Behind the Ka Mate haka
The Haka is known around the world but few know the origins of this iconic cultural war dance.
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Dinner Wednesday night: the guest of honour is a tall woman, very tall - 1.96 metres - elegant, sitting with her mother. She is the greatest woman team sports player Australia has produced and here she is modest, warm, approachable.
Lauren Jackson is the guest of honour, the woman who led Australia to the world championship of women's basketball in 2006 and to the Olympic final in 2000, 2004 and 2008. She also led her club team to the Women's National Basketball Association's championship - the world's top club championship - in 2004 and 2010. But on Wednesday night there are no cameras, no minders and no money involved. Jackson has agreed to become the patron of the NSW Rape Crisis Centre and is attending its annual general meeting and dinner. When she rises to speak she says: ''I hope I will be worthy of the role.''
She hopes her association can help raise awareness of the work the centre does. Last financial year, it had contact with 21,647 people concerned enough to call or email or visit. Surprisingly, only 31 per cent of calls were in response to sexual assault. Many more, 44 per cent, were about domestic violence.
Outdated? The All Blacks perform the haka against Australia last week. Photo: Getty Images
This is where Jackson can help: maintaining awareness. People will listen. The evidence is overwhelming that people who care about sport, especially people with tribal loyalties to teams, are not just indulging in bread and circuses. They are investing part of themselves in something larger than themselves.
The great mistake is to assume that the elegance of elite athletes in the field of competition indicates an elegance in the field of life. The opposite is often true, given the ruthless mental toughness required to succeed at elite sport. Three words, ''rugby league players'', summarise the argument.
Jackson is no shrinking violet on the court. Off the court, unlike many athletes, she is smart. She is studying for a degree in psychology and has supported several charities combating domestic violence. Becoming patron of the NSW Rape Crisis Centre continues a pattern.
Leader on and off the court ... Lauren Jackson. Photo: Getty Images
Of all the weeks to consider the deeper communal significance of sport and sporting figures, this is the one, because it is the week when an entire nation, our neighbour across the Tasman, has an immense emotional stake in the outcome of the Rugby World Cup final on Sunday.
Too much invested, in fact. Thankfully Australia's hopes and passions are spread across multiple sports. We have already moved on from the World Cup. New Zealand must live and die with its All Blacks.
The cumulative weight of the 24 years since the All Blacks won the World Cup for the first and only time has become a burden on the nation that can be lifted only when the All Blacks captain lifts the cup once more. Last weekend, you could feel the palpable tension in the crowd, even via TV, because of this cumulative burden.
Had the Wallabies won the game, and were now playing for a record third World Cup championship on Sunday, it would have caused a psychic scar across New Zealand. Not just a passing funk but a real resentment that would have lasted years.
When the All Blacks defeated Australia, they were clearly playing something that was more than a game. The ferocity of their forwards was desperate and disciplined.
Anything less than a New Zealand victory on Sunday will be an injustice. But I make one qualifying point about the important metaphors of sport. Just before kick-off the All Blacks will perform the greatest ritual in world sport, the haka. The team and its management might want to consider what exactly they are symbolising.
If some of the All Blacks persist in ending this latest version of the haka with a throat-slitting motion, they will be using a very big stage to remind people the Maoris once engaged in unspeakable conduct, which we don't discuss any more. I'll simply allude to this by quoting the journal of Captain James Cook: ''There was not a man aboard Endeavour who, in the event of the ship's breaking up, would not have preferred to drown rather than be left to the mercy of the Maoris.''
I expect the All Blacks will dominate Sunday's final but New Zealanders should remember two things: about 96 per cent of the world does not care about rugby; and the violence suggested by throat-slitting gestures has no place in sport or sportsmanship, especially in the national colours.
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