Dave Mollard’s Change is Constant: Make the most of Palmerston North’s Te Marae o Hine

This artwork created last spring honours Rangitāne ancestral leader Ereni Te Awe Awe. The name of the artwork kua kākahutia te rangimarie or under the cloak of peace reflects an important whakatauki (saying) for Rangitāne. Photo / Palmerston North City Council

OPINION

We all called it The Square. Despite it being more of a rectangle, it is the heart of our city. I remember as a kid walking with Mum and Dad through it on a warm summer evening on our hikoi from the PDC to the DIC. It was a magical place full of wishing wells, duck ponds and water fountains.

As a teenager, it was the place to drive around in my mate’s Mark 3 Cortina with tinted windows. We didn’t venture into the green space after dark because of some sketchy people hanging out but it served as a slow-speed racetrack for us petrolheads.

Then I left Palmy and on my return years later they had removed the bushes, the fountain and the wishing well, but the ducks were still there. Like many of us, I didn’t like the change but in hindsight, it was a wonderful transformation to a multi-purpose venue for us all to use. Most weekends there is some form of event or another on the lovely manicured lawns.

However, after visiting the squares and plazas of Europe on my OE I realised our square has a problem. It’s too big and it divides our central city into four slabs rather than connecting them. The walk I did as a kid between the two department stores was fun but I had forgotten the two road crossings and that Dad had to carry me on his shoulders for the return because of the distance. I do have to acknowledge the thoughtful landscaping that has happened recently that has slowed traffic and made it a more walker-friendly experience.

Late last year I had the privilege of a guided tour through this beautiful green space that we now recognise by its real name, Te Marae o Hine. The tour guide was a descendant of Te Peeti Te Awe Awe, whose statue dominates the southeast corner as he stands as guardian, his eyes firmly set on the horizon, his back protecting his people. The tour was a journey of understanding what that place means to mana whenua. It was not until I was over half a century old that I started to understand how important our quadrangle was to the bi-cultural peace that our region felt while battles were raging in our neighbouring provinces.

Te Marae o Hine is still too big to be an intimate setting to sip coffee and watch the world walk by, especially when a westerly is blowing, but its size provides us with a place where pipe bands can play, the New Zealand Rural Games open and close, and all our cultures celebrated.

It’s a brilliant venue for the Superstock Teams Championship scrutineering where bogans from all over Aotearoa gather to celebrate the smell of petrol, loud exhausts and metal-twisting crashes.

My challenge to you is to use our marae, especially while the weather is so good, and perhaps you could discover something you have missed all these years, like the name of our clock tower, Kerei Te Panau.

Dave Mollard is a Palmerston North community worker and social commentator.