A celebrtion of unity: The importance of Matariki this year

Hilda.

I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. Unity is the theme for this year's Masoiki. Today is the fourth year of the public holiday marking the Mali New Year. It's the first holiday to recognize molding and the first new public holiday introduced since Why Tungi Day became a

First off, Rangi, what is Matariki.

So Matariki is a cluster of stars, most commonly known as play and so it's in the constellation of Taurus. And it's actually there are a few hundred stars in that cluster, but there's only a handful that are visible to the naked eye. So Maturik is the Mali name that's given to.

That group of stars.

And in terms of martaiqui, what's the law there if people don't know?

So, stars rise four minutes earlier every day. So the stars you see in the sky, say in the summertime in the morning, are not the stars that you see in the sky in the winter time, they change, they change their positions throughout the year.

And so what happens is Martariqui will.

Rise on the horizon in the eastern sky just before the sun rises in the middle of winter. So when it appears in that position in the middle of winter, before the sun rises, you knew that you were around the shortest day of the year. And so that was a marker for when people begin their New Year celebration. And most cultures that have a New year, if that's you know, for want of a better phrase, sell lebraided it in the winter. You'll see that right across Europe.

Well, Mardi did exactly the same.

But the marker that we chose to understand and know when we were in the correct phase of celebration was the pre dawn rising of Matadiki.

And I understand that there's a theme this year. What's that?

So the theme this year is matadi Ki mapuanga that means mataiki and Puanger.

So you know, Mahdi, just like any other group of people.

We have our own you know, you can even though you're one people, perhaps we have so much diversity within our within our culture, and different regions have different approaches. For the vast majority of Maldi, Matadiki is the symbol that begins the new year, but for some tribes, the star Puanger or Ridal is actually the star that marks the beginning of the new year. It's a star that rises near at the same time of the year, but it was just a different start that was selected.

So what we're doing in this year is.

Celebrating mantari qui mar puna, which means celebrate together.

So we're saying to people, even though you.

Might have perhaps a little bit different approach, or there are these wonderful nuanced eardiosyncrasies or different characteristics that different regions have, we should celebrate those, but also come together to celebrate the Mardi New Year.

Siniki is representative of the Marii new year, but also something that was key as part of seasonal recognizing the change in seasons, and also recognized in different regions of it sometimes being at different times, but it is unique to New Zealand. It is something that's unique about our place in the world, and so it's a real chance for us to not only mark that in our own calendar, but to showcase that internationally as well.

How significant do you think that that theme of unity is at a time when there's been a lot of talk about culture wars and of course the Treaty Principal's Bill, It seems pretty timely to be thinking of togetherness. You know.

It's we're in a period where there's a lot of division, and not just in the country but right across the world, and it's often driven, i think, in many ways at a political level. And so people become divided because of their different, diverse practices, or different backgrounds or even different lifestyles, and so people become isolated and marginalized, and words become weaponized, and people become politicized and then even radicalized.

And so the division does that.

And what we're saying is it's okay to be different, It's okay, but it's about coming together with our difference, is to celebrate the things that make us the same.

And so it's saying we're from all.

Of these different, diverse backgrounds, but we come together to celebrate as one. I think it's such an important message in the context of where we are in terms of I guess the climate that is dividing many of us.

Why does the date change every year?

You do you know why Easter changes every year?

No?

Yeah, And you know most people don't know. The reason Easter changes every year, and it's about a month's difference is because the Easter celebration is built on a lunar

So have you viewed the cluster yet?

No?

Do you know how to?

No?

Okay, wake up? Go outside.

There's a hard part.

You're already away before sunrise. Once the sun's up foot washes out the stars. You don't want to get up to real leaf because you have to wait for the cluster to actually rise over the horizon. So between five thirty and six thirty is a good time of the morning to see it. You're going to look to the southeast. You're going to look for Oriyan's bout, which is also known as the pot.

Ryan.

It's also known as Totau, and then you're going to look straight out from the pot and you'll see Puanga. Yeah, and then you're going to look lift to the pot. You're going to see big orange stand and you're going to look a little for the lift, and then you're going to see the Matsadiki cluster. So it's just a cluster of stars and look a little bit hazy, and between five thirty and six city is the best time to see it.

Yeah, I saw.

In twenty twenty two, the Matadiki Advisory Committee set out the Maturiki Public Holiday day.

For the next thirty years. How does that happen?

You can actually work out what years will have extra months and when the particular and correct lunar phases will be of the correct lunar months. So it's no different as setting out moving forward Christmas for the next one hundred years. See Christmas doesn't always fall on the same day. It doesn't always fall on a Saturday or a Sunday or a Friday or a Tuesday of changes, but it will always be on the twenty fifth. That's exactly the

The correct lunar period of time. So yeah, we just you.

Can project right out for thousands of years if you really wanted to, what the correct lunar phases of the correct lunar months will be.

This is the fourth year celebrating Matauriqua is a public holiday. Do you think the understanding of Marsadiki has grown over that time?

It clearly has, and I mean the Ministry for Culture and Heritage have put out reports every year showing that it's increased. It's gone from I think fifty one percent of the entire population to celebrating it in its first year. Last year, I think it was sixty two percent or something like that. I want to be making up numbers.

Yeah, I think it was three quarters of Kiwis see Masadiki as a chance to celebrate the culture, people and stories of al Tierroa up from seventy percent in twenty twenty three, So clearly, I mean that's going to be encouraging.

It is, it is, and I think it's like that because there is no politics in Matauriki. There isn't There is no right way or wrong way to celebrate it. It can be as simple as just sitting down with loved ones and having a meal, to going out and watching a rugby match, to spending time going out to walk the dogs. It's about people reconnecting to their loved ones and reconnecting to the environment. There are tradition, Maldi four more ceremonies that are taking place right across the

So I'm really stoked that it's growing. I'm really really.

Happy that I get the feeling that people are starting to embrace it. They're always going to be those groups of people that will say it's just another day off for me, or I don't want to celebrate that, and that's cool, But hoping that as it starts to evolve and people become more comfortable with it and realize that there are no month police or no one's being judged, or it's open to everyone, that will become part of people's normal yearly cycle and part of our national identity.

This year, to celebrate Matadiki, we're having a lot of friends over to our fuddy and we're going to put down the hangy. I'm calling it Houerdiki. It's like friends miss but for Martadiki.

For Martiniqui. This year, I'm going to make some cute little short bread stars, which may not be successful, and I'm having some of my best friends over so that we can share some reflections and some of our goals for the next year.

Are there any other significant dates or events in the multi calendar that you would like to see more widely celebrated as well.

Yeah, there are there are those seasonal celebrations and those are mildly celebrated at the end of the harvest. So that was in the autumn, celebrated in the spring, when we planted, we celebrated in the middle of summer. And these were like acknowledgments of the seasonal cycles. But the big one, big one was Mataiki and that was big community events and feesting and coming together. But all of them, all of those Mali seasonal celebrations are deeply intertwined with the environment.

So there you know.

The Maldi calendar system is an environmentally driven astronomical calendar system and so it's people had such intimate connections and a knowledge of the environment, and it was embedded into everyday practice. And so I'd love to see more of that happen and people connecting to our environment and where we are in this part.

Of the world.

Thanks for joining us today, You're welcome.

That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage at enzadherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is produced by Ethan Sells and Richard Martin, who is also our sound engineer.

I'm Chelsea Daniels.

Subscribe to the Front Page on radio or wherever you get your podcasts, and tune in on Monday for another look behind the headlines.