By Goya Dmytryshchak
A festival celebrating the New Zealand Maori new year aims to unite the broader community at Williamstown this month.
Matariki Festival organiser Charlie Hopa said the word matariki referred to the Pleiades star cluster and the season of its first rising in late May or early June.
“We’re trying to bring the New Zealand Maori new year to the forefront, like the Chinese new year,” he said.
“Given the fact that Australia is so close to New Zealand, and we have a lot of New Zealand copatriots here – such as myself, I’ve been here for 32 years – we thought it’s about time that we relaunch on a bigger scale and bring to the wider community how we celebrate Maori new year.”
The festival will have more than 10 music and cultural acts, including headliners from New Zealand, The Harmonic Resonators.
There’ll also be traditional food.
“We have three operators cooking our traditional food, which is called hangi,”
Mr Hopa said. “We cook the food in the ground, which usually takes four to five hours.
“We have another one from the Cook Islands and they are cooking traditional island food.
“We also have the Aussie Veterans Coffee Co. They’re operated by either ex-soldiers or current soldiers. They raise money for soldiers that have served or are currently serving that suffer from PTSD.”
The Matariki Festival will be at Seaworks in Williamstown on Saturday, July 13, from 11am-6pm.
Details: matarikifestivalmelbourne.city
