2024 writing competition winners:
Rangatahi category
Winner
the shrug
The shrug. It’s there. It’s waiting. Stay away. I’m wasting time, and I’ll get mad if you question me. Mad if you watch. Mad if you point out my horrible procrastination. Or that horrible shrug I know so well. It’s like a crawling curse of a spider, scratching its way up my back and through my shoulders, lifting them up, up into a defeatist sign of confusion.
“Do you know what to do?” Shrug.
“You should probably get some work done.” Shrug. “
What do you think about this?” Shrug.
“Want to hang out?” Shrug. SHRUG. SHRUG!!
Things used to be so simple; she used to be so perfect. She loved working, and experiencing, and exploring. She was full of life. She strived for excellence. She strived to spend time with those she loved. When she was confused, she ventured out for the answer. But then that inquisitive spark dimmed out, the adventurous energy depleted, and the rise of the beasts took over. After this, nothing was ever the same; that girl I used to be was gone. Now she was tired all the time, work was draining, exploring was a waste, and life was boring. Time ticked like she or I had seconds to waste.
And all of this because I caught the disease of the S.H.R.U.G.
S for stressing about school and people and interactions and life.
H for hoping you can change
R for relying on yourself only to be let down
U for underwhelming times of happiness and,
G for giving up and giving in.
I can’t control it; I promise I’ve tried. I don’t want it. I certainly don’t need it. Don’t look at me and think I want this confusion, this cluelessness. I can’t admit that to myself. I hate that it’s never a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ but always an ‘I don’t know’ accompanied by the rise and fall of the mountains. I try to stop them from taking control. But I can’t. But I won’t. As it is always easier to stay in confusion, no matter how much you fight. To let the shoulders take over, to let the confusion linger. Because then you can just coast; use none of that tiring effort. You just exist. You’re just there.
Yet still you wish the pain of resilience could overcome the pain of regret. But it doesn’t, and yet again you’re left with the pain of procrastination.
You’re left with the shrug.
Copyright © 2024 Mikayla Botting
Mikayla Botting is currently in Year 11 at Mount Aspiring College and loves learning and writing and extending her skills. Creative writing is a passion, alongside reading, drama, maths and hockey.
Second
After this, nothing was ever the same – A change
The white man with his hunting dogs disappeared into the green hills. The hills looked like the apotheosis of all hills, with the brightest green color flooded with blobs of white from the herds of sheep, and there I was tired from my 24-hour journey from ‘home’. Don’t know if I can call that place home anymore knowing that it will only ever bring out the well-embedded guilt of being able to leave it once and come here but I don’t think I call New Zealand home either.
It doesn’t even feel reviving or exhilarating anymore standing in this open abyss of beautiful grounds rather I feel worried thinking if I will ever be able to perceive this place beyond its beauty. After all, home is one place that doesn’t need to be pretty.
Four walls, the odious ringtone on my mum’s phone, and the smell of my brother’s sweaty socks that I have only ever been so familiar with don’t seem to provide much comfort like home either. Sometimes it’s the sound of an overplayed TikTok that provides much scope for the imagination or the one of a tolerable podcast that plays in the background of my somber bedroom and saves me from my desolation, creating a half-good escape that honestly a home would do better. But anything except drowning in my thoughts. Don’t get it wrong with depression or anxiety or even grief, it’s the feeling of starting again with nothing.
“Every home must have been a house once” says everyone but I am not sure if I will ever be able to call anyplace home anymore. Unlike my parents, I haven’t lived most of my life, my cheeks still plump, my nails still soft, and my voice still of a girl. I can still be broken down, blended, and mended in all the places I visit. Parts of each place are interspersed into my skin delineating my immigrant journey, as if renovating my roots along with my sense of belonging. So if it’s supposed to become my home then why do I feel so uprooted?
Then a friend said it, ‘ Maybe it isn’t?’. I think so too. A change is what it is. A change that people crave yet I may never have a dearth of, with the nature of my immigrant life. Changes that will always alter the course of what I may acquire and will be. But then is my life too disturbing to ever have a home? People have homes on boats, cars and vans, what about me?Or will my life just move through places with no place to settle and collect it? I think that is exactly what it will be, too free of a life to fit in. I will move and move till the day I find comfort in remaining, which will never be. Since I am already there, I remain at peace with myself and my
ever-rewarding journeys. I may never have a home but I will have the curse – the fortunate curse of an immigrant child of never belonging to a place or a house, but the journey I cover throughout. A curse that allows me to never fit in one place yet so many places at one time. A curse that may follow all my whereabouts but not me.
Copyright © 2024 Avni Batra
Avni Batra, a student of Caitlins Area School, migrated from India to NZ around the end of 2022 and says “nothing has ever been the same. This piece reflects on my journey of not only accepting this change but embracing it.”
Third
The Burden of a Māori Kid
I recall having last sight of him: sitting silent, grey in the vanishing light of day, upon his whare paepae, a sombre greyness upon his worn face, a tama Maori-clad rakau, his wairua worn by the cruel facts of poverty and illness. The sound of his whānau’s māte and the chill of the cold, damp house seemed to hang in the stillness of the evening-a haunting reminder of the struggles they faced.
“You are not going to believe this, but.” he started off, his words full of aroha and resilience. He shared the daily battles-the pōuri that gnawed at his puku, the pō that echoed through the night as his loved ones coughed and wheezed, the struggle for aroha and whakapapa in a world that often seemed to ignore their pain. His words brought into sharp view an imagery of life unvarnished by the elements of hardship, of a young spirit grappling with battles well beyond his age.
As I sat next to him, wrapped in the weight of his story, I couldn’t help but mihi to his strength. How many times had I walked past similar scenes, oblivious to the struggles of those around me? How often had I taken for granted the simple comforts and security that he longed for? His eyes met mine-a silent challenge, a plea to understand and empathize in a world that could be so illserving.
All I could do was offer him a small koha, a gesture of aroha that seemed so futile in the light of his struggles. Yet, in the nod of his head, the grateful look on his face-something flickered in his eyes, a light that would not be doused. In that instant, I knew his taumaha was not his alone to bear, taumaha by all who had witnessed his story.
As the resonance of his words continued to echo in my mind, the strength of his resilience and the depth of his struggles continued to reverberate within me. That notion of kotahitanga-the Maori concept for unity and togetherness-carried so much more depth now, pressing upon me the need to reflect on the connectedness of our shared humanity.
His story was, therefore, a sad reminder that burdens of poverty and ill health are communal and collective problems that require shared responses and care. He called upon all of us to stand in solidarity, to lift up those carrying the heaviest loads, and to work toward a more just and equitable society for all.
And so I left that place with the picture of this young Maori boy and his indomitable spirit in my heart, never to be forgotten; a memory of what resilience and strength in the face of adversity can be. His was one of those stories which went on to become a call to action, beacons of hope in the often dark times that reminded me to be that agent of change, to be a voice of the many untold stories.
And with that, as the sun began to set into the horizon, casting its gold over the landscape, I made a silent vow to carry his story with me, use it as my guide through actions and decisions, and be inspired to bring positive change to a world in desperate need of it.
Glossary of Maori Words:
- Paepae – doorstep or threshold
- Whare – house
- Tama – boy
- Rākau – tattered or worn-out
- Wairua – spirit or essence
- Whānau – family
- Mate – sickness or illness
- Pōuri – hunger
- Puku – stomach
- Pō – night
- Aroha – love, compassion, empathy
- Whakapapa – ancestry, lineage, connections
- Mihi – acknowledge, respect
- Koha – gift or offering
- Taumaha – burden or weight
- Kotahitanga – unity, togetherness
- Hapū – sub-tribe or clan
- Tangata whenua – people of the land, indigenous people
- Kaitiakitanga – guardianship, stewardship, conservation
Copyright © 2024 Rereata Waihirere
As an aspiring writer from Aparima College in Year 12, Rereata Waihirere is known for an outgoing personality and passion for sports, saying “I am driven by a desire to make a difference and advocate for positive change in the world.”
