Before I start I would like to talk about Matariki. Matariki is a cluster of stars that you can see rising in late May or early June. The Maori call these seven stars Matariki. The English call them the Pleiades. For Maori, Matariki is the celebration of the New Year and the cycle of life and death. Some of us might think that it is weird because we celebrate New Year on January the 1st, but really it does not matter which day you choose as the first day of the New Year.
The celebration of Matariki died out in the 1940s but since the 2000s it has become popular again!
If you look directly at the Matariki star cluster you can only see six or seven stars, but if you look at it with the corner of your eye you see lots more stars twinkling! That's because the outside of our eyes is more sensitive to light than the center of our eyes.
There are lots of legends of Matariki, but the one I found most interesting was the story of a boy's parents who decided to separate. When the boy found out his parents were separated the god of wind called Tawhirimatea tore out his eyes and threw them into the sky to make Matariki!
Matariki is 440 light-years away. A light year is a distance that light travels in 365.25 days, so that is a long, long way because light travels at 299,792 km per the second! The distance from the Earth to the Sun is 93 million km. If that was only 25mm then the distance to Matariki would 708km.
Now to begin with my topic.
I have learned many great lessons this past year, but that's not surprising because I have had some great teachers and friends and family to learn from! one big lesson I learned is not to let your doubts and fears stop you from doing things. In term 4 last year my friend and I had to sing California Dreamin' in front of our own in front of our school! as the day got closer I was freaking out and was thinking up excuses to pull out. But I didn't and as soon as we stood up in front of the school I suddenly really confident and we sang really well. So the lesson I learned there was don't let fear hold you back.
Another lesson I learned was not to do one-handed push-ups on a soccer ball by a muddy puddle. I tried, and two minutes later my mum was putting my clothes in the washing machine and I was in the shower washing mankey water out of my hair!
I have had lots of successes this year, like learning to build a huge chook house and pour concrete, getting into rep soccer, playing hockey and enjoying it, being a school captain, and lots of other things.
On the family side, the best news is that no one died or got really sick! My cousin Hayley broke her foot badly, but she's coming right which is good. My cousins Matt and Emma had a baby boy, and my whole family went to the North Island for a big family Christmas which was really nice.
So the last 12 months have been really good for me, even with the COVID-19 lockdown.
Wow Mark, you have written this such pride and enthusiasm, fantastic job! I really like how you shared some facts about what Matariki and how people celebrate it. I love your reflection about the past 12 months, sharing what you are grateful for and the challenges you have faced. I wonder what the next 12 months have installed for you?! Maybe you could add an image of the Matariki cluster so that others can visually see what they are look for in the night sky.
ReplyDeleteMrs Read