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If you have a chance to visit a marae, or if you look around the Maori meeting houses in New Zealand’s metropolitan museums, you will notice the many carvings representing Maori ancestors. The posts (poupou) which hold up a meeting house are seen as the ancestors of the people who built it.

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Poupou, Waitangi Meeting House, Waitangi National Reserve, Bay of Islands

Although most Maori people now live in cities and towns, when there is an important occasion many return to their home marae and sleep beside their ancestors in the meeting house. Maori gain warmth, strength, and their identity from the life of the marae.

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Sharing the culture, Rotorua

Through their genealogies (whakapapa), Maori trace their families back to the canoes that their ancestors sailed across the vast Pacific Ocean. These genealogies are still recited today in Maori speech making (whaikorero) when welcoming visitors onto marae or at meetings (hui). Speakers identify their mountain, their river, their canoe, their tribe, and their special ancestors.

Visitors who take the opportunity for a homestay with a Maori family are fascinated by these living traditions and have an opportunity to experience a unique culture.

He toa takitini taku toa, ehara i te toa takita hi.
My bravery was the bravery of many, not just of one warrior.
(Strength can be found in numbers.)