by Aramiha Harwood (Ngāpuhi Māori miniature gaming designer)
When I was seven years old my family left Aotearoa (New Zealand) and moved to country Victoria, Australia. We left behind our Whānau (family), iwi (tribe) and rohe (tribal territory). We were not alone in doing this – many economic migrations for Māori took place in the later 20th century as they moved from the country into cities to secure work. Many studies in New Zealand have highlighted the difficulties associated with this – isolation, disconnection from traditions and whenua (land/country), youth crime rates, gang activity.
For me, moving to Australia was a culture shock on two levels. It was hard to feel connection to Whānau whenever we returned to New Zealand – awkward meetings on the marae (homestead/meeting-ground) with Aunties, Uncles and Cousins I didn’t really know; the slight disdain I felt (probably imagined) from them, because my family had abandoned them and our culture to seek opportunities elsewhere.
We were not always welcome in rural Australia, either. We were regularly told by Aussie kids and adults to ‘go back to where we came from’ because ‘our kind’ were dirty and different. My sisters and I learned to stand up for ourselves – my older sister became quite adept at chasing down other kids and giving them a lesson in ‘Māori diplomacy’.
At the same time, my Mum worked hard to teach us Te Reo (the voice/the language) and started a Kapa Haka (Māori song/action) group. It was hard to relate to these things, though – there was no-one to talk Māori with, and my friends made fun of me whenever our Kapa Haka group performed our songs and haka (war dance) to the Australian public.
My happy place, though, was in Play and Gaming. PC & Console gaming was kinda developing, but tabletop was my jam. Roleplaying games like Dungeons and Dragons, Call of Cthulhu, Rolemaster and Traveller. Board Games like Risk, Battle of Five Armies, Axis and Allies. My little group of gaming geek friends started to move into making our own games as well – we wrote a battle game using our Transformer Toys, Autobots vs Decepticons, adapting the statlines that were on the back of the toy packaging.
I shifted my interests to miniature gaming – little armies of miniatures. The material craft of modelling and painting these miniatures attracted me! I painted Warhammer Fantasy (Khorne) and Warhammer 40K (Space Marines – Dark Angels) armies with a Māori theme, warriors with dark skin and Tā moko (traditional tattoos). My parents didn’t quite understand my interests. My mum, a Māori artist, could see the intricacy of what I was doing – so tried to shift me towards traditional practices like whakairo (carving) or Tā moko (tattooing). I tried some of these things, but it didn’t hold my interest – being able to play and game with my painted creations motivated me much more!
Into adulthood, my interests shifted once again into Historical gaming. I have entire armies of painted Early Imperial Romans, Peloponnesian Greek Hoplites, Dark Age Vikings, English Civil War Royalists. One might notice the Eurocentricity of these armies. Players are limited by what is made available in miniatures ranges, and the interests of other wargamers around them – which has, in the past, been focused on European wars and battles (and, sometimes, Feudal Japan).
When I became interested in wargaming in the World War Two Theatre, I saw an opportunity to build and paint a Māori force – particularly A Company (the Gumdiggers) in the 28th Māori Battalion. This Māori Battalion had seen action in Crete, Egypt (El Alamein), Tunisia and Italy (Monte Cassino) – and are proudly remembered for their courage and determination in battle. I had known that my uncle and namesake, Aramiha or ‘Mick’, had served in the Māori Battalion, but not much else – since he had died several years before I was born. As I built my wargaming army, I researched my namesake and learned that he had been captured in Greece and spent a lot of the War in PoW camps. I accessed his service records (a special service from NZ Defence for Māori descendants) and learned of where he trained, who he trained with, and his deployments. This became the basis for me to talk to my Aunties and Mum about my namesake – and I found out much more about him, how he fell in love with an Austrian girl while a PoW (she died from the late-war bombings), how he hated the War and never took part in any of the service ceremonies in the years afterwards, how important he was to the rest of the Family (which is why I was named after him). I felt that my gaming had brought him closer to me, and I realised the importance of Whānau/Family and my elders in accessing these memories of him.
A few years ago, Eureka Miniatures (https://www.eurekamin.com.au/) approached me for consultation on making a range of pre-colonial Māori figures for wargames. I was happy to give them advice on weapons and poses. We also decided to design a set of rules around pre-colonial warfare, where Māori fought against each other. I wanted to use this as an opportunity to share with Western wargamers the concept of military conflict and battle as a ritualised or cultural activity. It is not just about killing all of your enemy and capturing their land and people. Warfare can be about narrative, the deeds accomplished, the way in which combatants are remembered for their bravery and/or cunning. This is the way in which battles of the past were conveyed to me by my Mum and Dad or elders – not by who ‘won’ or ‘lost’ the battle, but who carried the most ‘mana’ (honour/social cache) from it. Mana, in itself, was a complex structure of expectations and interactions that I wanted to convey through play. The wargame I published (TRIBAL) became the vehicle for me to share these cultural concepts of Mana and Tikanga (protocols) associated with warfare to an audience of Western wargamers.
Reception to TRIBAL has been mostly positive – there are variations on settings, from renaissance street gangs to prehistoric clashes. There are now Italian and Russian translations of the rules. Western gamers would prefer to have colonial powers bringing their guns and cannons to bear in these battles. We have included colonial forces for players in subsequent editions of the rules, but they are still beholden to the concepts of Mana and narrative. Another reward from publishing a wargame with an indigenous focus has been finding other Indigenous wargamers around the globe (we are well hidden!) who share my enthusiasm – from the Ngai-Tahu Māori teenager who messaged me to thank me for the game, to the Fijian player who argues with me as to what Mana means in a Fijian context, to a Rapa Nui friend who outlined shared language (Te Reo) and cosmology and warfare with Māori, to the Chippewa-Lakota academic/wargamer who uses TRIBAL to play out skirmishes in French-Indian War campaigns. I’d like to collaborate more with fellow Indigenous creators for future releases – I’m currently working with a young Nga Puhi Māori animator for sculpting and graphic design on new ideas.
It’s kind of cool to see Westerners learn about my culture through playing a game with Indigenous underpinnings. I am sharing with them the ways of my people, and their way of looking at the World. Play and Games gives a permission to do that, to explore and share on a common ground of enjoyment and engagement.
It has also been a voyage of discovery for myself. Through making and playing my games I learned that Māori have long been playing Ngā taonga tākaro (traditional games) to facilitate Whānaungatanga – forming and maintaining relationships and strengthening ties between kin. Through play I was able to bind the threads of stories and memories and lessons from my Aunties, Uncles and Kaumatua (elders) – to learn important lessons of my namesake, Uncle Mick.
Through learning about sacred Māori protocols for warfare – karakia (prayers) and tapu (taboo) practices – I learn more about my ancestors and their connections to each other and their World. Through attending mau-rakau (traditional combat) classes, to learn more about pre-colonial combat, I re-connect with my community who are also learning.
I look forward to playing and making and sharing many more Games with others around the World. While doing this, I acknowledge that Games and Play, in many ways, has strengthened my own relationship to my Māori Culture and Heritage.
As the saying goes: Kia whakatōmuri te haere whakamua: ‘I walk backwards into the future with my eyes fixed on my past.’
Nga mihi, thanks.
ara