Over the years I have been asked many times about our ‘training’ as children. How, who, when, what and all that’s in between. The reason being that we speak often of being ‘taught at the knees of our Elders’.

It was only recently that I understood the looks on people’s faces regarding these statements and how they could not fathom such a thing happening, especially with ones so young.

So with this in mind I’d like to share some of my experiences with my grandson Kiwa, as he explores and uses his innate knowing, all the while being guided and nurtured in his learning of this traditional body work Romiromi.

The photo above was taken in New York City, 2006. Yes that’s Kiwa on the massage table with a willing model under our hands. Donna (the client) noticed she had curvature of the spine when she was in her early teens and she struggled with continued back problems not long after being told she had scoliosis for life. This influenced the quality of her menstruation cycle (my belief), as her pelvic girdle was sitting to the right side, thrusting her hips to into an abnormal position and that shortened her leg by a good inch. She had suffered numerous falls, any one of which caused her tail bone to bend and pull the sacrum out of it’s normal position, cocking it like that of a dogs tail tucked between the legs.

In the photo below and the ones to follow, I teach Kiwa many things from how to use his ‘stone’. How to hold it, wield it, angle it and the use of pressure. To rubbing the kiri aa tua (skin), picking and plucking a muscle for different reasons. His interest is total and I sense his alertness to the slight changes that occur in Donna’s body.

Kiwa like most children his age (3 years), wants to be involved in what we do. So we used his interest in this work to give him some clear pointers, then allowed his own senses to take over. At all times during this process our client was well aware of what was happening, and happy with it. She could not feel the difference between his hands and my hands, as her senses blurred in to one with the work that was being done.

What Donna did say, was that she felt a very gentle pureness when Kiwa was touching her, and listening to us talking between ourselves, security, trust, safety peace and love were all she felt. You will see in this photo how we are using a stone, to massage the ‘angry’ stance of the scar that lay along her spinal column after her operation. It was so sensitive to the touch, that she could not handle being hugged for any length of time, her sleeping was compromised due to shifting constantly when the nerves got triggered and went numb as well as some other aches and pains that came with it. What we are doing is, ‘laying the scar tissue down’ using the stone, lots of oil (coconut) and then starting of very lightly, and increasing pressure until we could touch her without any triggers going off.

Here we are completing our work on Donna, smoothing and soothing muscles, tissue, blood, and oxygenating the area on her back for faster and better healing.

Note the small elbow in her back, used to hold a subtle pressure there. This is a natural completion hold for me, as I tap the top and bottom ends of the spinal column.