Māori canoe builder and much-loved chief to be knighted tomorrow

Busby is responsible for reviving long haul voyaging in the 1990s.

One of the north’s most loved chiefs will be knighted at Waitangi tomorrow.

Hekenukumai Busby, 86, a former bridge builder taught himself to carve waka hourua or voyaging canoes after a visit from a Hawaiian crew to Waitangi in 1985.

That visit making another knight cry – Busby told 1News he was deeply affected hearing Sir James Henare welcome the Hōkūle’a.

When Sir James died Busby made a promise to use his engineering skills to carve double-hulls, going into the forest the day after the tangi and cutting kauri for his first canoe, named Te Aurere.

When it sailed on its maiden to Rarotonga and was welcomed by the PM, there was a feeling of following in footsteps of his ancestors – and vindication that Maori just hadn’t washed up in New Zealand.

“You know I was so glad that they put all the greenery around me because you couldn’t see my face – tears were just running down my face I just couldn’t help myself.”

What has followed has been thirty years of building and teaching kids to sail. He clearly loves young ones and can chuckle at them.

“I tell you what, some of them when a storm comes you notice they come hanging around like I’m on land.”

He’s sailed all corners of the Polynesian Triangle, in that time re-forging cultural connections.

One mate told him when he came back from his first trip that it was the longest bridge he’d ever built.

The ocean a place he now considers home.

Affectionately known as Hek, the tomorrow’s formalities will start down at the point where Ngātokimatawhaorua, the country’s largest waka is stored.

He is bemused by the knighthood and says that it should help with funding applications to finish off a few building projects he’s got lying around his Doubtless Bay home.

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