Many Indians throughout the world have their own sacred places and customs. For the Maori, Lake Wakatipu in New Zealand, was considered sacred hundreds of years ago.
This myth was told to me by an old man, who was our guide, when we went to visit this lake.
New Zealand is located in the Southern Hemisphere off the eastern coast of Australia. It is a small country and consists of two main islands, Northern Island and Southern Island. Many years ago, the Maori, the original inhabitants of New Zealand, traveled there by canoes all the way from other pacific islands.
The Maori lived in villages that were generally guarded by a fort. The people were divided into several iwi, tribes. They believed in a number of Gods including Tane-mahuta, lord of the forest, and Tangaroa, a Polynesian ocean God. These people had dark skin, and they were very respectful of all of nature’s fruits, and with each other.
On Southern Island, where this story took place many years ago, many strange things happened. Lake Wakatipu was, and is, a beautiful place. The Maoris considered it sacred and didn’t let people swim in it. I could see the reflection of the sun shining in the lake. Also I could see the beautiful trees that surrounded it and animals running around it.
In New Zealand the Maoris suffered very much because pirates came and ruined everything, they even took their wives. The Maoris tried to defend themselves with a bow and arrows but couldn’t. Many years passed and they didn’t know what to do so the chief to the village decided that the only thing that they could do was pray to the god, Tangaroa, the God of the sea, to protect them. Every night the Maoris gathered in a circle around a big fire and prayed and sang to the Gods to give them a little help on how to get rid of the pirates. The god gathered the pirates and warned them to stop going to New Zealand to disturb the Maoris, but they didn’t care, and continued going to the island and burning their villages and taking their women.
Because of this, the God got angrier and decided to take charge of the situation by giving the Maoris ideas on how to catch the Captain Jerome Cathbury, who was the leader. By doing this they would get rid of all of the others because they would chicken-out. Captain Jerome Cathbury was a very fat man; he had a long white beard and mustache. He was very greedy and evil. When he went to capture the Maoris he did things that are inconceivable; he treated them like animals. He tied the men to the trees or poles and he buried the little children in underground dark rooms.
After about two weeks the pirates came back and tried to burn down the villages, but a terrible storm stopped the flames and the pirates stay in the island until it stopped. But what they didn’t know was that the Maoris had everything planned. They would sneak up, and capture the Captain. So the did, they did everything as they had planned. When he was sleeping, they sneak up and with some fishing nets they captured him. Then they hanged him above Lake Wakatipu. When the rest of the pirates saw this they gathered everything and left, and never came back. But that was not the end of the Captain of the pirates, because it seems like he had unfinished business here on earth, so he came back and started scaring the Maoris. The god, very angry because of this behavior, decided to turn him into a big, hideous monster in the bottom of the lake. The captain cried a lot and he begged to the god and the Maoris to forgive him, but they didn’t, so every time this big monster cried and sobbed the level of the water rose and lowered.
To this day it still does, and scientists are amazed and so are the tourists that visit the lake. What they don’t want to believe is that what makes the water level rise and lower is really Captain Jerome Cathbury crying and begging to the god Tangaroa and the Maoris to forgive him.
Submit Your Review for Lake Wakatipu
Required fields are marked with (*). Your e-mail address will not be displayed.