20 February 2007

Kia Ora Whanau PANUI

Our committee meeting held in Rotorua over the weekend was well attended with thirty present. We had a full agenda of business to discuss and transact and we express our gratitude to those of you who took the time to send us submissions on the items outlined below.

REGISTRATIONS AND REGISTRATION FEES

Registrations are due now and the closing date is April 30. Please note that the$50 fee must accompany the Registration Form because some have sent in the form with the intention of paying the fee later.In response to enquiries regarding a possible fee reduction for those who will not require marae accommodation or who intend to attend on a “casual” basis, the committee discussed this issue, and as a result, it was unanimously decided that the $50 fee will still apply. The accommodation budget is only a small percentage of the total fee and reduces even more with the numbers of those registered. The bulk of the fee is allocated to the Reunion Book, a Reunion Programme, the expenses associated with the hireage of the Kahungunu Marae, Unity Hall and Nuhaka School Hall, the cost of the activities presently being planned by the committee. Our committee expenses over the next ten months will also be included in the fee. The $50 koha was budgetted to pay for all expenses associated with the reunion up until March.We encourage you all to register now and get your form and fee to us as soon as possible. It is also important to note that this fee is based upon a minimum number of registrations received and if we find by the end of April that we have not met this target there will be an increase made from the 1^st of May. Your registration paid now and no later than April 30 will be a guarantee that you will not be subject to any increase. Registration forms were sent with the January Panui but if they have been misplaced please do not hestitate to contact us and we will send you more.

FAMILY FILES

We are grateful for all those who have submitted their family files over the past month and to bring you up to date on the progress we are making here are the numbers of individual family names received from each whanau:

Ruiha & Ropitini Matawhiua Whanau – 713 Heneriata & Henare Gemmell Whanau – 310

Charlie & Teoti Smith Whanau – 487 Wi & Mere Smith Whanau - 422

Rewi & Amiria Smith Whanau – 286 Tuehu & Tepora Smith Whanau – 604

Joseph & Heni Smith Whanau – 71 GRAND TOTAL:2902

All of these names will be entered into the Reunion Book after checking by the family reps for accuracy. Those of you who still have not submitted your files, please do so at your earliest convenience and no later than March 31 because we want to utilise the month of April for checking all files ready to pass over to the Book Committee. I have checked my master file and where most whanau have small bits of information to send in there are some families whom we have not received any files from and we know from our research the number of descendants from these are many. Letters have been written to these families encouraging them to submit them to us as soon as possible. Some have indicated that they will not be attending the reunion so feel it unnecesary to send in their family information. I want to point out to you that the decision to attend the reunion is entirely yours, and we understand that, but this invitation extended to all families to complete their Family File forms was twofold - as a means of identifying all of Peter and Emma's descendants and to have all of them included in the Reunion Book . We believe that this whakapapa will be invaluable to us and to all our future generations. If you don't attend the reunion you will have the opportunity of purchasing the book but we hope that you will make a decision to be present with your family.

REUNION BOOK

We are now in a position to provide you with more details on the compilation of our Reunion book as discussed at the meeting after a presentation by our Coordinator – Dorta Emery. A suggested format is as follows:

The Cover – being designed by Sandy Adsett.
Inside Cover – 'HE MAMAI AROHA'.
Pepeha – Nga Uri o te Pita raua ko Emma.
Nga Whanau o Pita raua ko Emma – Photos of their children and grandchildren.
Whanau in the Armed Services – Photos and profiles.
Whanau who have excelled in Education – Photos and profiles.
Whanau who have excelled in Sport – Photos and profiles.
Whanau who have excelled in Business – Photos and profiles.
Photos of grandchildren still living – hopefully recent photos.
Descendancy files - Whakapapa – all the files that have been received and entered on our data base – approximately 60 pages will be devoted to this section.
Sponsors pages – we already have two sponsors willing to “buy space”.
Acknowledgements

Quotes have been received from printers to print the book of no less than 200 pages. Now we require your help on the following:

● Photos of Peter and Emma's children and grandchildren either as a family or individuals.

● Photos and profiles of whanau for numbers 5,6,7 & 8 above.

● These are only ideas and nothing is yet “set in concrete” so if you have comments, suggestions on the format above please send them in to:

Dorta Emery, PH 124, Rotoiti Post Centre, Rotorua or phone her on 07 3627637.

REUNION PROGRAMME

Considerable discussion was spent on this important agenda item and as a result a tentative programme was tabled for further consideration at our next two meetings.

Thursday 27 – All attendees assemble on their allocated marae. Dinner, Whakawhanaungatanga – getting to know your own first cousins, aunties and uncles etc organised by each whanau committee.

Friday 28 – Breakfast on your marae.

9 – 10 ? - assemble on Manutai marae for official welcome and powhiri. The committee unanimously approved of the welcome be held here instead of Kahungunu.

10 – 1 – Whakawhanaungatanga or getting to meet everyone. - suggestion – each of the forty four grandchildren's families introduce themselves to all those assembled.

1 – 2 Lunch on Manutai marae.

2 – 4 – walk to Kaitamure cemetery. - suggestions – pay respects to our kindred dead, church service, unveiling for Hachen and Tauarai (Peter's Parents) now that their gravesites have been located, setting up plaques, planting trees and even a Memorial Gate. We await further thoughts from you. Nothing finalised yet. We also plan to meet with the Manutai Marae Committee who could give us some input.

Back to the maraes for dinner

7 – 11 - Concert, Talent Quest, Social evening, - 30 minutes of entertainment from each whanau will give us a three and a half hour programme.- Kahungunu Marae

Saturday 29 – Breakfast on the marae.

Morning– Sports activities to cater for the needs of all attendees – touch, athletics other suggestions please. Activities for the kaumatua – tour sightseeing trip etc.

Afternoon –Mahia Beach – activities at the beach

Dinner on marae

Evening – Reunion Ball – Kahungunu Marae , Disco for teenagers/young adults – Unity Hall, Videos for children- Nuhaka School Hall.

Sunday 30 – breakfast on the marae

Morning – Interdenominational Church service – Kahungunu.- suggested format – all religions invited to participate with speakers to speak on a theme accompanied by their respective choirs, choral groups etc.

Afternoon – Workshops, Discussion groups – Kahungunu, Unity and School Halls – an opportunity also for us to utilise the time reminiscing with all the living grandchildren and the “older” great grandchildren who will be attending. These kaumatua will form an integral part of the whole reunion as we all honour them on this special occasion. We need suggestions from you all on the topics for discussion – some already tabled include – whakapapa which will include a Power Point presentation, healthy living, history of the Kahungunu Marae.

Evening – the committee felt that the final night of the reunion should be spent with each whanau organising their own activity on their own marae so there will be no combined activity. We feel that this last night together will be invaluable – an opportuntity to make plans for future whanau reunions etc or just a night of fun.

Monday 31 – After breakfast all will assemble on Kahungunu (or should it be held on Manutai)for poroporoaki or farewell activities and after lunch the reunion will end.

Again we welcome your comments on the programme above because we still have another two months of discussions before it is finalised at our April Meeting. Remember all meals with the exception of lunches will be on the maraes where each whanau is accommodated. A letter has been written to the Kahungunu Marae Committee to provide us with lunches each day. However, at this stage our thinking is that each whanau will provide cut lunches for their members daily.

WHANAU IDENTIFICATION.

The committee unanimously decided that each whanau will be identified by a coloured T shirt. Colours will be selected by the whanau committees to be discussed at our next meeting.

WHANAU COMMITTEES

In the last Panui we identified most of the whanau committees who will have the responsibility of raising funds for the food and organise the catering on their allocated marae. The Rewi & Amiria Smith committee was set up over the weekend with Kahu Smith as Chairman and Freda Horomia as secretary and she plans to communicate with families within her whanau. At this stage none of the committees know who are attending the reunion and so in order for them to plan effectively or the amount of funds to raise they will need to know these numbers. We have received on some occasions numbers of family groups planning to attend, but until they register and pay the fee then we have documented evidence of the number of attendees. We have a system in place whereby all of the details on each registration form is recorded on our data base and at our monthly committee meetings the data received which includes the names, addresses – email and postal, telephone number , numbers of primary and secondary school children and total family members attending is given to each of the whanau committees. They will then have this information to help them in their planning so until you register and pay the fee you are not recorded as being an attendee.

CIRCULATION LISTS

This Panui is being posted/emailed to nearly 500 of you – 240 on email and 260 by post an increase of 80 new addresses over the past month. Our goal is to make sure that all of the living descendant families are included on our mailing lists each month and that they receive the Panuis to allow them make an informed decision whether they want to attend the reunion or not. If you have married children or living as partners, brothers or sisters who are not on our mailing list please provide us with their addresses so that they too can receive them. They will receive a personal letter from me with an invitation to their family to attend the reunion, an update on the planning progress, copies of their descendancy line from Peter and Emma, a Family file form to complete, a registration form and a copy of the latest Panui. We are also posting Panuis to whanau members in Australia so do not hesitate to send us addresses of any of your family members residing there.

COMMITTEE MEETING – MANUTAI MARAE – MAY 19/20

Our committee meeting for the month of May will be held on the Manutai Marae on the dates above. Our committee members all plan to be present there and a programme has been put in place. It is important (particularly those who do not know the area) for all to familiarise themselves with all the maraes which we will be visiting, the Kaitamure cemetery and other places of interest which will be part of the programme. The Manutai Marae Committee has kindly offered to cater for us overnight. Our committee will meet on Saturday evening after dinner probably from 7 – 9 and at this meeting they will receive the numbers of those registered and the fees received, will determine whether we increase the fee for late registrants, Budgets will be allocated, maraes allocated to each whanau, the reunion programme finalised and we hope to have a draft available of our Reunion Book. On the Sunday morning we are hoping to meet with the Marae Committee ( who incidentally is comprised of a number of Peter and Emmas descendants)to discuss in more detail the official welcome and the Kaitamure cemetery visit. Our committee extends an invitation to those living in Nuhaka, Wairoa and Gisborne to attend our meeting but if others would like to attend from further afield we welcome you.. If you do intend to be present and either require accommodation on the marae or to dine with us please let us know by March 31^st. We will be advising Jayell Smith secretary of the Marae committee of the numbers attending by April 1^st so your response is required by then.

CONCLUSION

As a committee we rely a lot upon your ideas, recommendations and suggestions to help us with our planning. This Panui requests a lot from you and we hope that you will respond to our invitation and make your submissions to us and irregardless of how “weird” or “wonderful” they may be,they are tabled for further discussion.This reunion is your reunion, and we look upon our role as a committee, to function and conduct the affairs of this hui on your behalf, and it is a privilege to do so. At this stage of our planning we have no idea how many will be attending, but we will know by April 30. Our only hope is that every family who presently receives this Panui will be attending and if two attend from each family then we will have a 1000 there. Our planning is in place to accommodate you all and even more.

Our next meeting is on March 17^th in the L.D.S Chapel, Dinsdale, Hamilton at 10 a.m and you are invited to attend. Your attendance will be much appreciated.

Kind regards

Hori Harvey