Pipiana Whiston. Photo/Stephen Parker
If anyone has an intimate insight into what makes the local hospitality industry tick it's Pipiana Whiston.
It's an insight which was recognised at last year's hospitality awards where she was named an icon, an acknowledgement by her colleagues of her contribution to the industry in which she's worked 30-plus years.
A year on it's recognition that still flummoxes her.
When we ask about it she rolls her eyes in a way we can only describe as 'kapa haka eyes', translate that as you will but Our People's sticking to our guns - Pipiana's expressive eyes tell a thousand words. When we comment on it she confesses it's visual shorthand her friends know well.
We understand why, this home town uber achiever's one of those who's far better at conveying her feelings with her eyes than in words - she's someone for whom talking about herself's an embarrassment.
Put it another way, this is one modest woman we're dealing with here - and one for whom recognition of her professionalism keeps on coming.
This week she was announced as a finalist in the general manager of the year category of the New Zealand Hotel Industry Awards.
Like her local acknowledgement, it's stunned Pipiana. "To be honest I laughed, it came totally out of left field."
She considers she's only doing what her job requires of her.
That job's general manager of the Millennium - it's the hotel, then under the Hyatt brand name, where she started as a receptionist and has worked her way through the departments, holding the top spot since 2004.
Press Pipiana for a self-description and she comes up with a "half and halfer".
"I think my life has been lived pretty much in two worlds, Maori and Pakeha, town and country. I have been very fortunate to have been exposed to both sides of these fences growing up."
We'll deal with the country side first. Pipiana was 9 when her parents bought a Hamurana lifestyle block.
"It really was the like The Good Life [TV programme] with farming in the back yard; we had animals, grew feijoas, I rode horses, went to a country school. Actually my brother, sister and I saved Kaharoa School from closure, its roll had dropped below 50 then we came along and took it up to meet the number needed to stay open."
Those horses she talks of sparked her dream of becoming a jockey.
"When we went to the country my grandfather fulfilled his promise of buying me a pony, I joined the Ngongotaha Pony Club, we went hunting in the winter, eventing in the summer, had lots of fun riding in the lake."
The jockey dream was shattered when the once petite Pipiana grew into something of a beanstalk, her long, lean, elegant form cut out for the catwalk not the race track.
However the catwalk never entered the career equation. From high school she joined the BNZ's customer services department. "It was a great grounding but after four-and-a-half years I became disillusioned. By then I was in the loans department, it was at the time a lot of mortgages were being foreclosed, I found that sad, hard to deal with."
A friend working at the Hyatt told her the hotel was looking for a front-of-house person.
"I ended up getting that job and apart from three years when I took time off to have my elder son I've been here since."
During her hotel break work didn't go on the back burner, Pipiana and a couple of friends opened Galleons seafood restaurant at Whakarewarewa.
"That's when the grandparents kicked in [with babysitting duties]."
Talk of grandparents and Whakarewawera takes us to her Maori side.
As one who knows Pipiana well puts it she's descended from Whakarewarewa 'royalty'.
Her late grandfather, Kuru Waaka, was founding director of the New Zealand Maori Arts and Crafts Institute. As a child Whaka was Pipiana's playground.
"It was where our grandparents' homestead was, we spent a lot of time there running through the valley in our bare feet to see our grandfather in his office, our grandmother in the souvenir shop or cafe for afternoon tea."
Our next question's a blatantly obvious one: Was she ever a penny diver? It sparks true confession time.
A young Pipiana wasn't all that keen on getting wet. "I was always a little bit scared, I would be the one standing on the side who'd run to the shop for the other kids because they were dripping wet and not welcome, I was their dry girl."
It's indicative of our all-over-the-place conversation that it jumps back to her hotel job.
"It's offered me a lot of challenges - I've had to become a jack of all trades; maintenance, HR, have the ability to move across all areas. The hotel's a very different place today from when I joined with the GM wandering around in his Gucci loafers, waving his cigar in a waft of very expensive aftershave."
The hotel aside, Pipiana Whiston is the epitome of the way women of Te Arawa have moved into prominence in what traditionally was a male-dominated society.
"I think local Maori women have come ahead in leaps and bounds, we're now out there doing good things and being acknowledged; our skills and our successes are being celebrated."
Pipiana's own contribution goes way beyond her workplace. She's a former member of the then Waiariki Institute of Technology's tourism advisory committee, a Maori in Tourism committee member and a mentor in the Big Brothers Big Sisters programme; through it she's acquired a 10-year-old 'sister'.
"At the moment we are doing hip-hop, at least she is, I'm watching, encouraging her. We spend at least a couple of hours a week together, go walking, out to the lakes, to the library. I think for those of us fortunate in life it's essential to pay it forward and it doesn't have to be monetary."
With this year's hospitality awards being celebrated tomorrow night we force her back to her icon status.
"It's humbling, flattering every now and then I look at the trophy, have a little chuckle and think 'wow, you have won this,' but you don't do these jobs for acknowledgement.
PIPIANA WHISTON:
Born: Rotorua, 1964.
Education: Selwyn Primary, Kaharoa School (including intermediate years), Western Heights High.
Family: Partner: Blair Chalmers (also a hotel general manager), two sons, grandson.
Interests: Family, friends, boating on the lakes. "I've started to learn to play the ukulele but am very much a beginner." Reading "anything and everything."
On Rotorua: "You arrive as a friend, leave as whanau."
On the hospitality industry: "Vibrant, exciting, the best is yet to come."
Personal philosophy: "Approach everything with integrity . . . doing the right thing when no one's looking."