Just over 82,300 people identified as being Tongan in the last Census in 2018. Photo / Brett Phibbs
Just over 82,300 people identified as being Tongan in the last Census in 2018. Photo / Brett Phibbs
This year's Tongan Language Week theme put an emphasis on sustaining the Tongan language in Aotearoa - encouraging Tongans to embrace the language to keep it alive. Budding journalist and proud Māori Te Kakenga Kawiti-Bishara shares about his own journey to learn a new indigenous language.
"Hāere koe ki teako i te reo o te iwi e whāngaia koe."
Go learn the language and the values of the people looking after you.
When I arrived in South Auckland for the first time to start my new career in journalism, the first thing I saw was a wave of colourful red-and-white Tongan flags on fences, draped as curtains and sprouting out of car windows.
The beautiful noise of the people - their reo - was a humbling token of inspiration and a reminder that the career I have chosen is the right one.
Since moving to Auckland to pursue journalism, I have developed an urge of responsibility to uphold the values of the communities that I am telling stories for.
From Manawatū to Manukau. I'm Māori - blood and soul - but I'm also Polynesian, heart and love. Cultural identity is at the forefront of the work I do every day.
Working to connect with the community I live and work in
But what if the community I work in cannot identify or trust me as theirs because I don't understand their values or their language?
The latest Census in 2018 showed just over 82,300 people in New Zealand identified as having Tongan heritage.
Despite the high population count, 12 per cent of Tongans aged under 15 indicated they spoke the Tongan language - a decrease of about 9 per cent since 2006.
I am a fluent speaker of te reo Māori; which entails the highest expectations from my kaumātua. I know the underlying values and privileges that come with the language.
Taking the wealth of knowledge I have gained over my 20 years under the wings of great examples of trust, confidence and love, I have decided to pursue the language of Tonga.
Te Rito cadet and budding journalist Te Kakenga Kawiti-Bishara has signed up to learn Tongan in a bid to understand his local community better. Photo / Supplied
I am seeking the missing connection that has built a wall between the trust of a well-populated community and my capacity in the media sector.
This is my journey from where my journalistic nose came from and where Tonga fits in.
At home, in my small township in Manawatū, Feilding is known for our Tongan high school rugby players whose hard-working parents and elders moved their children to New Zealand to pursue major positions in our national sport or to follow in their family footsteps.
The thread always seemed to stop there, though. I could not quite grasp why, until it dawned on me that Kiwis kept an archaic, stereotypical viewpoint of our Tongan community - one that is wrong.
I was one of two cultural representatives on the Feilding High School council in Year 13, with both Māori and Pasifika kaupapa under my belt.
Because of how engaging it was for me to use the role I had as an opportunity to develop my understanding of Pasifika affairs, I joined the school's Pasifika fusion team alongside kapa haka.
It helped me understand the true realities of the Pacific people in Aotearoa New Zealand and see that it is not as happy and as vibrant as Kiwis seem to only see.
At times, there is a different picture painted.
This is why stressing the importance of knowing the community you live in, upfront and accurately, is key to gaining trust and confidence in you in a journalist capacity.
Polynesian cultural values are intertwined with those things - trust and confidence.
I have been accepted to start my Tongan language course at the Centre Of Pacific Languages later this month.
