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Kia mau ki to māoritanga
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Papatūānuku Kōkiri Marae is located in Mangere East, South Auckland, on land that the marae leases from Auckland Council as a community partnership organisation.
Back in 1984, many of our kaumatua from across all the tribes of Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland) came together to address the needs of our rangatahi (youth) and whānau (families/community) – to rekindle our reo (language) and the traditional practices of our tūpuna (ancestors). Today, their dreams and aspirations are taught to so many people of all different nationalities and of all walks of life.
The marae has been servicing the needs of the local community throughout this time and officially became a New Zealand Registered Charity in 2019. Many of these founding supporters and their whānau are still working, to this day, at the marae in a volunteer capacity. There are 2 full time staff and a number of part time staff who run the day to day operations and oversee the many initiatives, volunteers and programmes at the marae. Since November 2018 and until March 2020 – just before the Level 4 COVID-19 lock down – the marae has also been blessed with a lot of hands-on help by over 100 wwoofers from all around the world on the marae’s organic urban farm. This has helped us feed our people and also educate them about healthy eating and how to grow their own organic vegetables. We give hand outs in a practical sense of healthy food and other basic necessities as needed, but we are also aiming to give people a hand up – to get them back on their feet if they’ve momentarily gone off track and lost their way. The marae, with its expert staff, is in the best position possible to genuinely help the people of South Auckland. This is a very difficult task, and they do amazingly well with huge successes along the way. They do this, essentially, on the smell of an oily rag.
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the marae was already working at full capacity to help and support the many families and youth of South Auckland in need in a variety of ways. This includes delivering fish heads, known as rangatira kai (chiefly food – regarded amongst Māori whānau traditionally as the best part of the fish), through the Kai Ika Project www.kaiika.co.nz
This project alone has helped many people to literally feed their whānau when they otherwise could not. Since COVID-19, the South Auckland area families have been hit hard by job losses already and the marae has seen a marked increase in the request for food and other basic necessities as a result. They are working hard – both paid staff and volunteers – to deliver food and necessities but everything costs money. With the need growing for support from the marae in the South Auckland community, in response, the marae needs to expand it’s services, put on more paid staff as required, pay for petrol, food and other necessary supplies.
The Trustees of the marae aspire to pay at least the living wage to our awesome marae staff – who do such outstanding work in the community with our vulnerable South Auckland families and youth. They are literally on the front line and make a huge difference to our precious youth and families lives in so many ways. We also want to resource them well, leading to the best possible support and outcomes for our South Auckland community.
By giving to the marae through this givealittle page, your koha (donation) will be used to cover the many costs that the marae has as a top notch grassroots New Zealand Registered Charity – helping those genuinely in need to survive and eventually, with the marae’s support over time, thrive.
In the interests of transparency, the marae would like to allocate 10 cents of every dollar donated through givealittle to the marae Future Fund. This Fund will not be touched until at least 2040 and by that time, we are aiming for a self-funded marae. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your generous and ongoing support of our mahi (work) – it is greatly appreciated.
Trustees of the Board
Papatūānuku Kōkiri Marae