Signposts - a blog about Te Ara the Encyclopedia of New Zealand

New Zealand Music Month is drawing to a close. Console yourself with our music-themed quiz.

A word of warning: ‘Find the answer in Te Ara’ will often lead you to just a clue.

To view the quiz you need to have the latest version of Adobe Flash Player

‘Your Stories‘ are accounts of personal experiences, contributed by members of the public to enrich Te Ara.

They are part of the entries they relate to, but to make them easier to find, we’ve added them to the ‘Browse the Encyclopedia’ menu on Te Ara’s home page.

From here you can easily make your way to the wealth of personal accounts about surviving storms, travelling to New Zealand, life in the bush, going eeling and much more.

If, after reading some of these, you’re inspired to write your own account of something related to a Te Ara entry – submit it to us and become part of Te Ara.

The 1968 Īnangahua earthquake

24 May is the 40th anniversary of the 1968 Īnangahua earthquake. With a magnitude of 7.1, it remains New Zealand’s largest on-land earthquake for more than fifty years.

Six people were killed in accidents related to the earthquake, including a helicopter crew repairing power lines. There was enormous damage in the surrounding hills, with huge landslides. State Highway 6, through the upper and lower Buller gorges, was closed for many months. Most large structures such as bridges survived with little damage because they had been designed to withstand large earthquakes.

I was asleep in the upper storey of an old wooden house in Westport. Just before 5.30 a.m. there was a huge earthquake, followed by an explosion above me. It turned out that the chimney had fallen over, and bounced down the corrugated iron roof. I can remember holding on to the bed, and wondering how long the shaking was going to last. It was much worse close to the epicentre, over 30 kilometres away.

40 years later there is little evidence of the earthquake. Most of the big landslides have naturally revegetated. But the people who lived through the earthquake will always remember.

There is a small museum at Īnangahua village, with many pictures of the earthquake, which is open most days.

One of the odder pieces of New Zealand music – the decimal currency song, 1967

May is New Zealand Music Month, when we celebrate the creativity of our singers, songwriters and musicians.

To mark this, NZHistory.net.nz has gathered together Thirty-one reasons to love New Zealand music. If you fancy a spot of live New Zealand music, NZlive.com has listings of all the NZ Music Month events.

We’ll be covering music in our upcoming Creative Life theme, but you can already find a wealth of New Zealand music on Te Ara, such as this sea shanty ‘I’ve traded with the Maoris‘, which is part of Seafarers. Other historic songs include this tale of sealers who were stuck on Open Bay Island for four years before being rescued, and the ‘Song of the digger‘ about kauri gum diggers.

One of the odder songs I’ve found on Te Ara is the delightful decimal currency song, from 1967, which aimed to promote the change from pounds, shillings and pence.

In Te Ara’s Te whānau puha - whales entry, there’s a video of a performance of ‘Ruawharo’. The waiata ‘Ka haramai a Pāoa‘ gives an account of how the Waipāoa River was formed, and internationally know bass Īnia Te Wīata sings a Ngāti Raukawa song, ‘He puru tai tama‘.

It’s essential to include Split Enz, one of New Zealand’s greatest pop bands. More recent music is represented by TrinityRoots and Che Fu.

You’ll be feeling patriotic after listening to all of this New Zealand music, so round it off with ‘The boys of the Southern Cross‘, or our national anthem ‘God defend New Zealand‘.

Native flax

When news reached Te Ara that the Horowhenua District Council was planning to remove 300 roses alongside a central town round-about and replace them with flaxes and grasses, hot debate followed among the Te Ara staff. Here is an expurgated snippet.

Jock:
It’s great to see the people of Levin finally throwing off horticultural imperialism, and realising that they live in New Zealand, and not on a little island off the coast of Europe. Roses were introduced by our English forebears to remind them of home, but they always get thrashed by the wind, and only survive by being sprayed.

Flaxes and natives are easy care – they don’t need to be pruned or covered in chemicals. The council will save $400,000 on their maintenance. Evolved for local conditions, they grow easily here – this was the area where a flax industry flourished.

They move beautifully in the wind; they attract the native birds. And they look so much better – colours that speak of the landscape around, shapes that are dramatic and eye-catching. Who needs the pastels and thorns of roses when you can have the drama of a flowering flax?

English roses

Maggy:
It’s tragic that horticultural chauvinism is advanced as an argument to support the actions of a short-sighted council. Let’s be clear from the start – flaxes deserve a place in our landscape – but the flax battleground is not on urban traffic islands or in civic gardens; it’s out on the plains, on our farms, and along the coast and waterways that we need to plant more flaxes.

Do we really want mass plantings of flax in our gardens? Consider the tenax cultivars – they grow into giants and harbour rats (hence the absence of native flax snails and weevils on the mainland). And they’re junk collectors – plastic bags, bottles, paper and empty cans collect in flax fans. They are not low-maintenance beasts – their old leaves droop and whip round and round in the wind, creating ugly bare patches. Coloured fans revert to green and old fans die off. Flaxes need regular haircuts if they’re to look their best.

The majority of New Zealanders are not averse to a flax or two in their gardens, but what most gardeners want is colour, colour and colour – something flowering roses provide in abundance. As a bonus, a rose-grower gets scent, form and beauty. Then there’s the satisfaction from growing a lovely rose. Any fool can grow a flax.

What a shame Levin’s council is failing to capitalise on its rich horticultural history, its equable climate and fabulous soils. It could emulate Timaru and promote itself as a rose-growing centre. Leave the flaxes in Foxton, I say.

Well, after hearing the arguments for and against, what do you think?