Atarangi’s Healing Inheritance
Growing up in a society where healing was a natural everyday event, I did not recognise the ‘training’ that was being given at the time. As my Dad said when he talked of his youth or those times of yester year, ”Those koroua (old fullas), they didn’t talk about what they knew, they just did it.” Meaning, they led by example.
My pathway on this journey came via my being extremely tutu (precocious/naughty/a handful), so I was ‘given’ to those who had patience, understanding and time. Of course children with this kind of behaviour these days would be classed as ADHD and ADD
Upon reflection, the healing arts were many fold in my whanau (family) life. A loved Aunt instilled in me the curiosity and the beginnings of my pathway in the healing realm. As young children, my cousin Rowan and I would spend many weekends and school holidays with this particular Aunt and Uncle beside the beach. The rest of the community was cut off at high tide, meaning no vehicles could get in or out, and it was accessible only by land rover or tractor at the half or low tides.
When Rowan’s kidney problems flared, and we could not get him to the doctor or hospital services, Aunty Pearl would show me how to work on his body to ease the fluids so he could feel more comfortable. We would miri (rub) his back in a certain circular motion, to ease the bloating and draw the fluids away from the extremities. As well, we would massage from the toes to the groin, so that the fluid that had settled there could be flushed out faster. Now I know these to be the kidney meridian and eliminatory organs. This technique allowed his body to regulate itself, release the fluids and be in control again. Sometimes, Rowan would lie down with his feet slightly raised and we would ‘push’ the water to the bladder so that he could urinate often to ‘release’ the build up. We would spend hours rubbing his legs, enthralled with Aunty’s stories of her childhood or of her journeys to far away places. Held spell bound I now know I was learning the many different strokes, pinches, flat hand and pao pressure she used. Thus my healing journey began.
Dad’s mum, Ani or Ganima (Karani-Mama) as we called her, had a vast knowledge of Rongoa – the medicines from the ngahere (bush). She used these all the time for many ailments like alleviating tooth ache, calming a feverish child, mending broken bones, sprains, sore muscles, blood disorders, diarrhoea, wounds, skin irritations, etc. I remember Ganima as having the softest voice and hands that were small and dainty yet they too had such strength and power behind them. Probably from her many years spent in the garden, chopping the manuka in Te Hapua, as well as weaving fishing nets with my Grandfather.
Dad’s father Henare, whom we called Ganipa (Karani-Papa) was the local midwife in Te Hapua and was present for the birth and delivery of all his children but two. He travelled the upper north of the north island with Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana, (Maori Prophet and Healer in the early 1900’s), the founder of the Ratana Movement. Ganipa was well versed in the faith, prayers, healings and sermons of Ratana so much so that his services in the healing realm were well sort after because of that.
Ganipa’s whakamoemiti (connecting link with God/Source/a Higher Power) was strong and eloquent and his faith deep. And it was this ‘gift’ that he passed on to my Dad. As my Uncle Freddy (Selwyn Muru) told me, he (Ganipa) had the knowing to ‘lift’ of the mauiui (sickness) of a person and carry it until he could either heal it or let it go. Ganipa was blind when my Dad was young, so he was his fathers eyes when they had to go anywhere or when work needed to be done. Because of this, my Dad learnt many of the whakamoemiti as well as the healing plants and their uses.
In his last years I would often see Dad taking and using rongoaa that he’d gathered and prepared to heal ulcers or cleanse his blood and kidneys as well as his pills. To him, the bush medicine was a compliment to anything else he’d been prescribed by his Doctor’s.
I have treasured memories of my Mum’s Mum, Maude Williams. She was well known for her hard work, community spirit, and bread making every Saturday as well as her seasonal bottling of fruit, peaches, pears and plums. Used to working communally, nothing and no one ever went without food with my Nan, she could make a pound of mince feed a group of people within 10 minutes of their arrival at home or the marae. I believe I get my work ethic from my Nana (indeed from them all), for she would work from dawn till dusk without complaint. I remember her in her 70′s and 80′s and she would be out on the road moving the cows from the upper paddock to the lower paddock. Just her, her stick and the dog.
My Nana had a deep faith, something I now recognise in all the people I have mentioned. As well they grew up in a world that was far removed from the one we know now. Where community meant if someone was hungry and they knocked on your door you would bring them in feed them and give them a bed. This happened often at my Nana’s place, it would be bursting at the seams with people, but we all had our space and place within the fold.
Aunty Bella (Nathan) was one of our kuia renowned for her healing work and in her case for using her feet or as they called it ‘tramping’ the body. People travelled great distances for a healing session with her. As a young child Aunty Bella would show me how to walk on Uncle Jerry’s back, thighs, legs and shoulders. When to use a toe, a heel, the flat of the foot or the arch (instep).
When to use the full body weight and when to use just the legs. How to stand on the body and ensure you’re keeping the spinal column safe. How to pressure the temples to release a head ache, neck ache or clear the sacrum.
Aunty Bella had the strongest hands and her grip was powerful, and when she grabbed a muscle in your shoulder or thigh, you couldn’t wriggle out of her grasp. She would show us how to miri the back with our feet, how to release a tense muscle, or how to build a weak muscle. She firmly believed that the deeper the work, the better the release, the freer the person in their physical, mental and spiritual being. I remember the rugby boys going to Aunty Bella’s on a Sunday (after their game). They knew to take their mouthguard, something to bite on. She’d have them squirming, but when they finished they got up and walked out straight and true. Many a chiropractor would bow to her knowledge of the body and how to get it moving again.
