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 |  is paved with good intentions... |
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** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Hi, I'm Elle. I'm based in Auckland, New Zealand. I'm the mother of two young adults, the wife of an entrepreneurial gamer and the Queen of Unfinished Projects. This blog will contain poems, short stories, possibly photos and book reviews if you're lucky, and my thoughts on a variety of topics. Hope you enjoy it. |
 I finally managed to buy a block of this chocolate. It's very controversial at the moment, so of course it sold out pretty quickly. Whittakers are a New Zealand company and their standard chocolate wrappers are printed in English. However, for the last three years, Whittakers have produced a limited edition version of the milk chocolate with a Maori language wrapper specifically for Maori Language Week. In actual fact, if you look closely, it's a bilingual wrapper. Previously, this limited edition version has been only available to a few lucky consumers through social media, but this year they decided to put it on the supermarket shelves for all consumers to buy. Cameron Slater, who is a well known far-right blogger tweeted 'Go woke, go broke' in response to the new release. Of course, a lot of the people who follow Cameron Slater are of a similar mindset to him (you have to be a certain kind of person to follow him, after all) and they agreed that they were not inclined to buy Whittakers chocolate if they were going to be marketed in Maori. However, there has been an uprising of people who strongly disagree with Cameron Slater, and who have vowed to buy MORE chocolate a) just to spite Cameron Slater, and b) to support Whittakers and their support of the Maori language. I don't have strong passionate feelings on the subject, honestly. Maori is one of our national languages. I think that, provided the use of Maori language does not discriminate against the vast majority of New Zealanders (most of whom don't speak Maori), then it is fine to use it. And by that I mean that if you communicate a message in a language that the vast majority of people don't understand, you haven't, in fact, communicated that message at all. During lockdown, we got regular (daily) updates from the Minister of Health, Dr Ashley Bloomfield. He did not deliver these important announcements in Maori. The announcements were too critical for that. They were delivered in English and sign language, so that the message was communicated to as many people as possible. However, Dr Bloomfield did use a sprinkling of Maori words where they would not confuse the message. For instance, he often replaced the word 'work' (as in hard work) with the word 'mahi'. If someone didn't quite catch the entire meaning of the sentence, which might something like, 'We appreciate all the hard mahi that you've all put in over the past months', it didn't matter too much. The critical safety messages were still clear, and over time, we all became accustomed to the use of the word mahi to replace work. There were a few of these that he used. So I'm in camp 'by all means use it, so long as the message is still clear to those who don't speak Maori'. And by getting us used to a word at a time, we learn and we grow. Virtually all New Zealanders have a few Maori words we can use with confidence. Whanau (family) and kai (food) are two of the most common after haere mai (welcome) and kia ora (hello). If I used any of those, most New Zealanders (except possibly new immigrants) would understand me. And because I attended primary school in New Zealand, I know more than some others might. So I come back to this issue of the chocolate bar. One of my colleagues said to me 'How am I supposed to know what it is if the label is all in Maori?' Well, for starters, it looks like a block of chocolate on the same shelf as all the other blocks of chocolate.  Secondly, it's a very recognisable label. Thirdly, miraka kirimi is not that bloody hard to differentiate from creamy milk, especially when you say it aloud. And thirdly and least importantly, it's a limited edition which means it's not here for forever, it's just to celebrate one specific week of the year. If you don't want to buy that particular packaging, then don't. But if you usually buy it, you could easily pick it up and put it in your basket without even noticing the change because the packaging is so recognisable. And if all that fails, for fucks sake, it's a bilingual bloody wrapper! Just read the damn thing!So my purchase was a little bit defiance against the ridiculousness of Cameron Slater and his cronies, because seriously, why are you so threatened by this? They're not going to change the packaging of every product in the supermarket so that 90% of New Zealanders have trouble buying groceries for gods sake. And it was a little bit in support of Whittakers, because I think it is important to support the use of the Maori language, provided that we do so in a way that doesn't exclude those who don't speak it. And mostly it was because I'm a sucker for anything limited edition. And maybe, just a teeny tiny bit, it was an excuse to buy my favourite chocolate.  |
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