historical stuff was great. He talked not just about the songs but about the instruments and their development over time and particular application of them by blacks. He had some of those jokes too; the ones about all blacks can sing - 'man, those slaves sho' like t' sing. We sho' lucky we liked t' sing.' Everyone laughed. There were four young boys in front of me, and they started off looking like they were unimpressed - like most young people when it comes to listening to 'old' people. But when Michael B. led the audience in one of those 'when I say - you say' numbers I could hear those boys beat-boxing[?] along. It was great because behind me was one of those deep Isaac Hayes type voices, and a couple of women putting their own harmonies in. Anyway, those boys soon started listening up. It was a great, great performance and it was followed by Michael Mack re-enacting a speech first given by black writer and commentator Frederick Douglass in 1883 at the 21st anniversary celebration of DC Emancipation. That was pretty cool too: think James Earl Jones with a little less rumble in his voice, and Michael B. picking away in the background on his guitar. There was a part in the speech which, in terms of the patterns and imagery in it, sounded remarkably like the much later Haile Selassie I speech eventually immortalised in Bob Marley's War. Interesting.

More interesting, though, is reconciling the images and wisdom of great black men - Douglass, King, du Bois, Booker T. Washington (regardless of what you think of their words) - with some of the crap I've had to deal with out and about in DC. The "hell-ohhh sunshine" and "all ri-ight" and "how're you today sweetheart" with long stare that follows me down the street. It makes me wonder who they're role-modelling. I'm hoping it's a Washington phenomenon, but if it continues when I hit Chicago I think I'll be leaving for Canada sooner than I planned. Admittedly it's not only black men who do that shit, as an Egyptian and a couple of white guys have proven. But, so far, for me, it's been mostly black men. And I get the distinct impression that smart-mouthing them is not the right move. Any tips on what the deal might be here? Is it all just harmless, and as acceptable as a smile and a 'kia ora' when you're out for a walk, or do these fullas just beleive too much in their love-song lyrics? (She says while nodding her head to Smokey Robinson's Cruisin' on Radio WASH).

Anyway, from the Emancipation event I made my way to the NMAI again, and stumbled into the Chinatown precint. In the slippage between the HSW and Chinatown I think I found a poorer DC - multi-ethnic, though predominantly black, lots of hair with weaves, cheap shops. I think it's where Jerry Springer gets his audiences. Micheal B. had mentioned DC's southeast as the main area that blacks live these days - although they'd previously been dominant on Capitol Hill and also Georgetown, DC's richest suburb. It's good I saw a poorer part of DC, because till then I'd been under the impression there was only upmarket and upper upmarket DC.

I had a much better look around the NMAI today than yesterday, and I've still got a whole floor that I haven't even been to. It's hard not to think of Te Papa though. Completely different building, total American Indian focus (meaning the American continent, not the USA), but still a museum trying to be modern and unable to bust out of the dimly lit glass display mould. The building itself is interesting, although I couldn't find any written material about it (same applies to much of the art work). A key motif is that it is shaped by 'air and water', so I reckon I'm right when I think it's supposed to invoke a canyon both inside and out. Must be why I kept whistling the theme to The Good, the Bad and the Ugly - especially on the inside. I couldn't help but think you could have a pretty mean shoot out. There's a large floor space at the bottom that looks up to each wavy stone-like floor which then goes up in circles to the top. I don't think the pic (below) gets the sense of height and space across, but you can see how small those people are. Now imagine them armed with their cowboy hats pushed over their eyes. That must be why I wouldn't walk across the open space at the bottom - instinctively afraid of being shot at, and with no cover and no-one to watch my back. Must be a native thing. And speaking of, it's been fun eavesdropping on some of them: like the brothers having a laugh about the cost of the kai, and the others who walked out as soon as a particular performer turned up on a music video. I so wanted to know why.

You're allowed to take photos in the NMAI but the lighting isn't that great. One of the exhibitions on at the moment is 'Identity by Design' which is all about native women's dresses - especially tanning (hides), weaving and beading. The cradle board and dress below are both all beaded - beads, porcupine quills. Amazing. Amazing and beautiful. And all women's traditions, passed from mother to daughter - or mother to mother as I heard someone say today. Hmm. That would cut me out wouldn't it? Might be a good thing since I'd never have the patience for it anyway.

I only went into one of the permanent exhibitions today - Our Lives, which is about contemporary Native life. (It's interesting to note that Our Universes is about Native beliefs, and Our Peoples Native history - singular, not plural). Our Lives is basically a series of tribal interpretations of being Indian in the 21st century, and it's easy to imagine iwi Maori having a similar exhibition, like the Kumeyaay display which announces 'I know I am Kumeyaay when I know where I am from'. Snap - indigenous snap, that is. But the area I stayed in the longest was the urban Indian display, which is basically the Chicago Indian Centre, the oldest urban Indian organisation in the US and about to hold it's 57th powwow this year. At the centre of their display is someone's lounge, with the big-screen TV playing a video of interviews with various urban Chicago Indians. But the lounge could be one of ours. Kids toys on the floor, Indian blanket thrown over the couch where our crocheted blanket would be - and the photos: school photos and family photos with the tell-tale blue backdrop and everyone posed; old sepia-toned photos of various tupuna; and the powwow (kapa haka) photos. Then there's the ornaments - one of those ceramic swan vase things that mum and dad used to put their coins and keys in, and a model tipi. Snap, again.

So, another interesting day. And I think every working woman (which is every woman) should arrive home to what I've been getting back to every night this week - a man in uniform offering me a glass of wine. Very nice - and I'm talking about the wine.

Another Capitol Day

2008-04-15T20:23:00.000-07:00

Interesting day today; a nice leisurely start – nothing opens till ten it seems. I spent a large part of the morning getting lost, but in a good way. First I went round and round Du Pont Circle looking for the right bus stop. And even after asking one the Washington ‘ambassadors’ (info-guys) for help, I got on a bus that went somewhere I wasn’t expecting and ended up finding out where all the Afro-Americans hang out. That means I got to see St John’s Episcopal Church and spend some time at the Martin Luther King, Jr Memorial Library. It’s forty years this month since King was killed, and tomorrow is DC Emancipation Day, so there’s something poignant and appropriate about me unexpectedly stumbling on the library – all tempered by having to get scanned by security dudes who looked and spoke like Ice T. and noticing that the shops are a lot cheaper in that part of town. (In fact, I wondered if I could've shopped out of some of the vans I saw parked up around the place).

Above and below: some of the art on the walls of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library, Washington DC

I spent quite a bit of time at the library. It’s big, and kind of old and in need of some TLC, and although it’s basically the District of Columbia public library, I don’t think I saw a single white person there and I was quite likely the only non-black person. There’s an amazing book shop there with really cheap books and all proceeds go towards supporting the library. The whole poverty thing was in my face again, preying on my Katorika guilt.

And here’s a free tip if you ever find yourself in Washington DC and decide to ride the Metro bus: a day pass means that you can transfer between buses for a period of two hours. I learned that from experience. It doesn’t pay to call into the Martin Luther King Jr Memorial Library when you’re on a two hour limit. And FYI, a memorial to King is scheduled to open before the end of this year, making him the first non-President to have a major monument erected in his honour in The Mall or Tidal Basin areas. (I love the way the publicity refers to him as ‘not a President’ rather than a black man).

After the debacle with the wrong bus, Piki and I opted for the ‘Open Top [double-decker] Sightseeing Hop On Hop Off’ bus. A bit naff, perhaps, but your bus pass lasts for two consecutive days, which means I can get to and from the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) and other key places easily. Plus, I decided to do the loop first so that I could get my bearings a little better. We both ended up with tourist bus hair (there was a cool northerly blowing), and the most fun part was the safety message that we had to keep all our body parts inside the bus. Well, it was funny for a while – until I was nearly smacked in the face by a low-lying cherry blossom branch. I spent quite a bit of time slouched in my seat after that.

I love the NMAI and reckon I'll be back there every day till I leave here. I need to eat my way through the Native American continent to start with. I started today with the Northern Woodlands area (oyster chowder and crawfish & watercress cakes). For tomorrow's lunch I quite fancy the Great Plains buffalo on fry bread. I met Purcell at NMAI today. He's originally from small-town Virginia, about three hours drive to the south. (No jokes about the Virginian please). He wants to spend his day off (Thursday) showing me around some of the other museums. Hmm. Can't do any harm I s'pose, although I do have a tip for single women travelling alone - keep a wedding ring handy: I was wondering around the NMAI today when this dude goes, 'Ma'am can I hep you? Can I pleeease you?' I thought he was going to come over all Al Green or Barry White or something. I know I've never had a problem telling men to f-off when need be, but over here where they practice different tikanga and it seems to be okay to be a bit forward, a wedding ring might help put some of them off opening their mouths in the first place. Interesting conversation with Purcell though, who assumed that if I'd come all this way from NZ I must be here to stay. Same thing happened when I went to Western Australia last year - people just assumed I'd gone there to stay. Makes me think people have a real confidence in the superiority of their respective countries or something.

There's so much free stuff to do here: poetry, blues, museums. It's hard to prioritise, but I'm thinking I'll stick around the black and native haunts for the rest of the week. Apparently DC has one of the lowest concentrations of white people in the country (39 percent compared to an average of 80) but it doesn't feel that way for some reason. I got caught up by the Pope & President motorcade this afternoon. Not that big a deal to me, but there were a lot of excited Americans on the open-top bus, all craning their necks. It was a funny old day - a mix of protest and ignorance and reverence. Some people had no idea the Pope was in town, and others thought it was a great day that brought together the world's two greatest leaders. Some people were out with banners and flags to welcome the Pope, and kids were asking their parents if they'd get to see the President. Others protested. And I was impressed by the way that teh homeless were conspicous by their absence in and around the White House precinct today, like magic. Apparently the Pope's visit is costing DC $4million. All I know is I'm over the security aspect of this town, which is bad enough on a normal day without upping the ante when the Pope visits. Lucky for me I've got Du Pont Circle to come home to every night - where I have discovered the wine shop and deli (Italian wines for just $12), and the neighbourhood Starbucks where I've got about eight free coffees to claim before I leave. All on the same block as Kramerbooks. Mmm.

Day One in DC

2008-04-14T21:23:00.000-07:00

Well, I reckon all my senses were satisfied today, including my sixth sense as I uncannily stumbled on the best bookshop concept in the world, a protest against the arrival of Pope Benedict XVI, Ralph Lauren handbags on sale for less than $30 each. And like magic, at the end of the day I walked into the lobby of the hotel I'm staying at and straight into an offer of 'a glass of wine, Ma'am?' Well, who am I to say no. I didn't buy any handbags though. I've had a day of trying not to support the US economy, for reasons that may become clear throughout this post.

But let me begin at the beginning. I woke this morning to gorgeous sunshine that lasted all day, although it was cold (ten degrees). I also found I am just minutes from Du Pont circle, the centre of DC's northwest quadrant. It's promoted as a hip, upmarket, gay-friendly neighbourhood; not too far from DC's major attractions and home to some interesting attractions itself. But the Northwest is also on the news as the police are looking for a sixteen-year-old boy who is responsible for shooting at two women in separate incidents. I guess that explains the sirens I heard last night.

Du Pont Circle
Just near Du Pont Circle is 'Kramerbooks & Afterword' an independent bookstore that I loved at first sight. It's a great bookshop with a restaurant/cafe attached, a separate well-stocked bar, and a fairly groovy mix of music playing (Bob, Style Council, Aretha). It has live music four times a week, and the line up for this week is looking most attractive. Trouble is, even though it's only five minutes walk away, I've been advised a couple of times now not to walk alone at night. It pisses me off a bit because I wonder if men get the same advice, or is safety here a gendered issue where the boys have the privilege of greater safety? (Doesn't endear me to your request for a bit of man-space in my blog, Murray). It is true I had to run the gauntlet of homeless people at the circle today, but they're pretty non-threatening and polite when they approach you. But it means I have to re-think things like taking a walk that takes mere minutes to go and hear someone perform 'New Orleans piano', or to join an 'exposition of the blessed sacrament' at the Cathedral just down the road. Similarly, my plans to take a slightly longer walk to Improv night at the Comedy Club and to check out an annual poetry jam. Tomorrow will need to be a girly swot day (National Museum of the American Indian for some research, and writing of a paper that's due on Friday), but I'll still have something like 48 hours to hatch a plan to overcome the 'don't walk alone' edict; thoughts so far include getting the concierge to walk with me, becoming a local at Kramerbooks as soon as I can, and heading out while it's still light. I'm sure I'll figure something out that will keep me out of harm's way. Anyway, I love Kramerbooks and the concept of it, who wouldn't want their books, food, coffee, alcohol and music under one roof? And it's clever. It's got 'electile dysfunction' cocktails including The Billary (you can't have one without the other). Electile dysfunction is a condition you get when you're unable to get aroused by any of the 2008 Presidential candidates. Kramerbooks is so close to where I'm staying I could resist staying for too long. I just noted a couple of books I might go back for and headed off in search of the Cathedral of Saint Matthew the Apostle, which I found, as the photos below prove.

Pics: Cathedral of St Matthew the Apostle, outside and in, and yes, that's a homeless person lying (sleeping, in fact) on the steps.

Cathedral of Saint Matthew the Apostle
Immediately I saw the Cathedral I thought of the one that Matt Damon and Ben Affleck end up at in the Kevin Smith movie Dogma. Matt is the patron saint of civil servants and every autumn the Cathedral celebrates the 'Red Mass' which asks the Holy Spirit to guide the conduct of the legal profession. Yeah, right. It's also the Cathedral where Hone F. Kennedy's funeral mass was celebrated back in '63, and Pope John Paul II celebrated mass there in '79. I hadn't realised till today that the Catholic Church is the largest in the US (at 23 percent of the population), but it also seems to be a church in crisis. It's suffering fallout from various abuse scandals, criticism about its financial accountability, and a shortage of priests. A number of parishes have closed or merged with neighbouring parishes and apparently a number schools are facing the threat of closure too. And Te Popi arrives here tomorrow arvo. I predict protest and prayer. Oh, hang on a minute, that's not a prediction. I spotted the evidence of that today. There are quite a few prayer opportunities at the Cathedral: two expositions of the blessed sacrament with evening prayer; masses three times a day; two adorations of the eucharist (sounds like fun); and lunchtime confessions each day.

I struggled a bit with St Matt's. It was the only DC attraction I actually sought out today, the rest I came across because I was heading in their general direction. The US seems to wear its dysfunction on its sleeve, but somehow without realising it. DC is obviously a rich city, yet the homeless are incredibly visible, and quietly persecuted. There was a sign in one of the parks headed 'help keep our park clean', and it had instructions like: no camping, no alcohol and about half a dozen other things. I don't know why they didn't just say no homeless people and be done with it. At least when it's our own dysfunction we can put our own fun into it, but it was hard to find the entertainment value in the obvious divide between rich and poor in this great big gas-guzzling, resource-depleting country. According to this morning's New York Post the slow-down in spending that is currently the scourge of the US economy is not happening for the rich, whose spending continues uninhibited. It's not that pretty in such a pretty city, with its spring-time tulips and cherry blossoms in full bloom.

St Matt's is beautiful, stunning, inside and out. But there was that homeless guy asleep in the doorway, and the church has notices about not giving money to any homeless people panhandling in or around the church - which it couches as a safety issue. It notes that there are other ways to help the homeless and that the church itself runs its own programmes. I could easily do my head in thinking about that, and I wondered if other visitors might feel similarly conflicted. But then I realised that St Matt's is directly opposite Burberry, where we can all go and salve our consciences - handbags for the girls, and suit jackets for the boys. When I got down to Lafayette Square, which is a little park opposite the White House, there was a Chicano/Hispanic/Latina (I don't know the right term) protest about the Pope's visit happening. I hung around for a bit as they were obviously getting ready for a speaker, and listened to some pretty cool acapela singing, although I didn't understand a single word. I was a bit confused about the protest. Their slogan was 'save 50 million Catholic kids from sexual abuse by priests'. That's cool. But their solution is to promote no celibacy, and I guess they mean for priests. (See the pic on the right). Then I got one of their flyers and realised the speaker we were all waiting for was Dr Jose Luis De Jesus Miranda, who is God on Earth or 'the man Christ Jesus'. And he can demonstrate that: there is no devil, there is no sin, there is only one true gospel, and celibacy is a demonic doctrine. Hmm. It's a little like the praying for the legal fraternity thing - far too easy a target to bother saying anything.

DC in General
It was pretty late in the day by the time I got down to vicinity of the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial and all those DC must do's. It's clear to me that five days here is not enough to see even the main attractions, so I'll do some prioritising overnight and maybe use the public transport instead of walking everywhere tomorrow. Walking proved pretty dangerous for me anyway. I'm finding it really hard to look left instead of right when I cross, and also I keep looking around at the architecture while I'm walking. I mostly like the older buildings, and hope to see more of the Art Deco stuff. And if I do get run over here, at least I know I'll be happy when it happens. The truth is, I was unmoved by many things today. The White House seems inanimate and clinical. And somehow I felt like I was the one fenced in rather than it. So no pics of the White House sorry, y'all can Wikipedia that shit. I'm not really digging the monuments either. A lot of them, most of them in fact, are great visually, but they're all about great white men so they only hold my attention for ten seconds. And overall the monuments and buildings seem to promote the US as this great, hard-won democracy. That emphasis, which seems so embedded in the public history around this place, kind of explains some of the undercurrents in the politics that occurred at the Indigenous Studies conference, like the idea that democracy American-style is this great, untouchable, never-wrong gift to the world. And the idea that it was so hard won seems to blinker the US from seeing any flaws in it let alone entertain the possiblity that democracy might be the problem sometimes. Anyway, long-story-short, I'll get interested in the monumental aspects of DC when I see something represented other than the white man's history.

There are still plenty of things for me to love about DC, though. America has been like that for me since I got here - conflicted and contradictory. Like I love and hate the way Americans seem so at ease speaking their opinions out loudly as if they are shared equally by everyone within earshot. And I love and hate the little stalls dotted around the White House area selling the kitsch souvenirs. It's funny, most of the customers seem to be visiting fellow-Americans. There are a lot of them around, with their tamariki in tow. And they all seem to talk to their children like that dude on Blues Clues. There also seemed to be a lot of school groups and sports groups around today. The few things that have really bugged me today have stemmed from shortcomings at the NZ end - like the phone charger that won't work with the adapter even though all the other electrical appliances will, and the tempermental credit cards that will work at some stores and not others. And it's really hard having a scrap with your bank online. Small sacrafices I guess. And it's not like I'm the best traveller anyway - forgot to take my cash when I went out this morning, camera battery went flat and back up battery is in Auckland. Oh well, he ra ano apopo.

There are a lot of different ethnicities here, and I think I've heard about five or six languages other than English. Most ethnicities seem to be in groups amongst themselves, though, and the few mixed-ethnicity groups I spotted were work-related I reckon. Despite the multi-ethnic make-up of the place, I'm fielding quite a few stares - more than when I was in Athens. In Athens it was hot so I wore short sleeves and my moko ta/whakairo were obvious, but people who wanted to say something about them just did. It's cold here, and I'm in long sleeves, so I'm not sure people notice the little bit that shows on my hand, but they still stare which makes me wonder if I've pen on my face. When I talk, people ask if I'm from Britain. I think I'll start saying 'no, but colonised by the Brits'. On the way home I was accosted on the street by a woman who does a breakfast show here. She was asking people their opinion about the Pope's visit tomorrow. I said I probably couldn't help her because I'd only been in town for twenty-four hours. She said, oh, are you from Britain? I said no, New Zealand. She said, my father's from Australia, so good. Then her camera man shoved his camera in my face and she asked me what I thought of the Pope's visit. I gave her a good old Maori shrug of the shoulders, and she said, you don't care do you? I said, not really, but I find it interesting that St Matthews is offering special services to acknowledge the Pope while others were protesting against his visit opposite the White House today. She said, oh never mind and walked away with her mic and her camera man. I've got no idea how to interpret that little exchange. Leave a comment if you've got any ideas your selves.

You could also leave ideas about the Boy Scouts monument. It has a boy scout, a woman holding a flame (would that be Liberty?) and a naked man holding a flower arrangement. It's just too cryptic for me. It doesn't help that the monument, erected to acknowledge fifty years of the Boy Scouts, is dedicated to the leadership of the men and women who established and nurtured it. Add to that the fact that part of the Boy Scouts' pledge is a promise to keep 'physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight'. I'll just let you ponder on that (see the pic on the right).

Athens to DC

2008-04-13T21:38:00.000-07:00

Left: Alice and Pete, a couple of the brainy Maories I travelled with to Athens (read more below). They're getting all strategic about the constitution for the proposed Native American and Indigenous Studies Association. And Piki is right in the thick of it, offering her full support and insight.

Frisked

I had so much fun getting from Athens to Washington DC today. It started with having to pack and be ready to leave by 9am after about four hours sleep (I see a pattern developing). But the really fun part was at Athens airport where I was told in the most hospitable blonde, blue-eyed Southern drawl that the computer had selected me for a special screening. 'Yay', I said, clapping. 'What does that mean?' She wasn't sure but said they'd probably wave the wand over me. (And I was dying to ask if I'd turn into a handsome prince). Anyway, at the screening part I was told again I'd been selected for a special screening, so of course I had to ask if I'd get a prize. She said no, but I did get a surprise - I got 'patted down'. I got taken into a not very private corner of the security area, a big burly guard stood in the doorway while my specialness was given the once over. I asked the security woman if I could get a photo of it happening and she said 'I'm sorry ma'm, but I don't have a camera'. I said I have, it's in my bag, and if we wait for my friend to come through he can take the photo. Thing was, I wasn't allowed my bag till it was searched. She looked at me like I was mad, but remained true to her tikanga of Southern hospitality. And I wasn't mad, I thought it was fun, and ironic. I've been avoiding the camera as much as possible - as you know I do - and the one time I was willing to volunteer myself for a pic, I wasn't allowed to have my camera. So my only evidence of being frisked and having my luggage and shoes searched and swabbed is the little notice left in my checked luggage to say my baggage had been inspected. Well, we all have our baggage, don't we. Probably does us good to do have it inspected now and then. A lot of the Americans are so sweet, though. Chad, who I met at the conference, was on the plane, and he apologised that I had to go through the whole search thing. Anyway, that fun little episode (the Americans seem to say fun a lot) has a little epilogue. My special screening was followed by scoring the special seat on the plane - I got the one by the emergency exit door. So the pilot asked if need be would I help him to open the door etc. in an emergency. I looked at him, looked at the door, looked at him and shrugged my shoulders. He said 'that's a yes, ma'am?'. So I said 'yes' nice and loud, and as he walked away asked if I'd be getting a prize. I don't think he heard.

But speaking of prizes, I should say something about the Maories I've been travelling with (until today). They're a brainy lot of brownies from Vic Uni. I've known some of them for years, I met a couple of them just recently, and the rest I met somewhere in transit between Auckland airport and Athens. I wouldn't have even known about the Indigenous Studies conference if Alice hadn't mentioned it, and then they let me piggy back on their travel and accommodation arrangements so it's all been v. cool. Maories are like that, eh? At Athens, there were some things that were conspicuous by their absence - I mentioned grafitti in the last blog, and we found it was really hard to find a taxi (even when you phoned for one), and there were virtually no Hainamana. So we set up a chocolate fish sweep: first to see a grafitti (that they didn't do themselves); first to see a taxi and first to see a Hainamana. Well Rawinia gets two of those prizes - the Hainamana one and the grafitti one. Pete wasn't convinced on the grafitti, he reckoned it looked like spilt paint, but me and Rawinia reckoned it was a tag. Alice took out the taxi prize - spotting one about four or five hours after we rang for one.

Athens, Georgia, USA

Okay, let me think about Athens and the conference and first four or five days which have flown by so quickly. Y'all might want to make yourselves a coffee, this might turn into one of those long reflective yawn-inducing pieces. The conference was good. But sorry, D., I've got no news of any bed-hopping to report for your entertainment. If there was any going on, I wasn't invited, and I'm pretty sure Piki wasn't either. Mind you, I couldn't find Tiki one morning and thought Piki had kicked his ass to the curb for ruffling her feathers. But he turned up in Alice's bag (not bed). Still, I've got three more conferences to go and will keep you posted. In the meantime, I've met and made friends with heaps of new people, caught up with a few I'd met before or wanted to meet, and hung out mainly with the Maories and the Hawaiians. There were some really interesting papers, and I think mine went okay. I got to show off about Taikarawa, but I was worried I got a bit silly with it - too many wisecracks maybe. But y'all know how my mouth shoots off sometimes before my brain can process what's coming. A few politics went down on setting up what will now be the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association. I won't bore you with that here, but Piki Wahine Doll played her part, and even voted (for members of a nominating committee to facilitate nomination of the first council). It was a secret ballot and all that, so I can't say how she voted, but she was snapped posting two separate ballots, which could be problematic.

Anyway, enough of the academic stuff for now. There are two things I struggled with in Atlanta and Athens: the kai and the pinga. They seem to have two kinds of food in the South: sweet or fried. Even their low-fat yogurt is sweet. I got some crackers - sour cream and chives - and I only had a couple, they tasted like a sweet biscuit. And it's been hard to find nice fresh fruit and veg. But I s'pose to be fair a couple of their diners did salads, and Mexican places tended to have salady things. One day I put some cheese on a salad because I thought it was grated carrot. They have orange cheese, and their cheese ain't that great. And quite a bit of their kai is salty too. I'm told that the kai in Washington is fantastic, and that's already been proven after my first meal here. The kai in the South was starting to scare me.

I made another food faux pas in one of the conference sessions. This woman was talking about a comparative film course she's teaching and she mentioned Taika Waititi's One Night Two Cars and this Native American movie The Dough Boy. I was sitting next to Alice and whispered 'What's a Dough Boy to the Indians?' (You see, I already knew they had fry bread). Alice didn't say anything, she just wrote on a paper D-O-E. Well that set me off with giggles I couldn't stop! And Alice encouraged them by trying to draw a deer to illustrate the kind of doe, and said something about wondering how you could make a film about a dough boy. Probably doesn't sound that funny but you know how hard it is when you get those unstoppable giggles.

The other thing I've been struggling with is the money. They've got heaps of coins and I've been finding them really hard to read. And all their notes are the same size and the same colour, so you have to be careful. And I'm still not quite used to the tipping thing, and get paranoid about not giving enough. I can vouch for Southern hospitality though. They're so helpful and friendly, with a long slow drawl, kinda like their public transport.

Washington DC

I could tell when I got to Washington that the service with a smile and a 'you're welcome ma'am' was over now, mostly anyway. But they're really good at the hotel I'm at, which is fab: free 'wines of the world' hour every night, leopard print bath robes, gorgeous view across some great looking architecture to something tall in the distance. I think it's the US Naval observatory but will check it out tomorrow.

I think I'm going to like DC a lot, which could mean I take a lot more photos than I have so far. I've never been good with cameras - whether in front of or behind them - and the hardest part is remembering to get it out and use it. It's a lot colder here than it was in Georgia, and it was grey and overcast this arvo, but with a pretty sunset. I've been told the food here is great, and there's lots to do and look at. But I've also heard lots and lots of sirens, and I've been told to be cautious about going out at night alone. I'll get out amongst it tomorrow and give an update tomorrow night. For now it's quite nice to have some time out and some time to sleep.

Landed

2008-04-09T09:00:00.000-07:00

Kia ora all. Just a quick note while I've got time online to say I arrived safely, and in the fine company of some fellow academics from Vic Uni. (That's code for I sat next to Alice and ignored all the good advice about sleeping and opted for getting hardly any. And no, we didn't watch movies, we theorized and came up with several stunning plans for saving the world while saving ourselves. So much for the inflight reading I had lined up, will have to save it for a return trip). We must've been in transit for close to 24 hours all up. It's nine on Wednesday morning, we're in Atlanta (where Mary J. Blige played live last night, and a body was found on the freeway this morning). We head to Athens, Georgia in a couple of hours, and the first conference starts tomorrow (Indigenous Studies).

Haven't seen much of Atlanta, but am very conscious of it being Martin Luther King Jr's birthplace, as well as the object of Ray Charle's affection in Georgia on My Mind, and the place the Tai Chi master of delusion dude, Nai Yin Xue, who killed his wife in Auckland and abandoned his daughter in Melbourne was caught by members of the Chinese community who threw a blanket over his head and hog-tied him before calling the police. The stay here won't be long enough to get a clear impression, but I haven't see any graffiti and have noticed really quickly that the cars here are really big.

If you're wondering about the 'wahine doll' in the pic, well we're calling her Piki and that's her at LAX on our short stopover at LA before heading to Atlanta. Hirini turned up with her at the Auckland airport just before we left, and so far she's having a great time, although we're struggling with her aeroplane hair. You might spot the American flag all blurry in the background.

Have various other pics and tales of little importance to follow, but may have to wait till I have fewer dramas with internet connections. In the meantime I can tell you that I got over LAX and customs and airport protocols very quickly. Haven't seen a celebrity yet, apart from the Maori ones I'm travelling with.

I guess if it's Wednesday morning here it might be past midnight Thursday in Aotearoa, which would make it Tiana's birthday. So happy birthday T, have a good one.

Au Revoir, Ciao Bella, Ka Kite and L8R

2008-04-08T13:16:00.001-07:00

Well, Tiops reckons he’s had three reads and still has no idea where I’m going. Excellent point! The itinerary goes something like this: I’m starting with a night in Atlanta, Georgia, USA and then heading to Athens for an Indigenous Studies conference. That’ll be followed by a week in Washington D.C. and then a month or more based at Chicago. I’ve got to get to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan by 19 June, for another conference and Vancouver by 2 July to get back home. So, I guess, except for the first bit and the last bit I don’t really know where I’m going either, but all will be revealed in due course.

Meanwhile, friends and family have been doing much to look after me. I’m feeling really spoilt. Best travel advice so far has to be: don’t be good, be fantastic. (That doctor’s so clever, isn’t she?) Meanwhile I’ve been given some on-board reading: Jamie Sams’ The 13 Original Clan Mothers from Cousin Lu, and Vincent O’Sullivan’s On Longing from Anton. I’ve already poked my nose into both of them, actually read a few chapters of the Clan Mothers already, and I’m saving Longing for the plane. It’s an essay, but it looks like it suits a long, slow read – like rich food. Clan Mothers is an older book (1992). From what I can tell it’s an explanation of Native American female wisdom traditions, something like that. There are thirteen ‘gifts, talents and abilities’ and I’ve already read ‘Wisdom Keeper’ who is ‘Historian of all Earth Records’. I also peeked at the closing chapters, as you do, and I see it can be read as a book about sisterhood and creativity. Very cool.

Lu also gave me a copy of Max Ehrmann’s Desiderata, which I’ve loved for a long time. It’s one of those touchstone pieces of writing, and such a great story about his writing and carrying the poem in his pocket. It’s also third time lucky for me because I gave away the previous two copies I had of it, and I can’t give this one away because it’s inscribed on the front from all my Mitimiti nieces and nephews. Works for me. I s’pose in return I should ease up a bit about not doing any gift-buying for them.

Anyway, I hadn’t expected to be blogging today, but someone’s sending me a giant email that’s taking ages to download, so I figured I could kill the online time this way.

Two More Sleeps

2008-04-06T22:03:00.000-07:00

Well the travel tips are coming thick and fast now: Don’t drink too much before you get on the plane (you’re not allowed to wind the windows down). Wear slip-on shoes. Use your airpoints to upgrade to first class. Sleep at the beginning of the flight rather than the end. Get a shoe bag. Stay hydrated. Write lots of academic papers. No, you can't ask the other passengers if they want to play scrabble or cards with you. Funny, none of this stuff is on the government’s Safe Travel website.

Now here are a few tips for you all: If you can’t work the comments function, ask your kids. If you haven’t got any kids, ask any kid. If you think I’m not blogging enough, offer to do a guest blog. I really won’t be posting any photos of me, and you can’t talk me into it. And tamariki ma, quit it with your lists of things to buy you, the American economy is getting enough of my money as it is. Besides, like I've already told a number of you, I don't think I should get any of you any prezzies until at least one of prove you know when my birthday is - and 'this year' is not an answer.

Also, so far at least my tongue is firmly in my cheek here. I’m not that serious about the shoes and handbags, even though Donna insists that I am, and even though the doctor prescribed a gorgeous fuchsia leather number to swing off my shoulder while I work my way through the various airports. And, yes, after brunch today we took that prescription straight to Newmarket and got it filled. A girl's gotta do... and all that. Donna is not impressed, and to be fair to her I should say that Paul D has emailed to support the one-handbag ideal. Anyway, turns out I needed the new handbag as retail therapy because I had a little freak-out about a settler colonialism symposium I'm speaking at in about three weeks time. I've only just realised what I've signed up for, and also who the brains are that will be speaking at it - people I've read and heard about, mostly professors. Scary. So I'm working late, trying to write clever stuff, and with little success as far as I can tell. I might have to torture some of you with drafts to read, like I've already done to Hirini, Bern and Melissa. Or maybe if I wind back the paranoia and "be my sovereign self", as the doctor says, it'll come more easily to me. I'll keep you posted, provided developments are interesting enough, of course.

And Then There Are The Days When We Just Have Nothing Better To Do

2008-04-05T16:11:00.000-07:00

I checked out my horoscope today. It’s not something I usually do. I know that the newspapers and mags have like a giant toilet roll of things to say in horoscopes, and they just take the next twelve sheets and slap them into their regular column. Or a computer programme spits them out or something like that. I know they’re not ‘real’. But I still checked out my horoscope today, in the Granny Herald – you know, the grand old dame of unbiased New Zealand journalism. It’s a good horoscope if you like that sort of thing. It goes like this: Great things are promised by the new Moon. (That means nice tides doesn’t it? Get some kutai if you’re at Mitimiti, tuatua if you’re at Ahipara?) Delayed gratification becomes a thing of the past... (Hmm. Not tino sure what that means. Being a Leo I don’t really take my gratification delayed, the Leonine ego couldn’t tolerate that. Mind you, it might be a direct reference to the gratification of having regular Tiki Haere readers. There are at least two of you I discovered today, and what fascinates me is that you both want actual updates on how the shoe and handbag selection is going.)... as you spread your wings and embark on a journey of self-discovery. (Yeah, yeah, and I can hear some of you already with your jokes about other things to spread – like the word, the news, the butter and the jam. Ha, bet you thought I was going to say something else. Just don’t bother with the obvious smart aleck comments unless you’re one hundred percent certain I won’t have a comeback).

... as you spread your wings and embark on a journey of self-discovery. Now that’s what I’m talking about, even though I'm feeling a bit old to be doing the self-discovery thing. Still, I have been saying for a while now that I’m living my life backwards. And I have been thinking that while I’m away I might figure out what I want to do when I grow up. I said that out loud one day and Georgina said “first you have to decide to grow up, Aroha.” Tough decision.

Self-discovery: it sounds good. But if I’m just heading off to discover myself now, who have I been up till now? Or have I always been myself but never discovered or known who my self is? Oh no, not those kinds of questions. My brain might cave in if I keep them up, so I think I’ll just let it rest there for now: self-discovery, it sounds good, even in a horoscope that I’m entertained by but don’t necessarily believe.

Fare Thee Well

2008-04-04T15:32:00.000-07:00

Aw shucks, I love the way you fullas say “see you”, especially you iwi ones. While fulfilling my last few iwi duties, our chair said that I’m “a butcher” (talking about my editing style). Our CE said I’m “pedantic and grumpy”. And one of our kaumatua toasted my departure with “we’ll miss you for a few days”. They’re all men, so there might be something else going on here that I’m missing because, meanwhile, the women have said things like: “mate, make a dash for the exit while you can” and “don’t worry about packing, just make sure you get on the plane” and “blog me that shit about who slept in whose room at those conferences”. Well, D, I don't know what you comms/PR people get up to at your conferences but – clutch my pearls – I swear I’ve never been to one like that. Pono marika. (Yeah, all right, D can tell you that’s not what I said when I texted her. But it’s my blog, and I’m claiming poetic licence or poetic righteousness or something).

Anyway, Robyn rings this morning and says “Are you shopping or having coffee?” Puh-lease, maybe I was writing a conference paper. Okay, I was shopping – but for important last minute stuff, and isn’t the whole point of last minutes to fill them with shopping? Robyn also says shame on me for taking too much time out since the last blog, and since she earned an honourable mention in dispatches because she answered the spot quiz (see her comment after the March 25 blog) I figured I could indulge her with this one. Meanwhile Margie and Donna are back from the Big Apple, and Richard (via Margie) has chipped in with this advice: if I can’t carry it myself, don’t take it. You’re such a husband, Richard. All I can say is – luggage with wheels.

This week I read – or, more accurately, devoured – Thomas King’s The Truth About Stories: A Native Narrative. Pania lent it to the doctor who lent it to me, and I love it. I’m going to look for my own copy while I’m away, and I’m so going to be setting readings from it when I get back to teaching. Thomas King is Cherokee and Greek, a Professor of English in Canada, and I s’pose this book is a collection of essays (or talks) about the proliferation of wrongful stories about North American Indians (stories about treaty claims, stories about what Indians are like, you know the look – indigenous snap, anyone?). It’s one beautifully written, funny and also challenging book. And I like the way he talks about writing while he’s writing, and how he cuts in with his internal dialogue. In his afterword he shares what he calls a ‘private story’, and says the book is the only place where the reader will find it: “Contained within these mute marks on a silent page.” Beautiful. And he goes on: “Sounds portentous, doesn’t it. Or at least poignant. Mute marks. Silent page. Hyperbolic language to entice you to read the next sentence. Just another cheap literary trick.” See, funny. Smart and funny. Got that self-deprecating humour that seems to appeal to us native folks. It’s a great read, if you’re looking for one.

If you’re not up for a great read, you might want to give some of those nieces and nephews of ours an education. I’ve fielded a couple of comments from the younger ones that they don’t understand some of the things I’ve written, like: “what’s bon voyage”, and “I don’t know what frock means”. Sounds like an opening for a great inter-generational discussion to me, and even better, why not get the dads to explain the meaning of frock/getting frocked up? In fact, why not get dad to give a demonstration? Yeah, smart and funny.

Heoi ano. See some of you on Sunday (Servo @ 11). See others of you on Tuesday. And see the rest of you sometime after mid-July, unless you’re going to contact me before then to say let’s meet for coffee/vino in New York.

Let the Bon Voyaging Begin

2008-03-25T07:25:00.000-07:00

Check out that view - looking westward from the balcony at Te Hu, on my last morning here this summer. I'm sure going to miss it. And it's available if any of y'all feel the need for a week or weekend to maybe do a bit of writing, or just generally contemplate your pito. Contact me or the doctor and we'll get you sorted.

Anyway, the doctor tells me I had my first bon voyage dinner last night – a risotto tino reka, tuatua, scallop and prawn skewers, and a fab fresh salad with a mango dressing - all made by her own hand, she even picked the tuatua. Of course she’s had to give these details to me in a prescription, because I’m no cook. I can break down the seafood no probs, but ask me what was in the risotto and um, there was some rice and some herbs and some stock – pipi stock, I remember that part. And I think the secret ingredient was the feijoa vodka.
So, my dear friends, before I depart may you all try and emulate the doctor’s farewell dinner party for moi. And it’s not just the wonderful kai you’ll want to think about, but also the witty repartee and the classically beautiful ambience. Not only that, but girlfriend put all her doctorly skills to work, giving me the best advice about beating jet lag. Plus she's promised to play spy while I'm away, so she'll be counting how many handbags Donna is seen with during that time. And so you know, I have it on good authority that one handbag will not be enough for my travels, and that a tote is not a handbag, and nor is a kete. I love that we're so clever about handbags, aren't you?
Meanwhile, I've been fending off the demands of my many iramutu for all kinds of goodies they reckon they'd like me to bring back for them. Funny, I was so sure they'd all be thrilled if I came back with a great big kiss and a cuddle for each of them. Best conversation on the gift front so far must be the one with Kahu. She's got a list longer than all Maori petitions to Parliament. But the great part was her insistence that she is more special than all my special nieces and nephews, and that I should just get them a pen and a key ring each, so I can focus on shopping for her queenly self. Girl's a comedienne for sure.

Twenty Three More Sleeps

2008-03-16T18:20:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday Kahukiwi. This one’s for you, a spot quiz.

I will know my leave from the island was fantastic if:

(a) I come back broke
(b) I come back exhausted
(c) I come back with more luggage than I left with
(d) I forget to come back

Ko Te Tuawha

2008-03-09T10:43:00.000-07:00

E hoa ma, it’s so nice to have such treaty-savvy readers. But was there really a fourth article, a promise of freedom of religion? Absolutely if you love and revere Pompallier the way we do in my neck of the ngahere. Just thought I’d share that, it being Passion Sunday and Lent and all.

I hope y’all did something wonderfully womanly for International Women’s Day yesterday. I beached it with a group of Women Who Work Too Much, all wahine no Te Rarawa. Reminded me a little bit of the EWOTs (Embittered Women of Taitokerau - some of you will remember them). Fab food, yummy wine, stunning company, drop-dead-gorgeous location (beachfront Mitimiti, thanks George) and a ban on work except the kind that yields kaimoana (for obvious reasons, mmm).

Ko Te Tuatoru

2008-03-07T22:58:00.000-08:00

The third article, the oritetanga article, where I promise to love shoes and handbags equally. Ah, lovely. And let me update that little issue: Donna has emailed with her usual practical and motherly advice. She says: one pair of boots, one pair of dress/evening shoes and, if I must, a pair of casual shoes. She also says: one suitcase, one carry-on piece filled with all those en route essentials. I don’t know what those ‘essentials’ are exactly, but they possibly include a hair dryer and an iron if Donna hasn’t changed too much over the years. And Donna’s last piece of advice: one handbag. ONE handbag. ONE HANDBAG. To be fair, she tempers her advice by reminding me that I’ll buy heaps. But surely I need to be giving good handbag while I’m doing all that buying.

And a bit of context for those of you who don’t know Donna: She was camp mother when I started uni as a fresh-faced eighteen-year-old, back in the day. She used to pick us up for parties or socials or whatever was on. And she’d say things like “I think you better bring a cardy. It might get cold.” Now what self-respecting first-year uni student, free from the sanctions of whanau for the first time in her life, and off out for a spot of under-aged drinking took a ‘cardy’? Show of hands please.

Yeah, okay, I did listen to her, and still do. Even listened to her the night at the Kiwi Tavern when she told me to sit down and finish my drink even though a cop had kicked me out (for being under-aged). Once they’re set, even the pirihimana can't undo those tuakana-teina type relationships, eh? And true to teina style I’m online getting cheeky to her while she’s all frocked up at Turangawaewae for the Maori Academic Excellence Awards dinner, picking up something for me because I couldn’t get there myself. (Legitimate excuse – prior commitment and all that. You know how it goes). Thanks Donna. I owe you one.

Ko Te Tuarua

2008-03-02T10:36:00.000-08:00

Ah, yes, the burden of the second posting: will it be bigger than the first but without being too big for its boots? Will it meet the expectations created by the first post? (Well, absolutely, if those expectations were effectively managed down). Will it demonstrate that the author has the perseverance and commitment – not to mention the material – to last the distance? And will it stop asking questions any time soon? (Sure: how about now?)

Actually, there will be a serious tone to this post. I owe a number of shout outs, props, big ups and mihimihi to a few people who have supported me in this (ad)venture. And I’m reminded of that support because at the moment the bach at Te Hu (that’s at Ahipara, folks, from whence I am blogging) is filled with that wonderful smell of freshly woven harakeke. Tania Rule called in yesterday and dropped off a supply of kete and sun visors that she wove for me. She’s a fabulous young Te Aupouri weaver and I think her work is just great – great colour, great attention to detail. And she’s got a great attitude toward it too. And yes, I got me a pink kete that I’ll be keeping for my self. And yes, I’ll be posting some pics as soon as I get my camera. But they won’t be nude pics as suggested by a certain friend who shall remain nameless. (I’m feeling the power of the blog now: shall I name names or not? Mind you, there are so many ways to interpret nude. But I don’t think Michelangelo’s David is what said friend had in mind).

Anyway, need help joining the dots? What’s the weaving got to do with the haerenga? Well, it all goes back to my childhood. You see, I’ve been blessed with old-school parents and specifically a mother who taught us from a very young age that when visiting always take something for your host. So the weaving is to take on my travels to give as gifts. I’m also taking some of Vicki Morehu’s work. Vicki’s another wahine Maori tino kerewa from Te Atihaunui a Paparangi. She does the handmade funky-coloured polymer clay tiki, and other accessories too, including stuff for the bros. I love Vicky’s work too. She made me some key rings - 'native', 'manawahine' and my current fave, ‘cannibal’. By the way, if you can’t be bothered waiting for me to post some pics, you can check out Vicky’s website at http://www.tepono.com/. In the meantime it looks like kete and tiki have surpassed shoes and handbags as pre-departure priorities. Such are nga pikinga me nga hekenga of women’s world.

I want to put in a word for my Mitimiti cousins and all our nieces and nephews. They’ve been taking lots of holiday snaps, some of which have ended up in my power-point presentation for an indigenous studies conference paper I’ll be giving at the University of Georgia a few days after touching down in the States. One of my nieces in particular, Tiana, took a lot of the pics. (She’s ten, nearly eleven, Aries, attitude a mile high). The sunset photo (right) is her handiwork. And she had quite a few accomplices, probably her cousin Jaz especially. And in case you’re interested, the conference paper’s based on some of the iwi research I’ve been doing of late, with a focus on the craziness that is Maori customary fisheries regulations. I promise not to get started on that, if I do you'll be begging for more korero about shoes and handbags in no time.

My last kia ora today is to my mates who peer reviewed my first blog. Thanks Hirini (check out his blog at http://www.rangatahi.org.nz/) for suggesting ‘blogetta’ as the feminine of ‘blogger’ and for inadvertently alerting me to the comment function. And Bern, for recommending that I take six - yes, six - pairs of shoes and send some home as I buy more. (Happy and safe travels to you and M. I want to hear all about the hot date in Tuscany when you get back). And Anton, thanks for saying it’s “bootiful” (But, hmm, not sure how much emphasis to place on that boo, Boo).

Okay. And now for a few free-ranging thoughts to close with: I’ve been mulling over this whole blogging caper. I really didn’t think it was me – but I’m beginning to think that maybe I was wrong. Well, not really wrong, just not as right as I usually am. You see I’ve realised that blogging requires writing, and those who know me well know I like writing. And you might be pleased that I’m writing here, and not leaving you silly scribbles that I wrote at your dining table, or emailing you some other silliness about decolonised Christmases or Ex-mas 2007 or how to check the whakapapa of fish so we know which iwi they belong to. And blogging seems to appeal to my inner control freak, because I can write what I want without any censorship (except that of my inner control freak) and if there are any regrets afterwards (or law suits) I can delete and edit. I think I prefer that far more than – for example – turning up at the doctor’s place to have her read something to me that I wrote ten years ago while I cringe and frown and will it to stop. On the other ringaringa, blogging can also be a kind of torture for my inner control freak: I can’t bear to see a single comma out of place, yet I understand blogging is largely about getting ‘published’ quickly. Well, I have difficulty being controlling and writing quickly at the same time. It's bad enough that I’ve already let a couple of split infinitives slip through. Hei aha. I’m giving myself the rest of March to get au fait with the process. By April you’ll be wanting to make sure I really get on the plane and get the hell off the island (assuming you keep reading).

Ko Te Tuatahi

2008-02-29T20:06:00.000-08:00

Tena koutou e hoa ma,

And welcome to my first blog, and a whole new experience for me.

To start, a little reflection on how I came to be a blogger (such an unattractive label, don't you think? Sounds too much like bloke and makes me want to get all gender-analytical on its ass. Is blogette an alternative?) Anyway, I digress - or multi-task, perhaps. Becoming a blogger was pretty straightforward really: it's Hirini, Bern and Melissa's fault, or maybe I just had too much wine the last time we were all out together. We were talking about my upcoming kotiti haere to the US and Canada (I get three months off the island, woohoo!) and some bright spark at the table suggested I do a blog, and the other bright sparks immediately agreed. Of course I protested: said I'd never wanted to do a blog, couldn't understand why they thought I would, said I didn't want to make more work for myself. And I asked who'd read it, to which they replied 'we would' - in unison, with smiles and genuine affection and interest. Well, after a few more wines (and whines) and the added incentive that I wouldn't have to send postcards and emails, I agreed.

So I guess this is a limited-term single-issue targetted-audience blog - it's about my wanderings in North America, April to July 2008, and it's for my friends and family (because you fullas and fullesses really won't be getting any postcards or emails. But you know me: bound to make exceptions for the tamariki).

And here I am - blogging. And I haven't even left yet. Got thirty-seven more sleeps to go in fact (not that I'm counting, I just worked that out now, for effect). But having agreed to join the blogging fraternity I decided there were some crucial pre-departure mana wahine conversations that I needed to have with the gals, especially since I'm not the seasoned traveller, as well you know.

Now, you boys that are reading, I'm giving you fair warning: I'm about to turn my attention to the important stuff that women's world is made of. But there's a really simple way for men to handle women's world - just relax, you know, lie back and think of Hawaiki, or go and watch the rugby, or if you think you can handle it read on, you might get an education.

Anyway, wahine ma, I'm going to be away for three months, so how do I choose what shoes I take? I mean, a girl's got to give good shoe, right? Surely I have to take at least two pairs of boots, minimum. Then there's the dress shoes, the work shoes and the casual shoes. That's five pairs right there without even trying. And don't even get me started on the handbags. What is the handbag protocol here? Just how many handbags can I reasonably be expected to be seen with in a three-month period? These are huge, life-altering questions that I am sure have vexed women's world for generations. But I've got good friends, and I know that you'll offer nothing but wise counsel.

As for you brothers that are still reading (especially you straight ones), if you're confused, all you need to know is that women have a relationship with shoes that men can never understand. And, my sisters, men have a relationship with women's shoes that we should never try to understand. (I think I read that somewhere).

And that's it for my first post, e hoa ma. Watch out for my next post: maybe I'll post pics of my current favourite shoes and handbags and we can vote for the ones that get to travel with me. Riveting, I'm sure.