Collaboratively written and illustrated by
Axel, Jack, Luc, Ryan, Will, Yamato
Year 5 students from Kahikatea
June 2022

Te ipu a Mataaoho

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In the beginning there was an ancient tupuna known as Mataaoho. Mataaoho was the youngest son of Papatuanuku and Rangi te Papa. Mataaoho was different from his brothers because he was made from magma and rock. Mataaoho usually lived underground. Mataaoho was often not seen on the surface of the human world. He was every colour of the sun such as red, yellow and orange. His body looked like it was engulfed with massive fire.

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Every so often Mataaoho needed to stretch and come to the surface and visit with his brothers. When this happened the earth rumbled like a giant earthquake. Then as Mataaoho stretched his arms and pushed the earth up, a mountain would grow. Sometimes he would push so hard that the mountain would split apart and a volcano would erupt and destroy the land.

Mataaoho had an important job because growing mountains created land and islands such as Aotearoa, New Zealand. Mountains are also important because they attract rain.

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Mataaoho was known to live at the top of a high mountain in the centre of Tāmaki Makaurau. He had a wife who loved him and she looked after him by cooking his favourite food and keeping his house warm. She cleaned his house where they lived. However one day his wife got sick of him never coming home because he was always so busy creating mountains.
She was enraged and so she packed her bags and left.

Soon after Mataaoho returned home but there was no one there to greet him. He was tired, hungry and cold. Mataaoho felt depressed and sad. He cried big Mataaoho tears in his lonely crater. As he cried he wailed and his huge body shook with grief that the ground around him rumbled.

Then Mataaoho's niece Mahuika, Kaitiaki of fire, felt the ground rumble and heard him crying. Mahuika was known for her fiery temper and her flaming, long, wavy hair. She asked her husband, the comet Auahitūroa if he would mind staying home and taking care of their five children while she visited her grieving uncle.

Next Mahuika came to visit Mataaoho and and she found him sobbing in his crater. Mahuika felt sorry for her uncle and so she made him some food.  

After that she took out one of her ten magic fingernails that could make fire and threw it into the distance. They formed large fires that encircled him and made him warm. She stood on the top on the mountain and watched her gigantic fires burning in the horizon of Tāmaki Makaurau surrounding Mataaho. The circle of mountains around Mataaoho is known as Ngā Huinga-a-Mataaoho or the gathered volcanoes of Mataaoho.