Taiki the steam engine draws mass crowd in Waiuku

Taiki the tank engine. Photo / Supplied

The iwi of Ngāti Te Ata in Waiuku has collaborated with the Glenbrook Vintage Railway Charitable Trust to bring on an exciting new project that the whole whānau can enjoy.

Taiki the tank engine showed his face to the public for the first time, and to more than 2,000 people recently in Waiuku.

Mana whenua say Taiki is a vehicle for locals to learn more about Matariki and to cultivate te reo and mātauranga Māori.

Taiki is one of the founding ancestors of Ngāti Te Ata in Waiuku and, in honour of Matariki and in celebration with the Glenbrook Vintage Railway, the local iwi has decided to name the train and Matariki event, "Taiki".

Ngāti Te Ata representative Roimata Minhinnick says, "It was about a hononga (relationship) between us - the local iwi Ngāti Te Ata and Glenbrook Vintage Railway. How can we do something special and 'whakatinanangia', give some substance to the public holiday coming up next year, Matariki.

"It's discussing things like, places of significance, ancestors who are meaningful to us, our heritage and, in particular, Te Reo."

"What that means is more access to more history, to more reo, to more education and being able to share that."

Glenbrook Vintage Railway general manager Tim Kerwin says, "We are probably a little bit separated from the community so we supported a call last year to set up a meeting with Ngāti Te Ata and talk to Roimata about a number of different things and snowballed into this."

"Using the character Taiki for educational purposes as well would be fantastic. We bring about 30,000 people into the township here annually, so I think there's a lot of synergies there that we can do to help with Māori education and cultural awareness for what we are doing here."