Good Morning Beautiful - (Mōrena Ātaahua)
Mōrena Ātaahua is Māori for good morning beautiful. New Zealand’s integration of the indigenous culture is inescapable when you visit this global treasure. Most names for towns, beaches and streets are much easier to pronounce once you learn their use of vowels. If you’re considering a trip to New Zealand, I highly recommend checking out New Zealand History in Bite-Sized Chunks.
“Out of nothingness emerged Ranginui and Papatuanuku, the sky father and the earth mother, locked together in a close embrace, two parts of one whole…”
On our last of three weekends visiting our NZ family in spring of 2022, I was treated to several early-morning, views that felt like my calling to return for longer visits in the future. This was my fourth trip to New Zealand, usually kept short for family functions - especially this one. I was there to support my family and memorialize the life of my father-in-law who passed during COVID. We had to wait for months of lock-down restrictions before the miraculous events that allowed us into the country in April 2021.
Grateful to even be there, my days were spent on lists of landscaping and other utilities that were challenging my mother-in-law. Emotions were raw and quiet/self-time was limited to a walk to the nearby Coffee Club.
My desire to rise before the sun for nature photography was the furthest thing from my mind. On our last weekend, my brother-in-law booked us an Air BnB on the east coast of the North Island. The beaches of Whangamata New Zealand are breathtaking on any day, but this particular sunrise meant much more to me. I rose at 4a to greet the sun with a camera between us, on a beach I had yet to even see.
I did no planning. I had no car. I knew where the sun had set so my brother’s friend Tony offered to drive me there. As I do on the Oregon edge of the Pacific, I greeted the ocean like my closest friend. “Good morning, beautiful!..” I’ve greeted many beautiful sunrises in my days, but few have made me feel like this one. A Knowing that Rangi & Papa were responding to my greeting.
There are few walls in my home, large enough for the number of images I would love to hang. Mōrena Ātaahua is the first image I see across from my bed each morning as a reminder of a journey filled with both miracles and invitations to return.
