Tylah's Myth

How Te Whakaraueka Found Communication

Many, many years ago a boy called Te Whakaraueka wondered how the Gods knew something was going to happen without talking face to face to people. So he asked the people around him, they whispered “I have no idea, go ask Tanewharaheka, the god of the trees and birds. He knows everything that happens, he will ask the ancestors if he doesn’t.  You will find him in his tree hole,  he doesn’t ever leave it so call to him when you find the biggest tree in the forest”.  So Te Whakaraueka wondered off into the forest excitedly.

 He ran into the forest and saw heaps of birds flying in the blue sky, they looked like little stars floating across the sky. Te Whakaraueka got distracted looking at the little birds and ran straight into a huge tree. It was the biggest tree in the forest and when he looked up he saw the tree hole that Tanewharaheka lived in and he thought to himself ‘Am I here?’.  He called out “TANEWHARAHEKA, the God of the trees and birds, are you there?” he waited and waited then all of a sudden he heard the birds chirping loudly and going from tree to tree until all of a sudden they came to this tree and instantly it went as quiet as a library. Soon he heard “WHO DARE COMES TO MY TREE?” Te Whakaraueka yelled “ITS ME, TE WHAKARAUEKA!! I need to ask you something”. He went up and saw Tanewharaheka, he popped his head out of the hole and he asked “How do you communicate between all of the Gods without coming out of your home or sending notes?” Tanewharaheka whispered “We talk with birds, I yell out or think something and the birds pass it on to each other until it gets to the God I want it to go to, we can all communicate this way. You  just think something and it will be taken to the God you want it to go to”  Te Whakaraueka was happy with this and thanked him and went back to his village to share with his people.

He went running in the forest and got caught in a net and wondered what he was going to do. He tried cutting the rope but realised that the rope was too thick, it was as strong as concrete. He thought to himself ‘should I scream…no because then people may come and eat me’ so he thought again  ‘ I wonder if the chant works and he said it in his head, KARANGA MAI RA KARANAGA MAI RA, send me help; birds, trees, animals, any creatures God, please help!’ Within two minutes there were birds chirping and soon the solid rope came apart, after 15 minutes he was free, “Thank you Tanewharaheka, if you didn’t show me how to communicate without words, I would still be caught in that rope and I would have died.”