Maori Study and Tai Chi

This last week was intense. Glenn and I were able to take another weeklong Maori language course. The classes ran all day from 8:30am to 5pm. We both felt exhausted at the end of the day. Though we did go away from the course feeling we had at least a beginners understanding of Maori. Our days were not spent entirely in class learning pronounciation, punctuation, grammer and spelling; we actually spent a good portion of our time singing or learning Maori songs (waiatas). Each day after lunch (kia) all the classes gathered in the marae, the traditional Maori gathering space. There we sang songs some with actions some without. This was such a powerful experience with the maori carvings all over the walls and the energy of everyone in the room singing the room just buzzed with energy. Everyone sang, no one hesitated or said “but I am not a singer”. Some of the women’s voices were extremely powerful.

This morning the sky was cloudy and there is a cool breeze. We rode our bikes to the park for your Saturday Tai Chi lesson. The park was a soft green in the blue overcast light, the finches sang their morning song, the ducks waddled by the pond edge and we centered ourselves gaining energy from the earth. As we followed our instructor through the movements, I inhaled the fresh morning air, focusing inward and outward. Before me stood a wise tree and from it flew a Gray Heron. He came and went but always brought back with him a strand of grass or a thin twig. The soaring vastness of the heron was mesmerizing. I felt an awareness and connection each stroke of the herons wings. This moment felt like a long and deep breath. When we ended the lesson the heron was no longer making his journey back and forth from the tree. But we did see a small pile of grasses and twigs where the trees branches forked, we expected the heron was out catching breakfast.