Rata

He was living in Pare-Arue at that time. It is said that, in search of his parents kidnapped by Matututa'ota'o, the monstrous 'otuu-heron of King Puna of Mangareva, his grandmother, a bit of a magician, asked him to go build his canoe.

With the magic ax 'Ui'ura 'that must be rubbed on the back of the grandmother to sharpen it, he went into the forest to find his tree, found it and felled it. Once the tree fell, he began to cut the branches and remove the bark. He was ready to be gutted, a task he put off until the next day.

What a surprise when he returned in the morning: the tree was standing, intact.

Suspecting some stratagem of the spirits of the forest, he felled the tree again and pretended to go away. He came to hide in a bush and observed the scene. The tuputupua, spirits of the forest, led by their chief craftsman Toahiti, had gathered around the fallen tree, and danced while singing a magic incantation:

– “You the branches join the trunk”. And the branches obeyed.
– “Aqueous sap of my tree, come gently, come with rage! Sticky eraser come, train, train the tree! You, the tree, stand up, let the tree stand up”.

And the tree straightened up with all the gods in the branches.

Rata had not respected the procedure by ignoring the Mana of the forests, the spirits came to restore order. The story ends well however for Rata since he will make himself known to the spirits of the forest who will then become his friends and traveling companions. They will even participate in the construction of his canoe.

Yet Rata, decidedly very distracted, will forget to respect the faaimuraa vaa ceremony, the one where the canoe is made to drink. A baptism of sorts. And he will see his canoe sink like a stone canoe. Fortunately, the grandmother will come to the rescue and Rata will finally be able to go in search of her parents.