- Kay
Learning Te Reo
I want to learn te reo Māori. Have for a long time, so thought if I learn just two Maori words a day (hoping some days I will learn more), then after 5 months or about 150 days, I will be well on my way with a basic vocabulary of 300 words.
I have recently taken some te reo classes with the lovely Ani on a night course, so now have a few of the basics in sentence structure.
To keep me honest I will post my words of the day or week. It may be place names and knowing their meaning could be a way to learn new words and some NZ history. For example Kaikoura: Kai means food/eat and Koura is crayfish. The literal translation is “to eat crayfish”.
I am getting the translations from a te reo Māori app by AUT university. It also provides the pronounciation.
My first week of words are:
Cape Rēinga / Te Rerenga Wairua
Rerenga: (noun) 1. Place or time of leaping, running, fleeing, withdrawl; 2. voyage, journey; 3. flowing; 4. setting, rising (of the sun); 5. fugitive, survivor.
Wairua: (noun) spirit, soul - spirit of a person which exists beyond death.
Wai: (personal pronoun) who? whom?
(noun) stream, creek, river
Rua: (noun) 1. hole, pit, grave, mine;2. abyss - place where heavenly bodies disappear before reappearing
(numerial) two
Rēinga: (noun) place of leaping, leap, departing place of spirits
Maunganui [Bluff]:
Maunga: Mountain, mount, peak
Nui: (noun) size, quantity, vastness, greatness, importance, abundance
Hukatere [Lodge]
Huka: (noun) snow, foam, froth
Tere: (verb) 1. to be quick, swift, fast; 2. to float, drift, swim, flow, glide
Waipapakauri [Holiday Park]
Wai: (personal pronoun) who? whom?
(noun) stream, creek, river
Papa: (noun) 1. box, chest; 2. buttock, flank; 3. victim, sacrifice
Kauri: The name of the largest trees in NZ
Aupōuri [Forest]: the most northern tribal group of the area north of Kaitaia.
Kaitaia: Literal translation: food in abundance
Kai:Prefix added to verbs to express some kind a action to form nouns denoting a human agent. eg Kaikōrero - speaker, kaimahi - worker.
(noun) food, meal

kōrero: (verb) to tell, say, speak, read, talk
Mahi: (verb) to work, do, perform, make