Evening star., 1943-12-13
BY GEORGE WELLER,
War Correspondent of The Star and


Chicago Daily News.
NGARUAWAHIA, North Island
New Zealand Via Air MaiD MANY
doors of New Zealand homes, have
swung wide to welcome Americans
but no threshold has been crossed
more often by heavy G. l., Navy or
Marine shoes than that of Princess
Te Puea Herangi.
Considering that the WHARF, or
own pa, or village, lies between
Auckland and Wellington without
being particularly accessible to
either, the hospitality of the princess
is not more remarkable than the
effort that scores of our enlisted
men are willing to make with their
Scanty leave time to go out and
visit her.
Princess TIE Puea is a kind of
Maori Eleanor Roosevelt. Physically
she is quite different from the
American woman whom the Maoris
during her recent visit here in
variably called Mother Roosevelt" "
She is small. with a sensitive. family
, bronze face, SO years old, married
but childless.
Leaders in POlyneSian Life.
With Queen Charlotte of the in
dependent Kingdom of Tonga. and
Mrs. TUT Love, hereditary Queen of
Rarotonga in the Cook Islands and
widow of the commander of the
Maori battalion that served in
Greece and the Middle East, Princess
! Te Puea is one of the foremost
! figures in Polynesian life today. All
| three have entertained Americans
in accordance with their means.
Her WHARF, however, is not one of
those simple but adequate shelters
OF uprlghts and palmleaveS, like the
faleS of Samoa, where Americans
have often, during the past two
years, eaten the Poi and drunk the
kaVa that were so familiar to their
Whalemen ancestor of a hundred
years ago.
iiC NlldIC VI lIlt lIlStSS Is dS
big as an American country house.
It's main room, which was designed
as a hospital ward originally, is
some so feet long by 40 wide, and
furnished in melange of new and
old styles, Maori mixed with Grand
Rapids.
There are dozens of chairs. as in
a royal anteroom. The back of each
is covered with white Maori winter
Wrap-around cloak, while on the
chair is a big silk cushion, purple,
red or blue.
Loaded Glass Windows.
The windows are of loaded glass,
in a kind of medieval style. But
their principal hangings are hula
skirts.
The walls are carved in red in
an extraordinary rich design of
gargoyleS with tongues extended and
grinning imps that recalls both
Notre Dame de Paris and the totem
poles of Alaska, without being quite
either.
Here the Princess, in her work
aday gray slacks and big purplish
country coat, received this CORE
spondent, who had requested to
meet her through the governmental
channels OF the native bureau. Prin-
cess lie Puea does not receive casual
visitors; her time is too occupied
in taking care of her 400-acre farm
and the several families who own
land within her pa.
At the end of this great reception
room is a kind of stage. Walking
across the fine mats fringed with
red and blue that are scattered on
the hoor, one follows the Princess
to the platform. There she points
out the precious feather cloaks of
the early chiefs. now very rare. the
bright greenStone patus or meris,
that cronate club with which the
Maori smote his enemy at the base
OF the brain, and the prim old pic
lures OF her ancestors. all of them
In western clothes of the 10Th CEN
tury.
Wants to Equal Kapeha.'
Il wanted to equal the kapeha-
that means white - hospitality,
murmurS the princess. THAT is why.
whenever there are new pigs at the
farm, and the turkeys and geese are
fat and big, I invite your boys to
come down and we have feast"
IL, -
Mok Katipa, is running her farm
several miles away. Her chancellor
temporarily is Capt. Werohia. a
lovial Maori in army uniform built
on Tony Galento lines. Capt. Wer-
ohia sleeps on a curtained bed be-
side this stage Il was at Their
mopylae in Greece at the same time
you were, in April two years ago." he
told this correspondent. They sent
me here to take care of the Maori
outfit which has quarters near the
Princess TIE Tpuea,"
On the cold green waters of the
Waikato, which flow by her door
through the pa, the Princess has
held several regattaS in old Maori
style, with Americans as invited
guests.
Too Cold for Sarong.
Americans who hitherto associated
Polynesians only with warm and
islands, learned to know
a different people and climate here
in the valley of the Waikato. This
is a chilly, brightly green country of
hills, pastures and dark fir trees. It's
much too cold for sarong There
are no coconut palms and no ukelele
music. The American soon comes
to think of the Maori as of our
mountain Indians, the Iroquois,
Blackfeet and Yakimas, and with
that step in his thought processes