The kids of Moanataiari School are hoping to help their local community with the opening of their Pātaka Kai.
A Pātaka Kai is traditionally the name given to a storehouse or pantry in Māori.
There are various Pātaka Kai set up in neighbourhoods across the Thames, Coromandel and Hauraki districts – some run by individuals, and others located outside schools, businesses or community gardens. They are places for people to leave what they have spare – usually food or excess garden produce – and for those in need to take for free and without judgement.
The students of Moanataiari School have been working on their Pātaka Kai, a jaunty red shed by the school gate on Moanataiari St, since the beginning of the year.
“The year six children have worked on it all year on Mondays when the other kids in their class go to tech,” Claire Nankivell, the school’s garden and kitchen teacher, said.
“These guys have done heaps of work, not just preparing the Pātaka Kai, but making brochures to drop around the neighbourhood and designing the signs and what the rules of the Pātaka Kai should be.”
The school received funding from the 2023 round of Seagull Centre community grants to develop the Pātaka Kai. And the building which houses it is special too.
“We got super lucky and got the little first aid shed that they used when they were doing the road works on the Kōpū-Hikuai [Rd], and so now that’s the building that we have repurposed as the Pātaka Kai,” Claire said.
“It was painted red because it was the little first aid emergency station. [School principal] David said we should keep it that colour, to keep its origins.
“It’s like a beacon.”
