Ōrākei Marae

Visiting Ōrākei Marae by Ford Stallard

“Haere mai te manuhiri. Haere mai, haere mai, haere mai.” Room 22 and the teachers and parents and the rest of the children were walking into the gateway. There were patterns on the ground. The ground was concrete and the patterns were white and peach. We finally were at the interesting wharenui. My eyes were alert. The carvings were black and I was surprised the carvings were black because the carvings are normally brown. We took our smelly shoes off. Then we carefully walked in the wharenui. The wharenui looked amazing. Then we sat down on the incredible floor – the floor was black. We did the powhiri, then the powhiri was done. We heard lots of Māori words. Then we sang Te Aroha without the music. The people sang a song that all the people didn’t know, not even I knew that song, but I sat still and did not talk. It was silent until Lome’s little brother started yelling. I felt excited because I liked the carvings and there were lots of magnificent carvings at the cool marae.

At Ōrākei Marae by Julia Aho

When we got to the marae we went to put our bags in the wharekai. We went outside to get ready for a person to welcome us into the wharenui. Finally a lady came out and she said to all of us, “Haere mai, te manuhiri! Haere mai, haere mai.” And Lome’s mum replied back. We walked slowly as the woman welcomed us to the wharenui. We took off our stinky shoes and went in. As we were walking in to the wharenui to do the powhiri, some of the parents sat on the front chairs and some parents were sitting on the back. Some kids sat at the front and some were at the back. I felt very, very, very excited because it was my first time being at a marae.