What's with all the fuss about Matariki?

[Roscoe]

My long departed father used to, in his job running 7 seasonal warehouses, employ up to 150 labourer staff for 6-7 months each year. The biggest problem he had was, as his staff used to call it, was the "Maori day off"

Ken

Ha! Ha! Yes. I have heard that one as well. Used to take the occasional "maori day" off myself. I was REALLY sick! (Sick of work.)

You would not be allowed to call it that these days. Racist. How ridiculous.

[WalOne]

No more holidays .
Its getting stupid.
Most dont respect what the various holidays where actually for .

Its not a free shopping day . If we dont respect the day , why have it as a holiday.
That applies to easter , xmas, Anzac, Waitangi

How can it be a 'holiday' when so many are forced to work , just so we can buy a coffee or a pot plant. Or get stupidly drunk at the pub .

I thought the 4 weeks annual leave was over the top. It just becomes an issue for employers having to find a way to cover staff's annual 4 weeks off

Ahh, but isn't there an election next year? If you've spent all the available money that could be otherwise used as a bribe, another public holiday could suffice.

No matter that there is still an enormous drain of our coffers if only in the form of its negative impact on GDP. Someone somewhere has to pay for it.

Government has to pay its wage and salary bill, without any value returned. Industry likewise. White collar workers, the professions, it goes on. One of my neighbours is a courier driver. He works for himself. He still has his overheads and fixed expenses but he is denied an extra day's income because of a new additional day when his customers are closed for the day.

As a country we just can not afford two public holidays one after the other. We could have waited until we really have no real need to celebrate the birthday of a monarch - it's only going to be 10 years at the outside before we have a soft reason.

I don't have a problem with Matariki itself. It makes sense, much more than Waitangi Day, Easter etc. I'm a Royalist but personally that's only going to last until we get a Chas III. Mondayize Matariki, make it a moveable feast as is Easter so it doesn't lose any of its affinity to the lunar calendar.

[kenj]

Is MataRiki ...... MataHari's brother?

Ken

[Paul.Cov]

Yeah, it is entirely cultural tokenism, but maybe not before time.
I was thinking about it earlier today... look at our 'special' days...

Xmas - Honkie religon
New Years - Honkie Georgian Calendar
Easter - Honkie religon
Queens Birthday - Honkie token leader
Waitangi Day - Honkie taking over (under a veil of something more innocent)
Labour Day - Honkie work patterns and subservience to the need for an employer (enslaving the masses in the honkie capitalist way of life).

[kenj]

Interesting, saw this on Stuff

https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/128...on-of-matariki

Being a doubter I turned on the TV and went to Maori TV just in time to see a little of a very intense program on Matariki, all about the traditions, the culture, the food etc.

The presenter then said that in modern times Maori "......don't harvest like they used to in past times but now go to Countdown or Pak 'n Save for their food". All the while the TV screen was filled with a picture of a bright yellow Pak 'n Save!!

Am I being cynical about this??

Ken

[piroska]

Interesting, saw this on Stuff

https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/128...on-of-matariki

Fat chance.
I doubt the churches wanted Xmas to come all about food and presents. Or easter to be about chocolate.
But these things happen anyway.

I won't be surprised to see Matariki Sale or whatever....
Or maybe supermarkets...as they say Matariki is about kai...well there you go.
Bugger, I should have had fish and kumara today then.
We had curry, lol

[Beav]

What's this "new beginnings" bollocks the media is spewing

[Roscoe]

Yeah, it is entirely cultural tokenism, but maybe not before time.
I was thinking about it earlier today... look at our 'special' days...

Xmas - Honkie religon
New Years - Honkie Georgian Calendar
Easter - Honkie religon
Queens Birthday - Honkie token leader
Waitangi Day - Honkie taking over (under a veil of something more innocent)
Labour Day - Honkie work patterns and subservience to the need for an employer (enslaving the masses in the honkie capitalist way of life).

You obviously are very anti religion. That puts you up against organisations that are in the majority of the world's population. Just because you have no time for church going does not mean that there isn't anything to it. Shows you how much you know - you can't even spell religion. "religon"? You have to be joking!

[gary67]

Yeah, it is entirely cultural tokenism, but maybe not before time.
I was thinking about it earlier today... look at our 'special' days...

Xmas - Honkie religon
New Years - Honkie Georgian Calendar
Easter - Honkie religon
Queens Birthday - Honkie token leader
Waitangi Day - Honkie taking over (under a veil of something more innocent)
Labour Day - Honkie work patterns and subservience to the need for an employer (enslaving the masses in the honkie capitalist way of life).

Let me correct you

Xmas - Honkie religion. Stolen from the Pagan winter solstice
New Years - Honkie Georgian Calendar. Stolen from the Pagan
Easter - Honkie religion. Stolen from the Pagan Spring fertility festival

You see the Christians who are supposedly peaceful so long as you follow their particular variation of the fairy story have been stealing from other cultures and religions since the day they realised there was money to be made out of misery.

[Roscoe]

New Years - Honkie Georgian Calendar. Stolen from the Pagan

New Years Day has not always been regarded as the first day of the New Year. Many years ago the New Year began on March 25th.

https://www.britannica.com/story/why...t-on-january-1

Pope Gregory XIII reestablished January 1 as New Year's Day in 1582.

So Matariki is not the only time, in the past, to have had the New Year other than in January.