‘Oh yeah?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Oh yeah?’
At their most serious, our conflicts ended as screaming matches and fisticuffs in the main street of Gisborne, but our arenas of conflict were mainly ritualised. The race to the bridge was one; shearing was another. However, the main arena was the sportsground. Here, we could engage in gladiatorial combat which assuaged our blood lust and allowed us to put the boot in. Had it not been for sports, I am sure our conflict would have escalated.
In all this, what was at stake was the mana of our leaders — in our case, Grandfather Tamihana; in their case, Rupeni Poata.
Again, had I not assumed religious differences as the cause, I would have looked to some sporting incident at the heart of the conflict. For Rupeni Poata, like Grandfather, had been a sporting champion in his youth. Haromi, Andrew and I found this incredible, because Rupeni Poata was what my cousin Mohi would have described as a real short arse. At five foot two, he was more than a foot shorter than Grandfather; he was even shorter than Grandmother Ramona. How he ever managed to beat Grandfather Tamihana in wrestling and track events — which he was reputed to have done — was beyond us. Rupeni Poata was also dumpy and ugly. When Haromi and I went to see The Ten Commandments we clutched each other with shock at the sight of Edward G. Robinson playing the lascivious Jewish turncoat who threatened Debra Paget with a fate worse than death.
‘Rupeni Poata!’ we hissed.
It was all the more incomprehensible to us therefore that Rupeni Poata was reputed to be so successful with women. When he spoke there was a slight whistling sound on his sibilants. His lips were big and fleshy, and he had a gap between his teeth. He was a snappy dresser, though, I have to say that for him. He had a habit of wearing dark suits and a fedora with its brim rakishly pulled to one side. He also drove a Lagonda.
‘But he has another car,’ Andrew told me.
‘What kind?’
‘An old Model T Ford,’ Andrew said. ‘It’s locked in one of the sheds on his farm.’
‘What would Rupeni Poata be doing with a Model T?’
‘He must collect vintage cars,’ Andrew shrugged.
In 1918, Rupeni Poata married a woman of high rank from Waikato; he knew how to get ahead. His wife’s name was Maata and together they raised fourteen children. Although Rupeni began having children later than Grandfather Tamihana, his household overtook Grandfather’s by having two sets of twin boys to begin with. Whether this should be taken as an indication of rampant sexuality I don’t know, but if so, Rupeni was obviously on par with Grandfather Tamihana. The twins were Uncle Ruka’s age now, big, fierce men who had taken their physical size from their Waikato mother; and their names were all from Roman history: Caesar, Augustine, known as Augie; Titus, or Tight Arse Senior, and Alexander. They were an answer to their father’s prayers, forming as they did a rugby front row of equal size to ours. To witness them against our front row of Uncles Matiu, Maaka, Ruka and Hone was to witness a battle between Leviathans.
The twins were followed by eight sisters: Julia, Agnes, Helen, Virginia, Gloria, Anna, Carla and Poppaea — she was the one we called ‘The Brute’ because of her strong hockey tactics. The Poata women, too, were big and fierce, and endowed with qualities which were suitable for men but which tended to tilt the women towards masculinity — moustaches on their upper lips and lots of hair under the armpits. They all seemed to marry tiny men, similar to their father, but they bred big children. Two brothers followed them, Bill and John, named as if Rupeni couldn’t be bothered with the Roman any longer.
Had I not known better, I would have suspected that Rupeni bred his big family on purpose, to challenge ours.
The Poata homestead was right in the middle of Hukareka, next to the War Memorial Hall. It wasn’t as big as ours, but because of Rupeni Poata’s considerable reputation among the Ringatu community, it was the centre of attraction. Maata also brought her own mana and glory to Hukareka, and that amplified her husband’s fame.
When Maata died in 1947, Rupeni Poata remained alone at the house, unmarried despite the interest of a number of widows. Unlike our family, none of his children lived with him. Rather, they took houses nearby in Hukareka. They were apparently devoted to their father, despite his evil and manipulative nature. Of course they believed everything he said, and thought everything we said was a lie.
Rupeni’s constant companion was his granddaughter, the beauteous Poppy. How she was ever born from The Brute is God’s own secret. I think that Andrew was as much in love with her as I was, and I venture to suggest that it was because she was so like our own Mahana women. She danced in Maori culture competitions with fire and spirit. She played hockey like Boadicea, her stick an instrument to mow people’s legs off. She carried herself most of the time as a Maori princess.
As for Tight Arse Junior and Saul, weight for weight and height for height we were similar. This made them well-matched opponents, but I sometimes wished that God hadn’t given them one asset we didn’t have — longer arms. When Andrew and I got into fist fights with them, we sometimes came off worst. If God was truly on our side, how come we didn’t have the longer reach?
In sum, the Poatas were worthy challengers for the House of Mahana. The stage was always ready for some good punch-ups.
Chapter 12
Apart from Sundays, the only other time when Waituhi wasn’t the best place in the world was when the shearing began. As the only working male left in the homestead, I was like Audie Murphy in The Siege of Fort Petticoat, defending the women as well as the crippled, the lame, the elderly, the ill and decrepit against Injuns.
‘This is the way it’s always been,’ Aunt Miriam consoled me. It was six in the morning. I had already finished the milking and lit the copper in the washhouse. ‘Every morning all his life your father has had to do this. Milk the cows, chop the wood, fill the copper for the washing —’
Aunt Miriam was carrying out the baskets of sheets, towels and clothes, including Grandfather’s longjohns. Today they’d all be soaked, boiled in the copper and taken down to the creek to be rinsed, slapped against the rocks and pegged out to dry.
‘And it’s going to get worse,’ Aunt Sephora joined in. ‘The shearers will be sending in all their clothes soon.’
‘Why you, though?’ I asked my aunts. ‘Why has it always been like this for you and Dad?’
‘It’s our job,’ Aunt Miriam answered. ‘We’re the youngest. Anyway, what else have we got to do!’ They laughed together.
I could never really think of my three aunts as separate women. Where there was one, the other two were nearby.
‘But you could get married,’ I said.
Aunt Miriam blushed. Aunt Sephora gave her one of her glances.
‘We’re too busy to do that,’ she said. ‘Bulibasha wouldn’t let us anyway.’
‘You get used to it,’ Aunt Miriam said. ‘Being us, I mean.’ There was a pause.
‘Enough talking,’ Aunt Sephora instructed. ‘We’re running late. Esther, you better help Simeon fill the copper.’
It was on the tip of my tongue to say No. Instead, I nodded, and together Aunt Esther and I began ferrying the buckets from the outside pump to the copper.
At breakfast, Grandfather Tamihana said to Aunt Esther, ‘I saw you helping Simeon.’
‘It was nothing,’ she answered. I wasn’t being reprimanded. Esther was.
‘You do your job, Esther. Let Simeon do his.’
‘Everybody has their job,’ my mother Huria said a few days later. The washhouse was on the go morning, afternoon and evening. The wood pile was diminishing fast and I was constantly chopping more wood. Now, just as I finished, Grandfather yelled, ‘We’re running low on meat, Simeon.’ The criticism was implied: you are supposed to be the provider but you are slacking on your job.