Elzora Martin - New Zealand
"Māori originally came from Polynesia, and, as I say, they had no hint of trouble with the government. And, we luckily made friends with them, and luckily they were very kind to us. And as I say, they went out of their way to invite us to go with them and things like that. So, I think we had a wonderful trip to New Zealand."
Elzora Martin - Māori Friend
"A little later on, there was a Mauri lady who was making corn in some sofa springs. And, I decided I would go up and try this word. I figured it was a fifty fifty chance. She was a lady and I was a lady and if we had to fight it out, we could. But, she was very nice and she said oh, you’re a friend! Which surprised me because Mauris don’t accept people…white people as friends. So, all of a sudden she gave me the corn, we tried that. And, then we joined a group that was going where they did dances and things for the tourists. And when that was over, I was very surprised when about four or five Mauris come running over to me to hug me . The lady who was getting me the corn saw that I was there and she told them. So we, I had a little group of Mauris around me."
Elzora Martin - Meeting Māori
"When we go around a place, we always tried to read up about the peoples there. We also try to do some of our traveling around by bus to meet these people. We learned that the natives there were called Māori.
The Māori were not liked by the New Zealand government and they really and truly treated them abominably. My husband and I got on the bus. There were two sections and my husband had one seat in one section and I had another seat in another section. And, I happened to look at the man beside me. He looked very odd and I thought, “I bet he’s a Māori.” My husband is signaling me like mad to shut up. But, instead Elzora turns and very politely said, “I beg your pardon, but are you a Māori?” He looked at me kind of odd. And, my husband and I thought he was going to attack me right away because they can do that if they want to.
So, finally he said to me” give me a paper.” And, I gave him a sheet of paper and he wrote a word down and made me repeat it three or four times. And, he said, “if you meet a Māorii, say this word.""
Elzora Martin- Antarctica
"My husband and I retired and we moved to Carlsbad for our retirement home. We belonged to a special senior citizens group down there. We invited guests from all over the world to come and talk to us and invited them to supper and so forth.
This man came from Antarctica to talk about Antarctica. When he was finished, my husband and I went to talk to him about it. He invited us to go down to Antarctica, which we did do eventually, and visit. He was a Quartermaster in the Navy.
While we were making these arrangements he told us we had to go to New Zealand—to Christ Church—where we would get transportation to fly out of New Zealand to Antarctica and also they would supply us with some clothing that we might need if we traveled around the different areas of Antarctica.
So, we made arrangements to go to New Zealand and then decided that instead of just spending that little time there we would spend three weeks."
Elzora Martin - Tasmania
"I was invited to go to Tasmania with them. My husband and I were invited to go to Tasmania in a long boat and we were taking behind us a flat boat full of raw meat and meats of all kinds. These were going to the Tasmanian devils and the Tasmanian tigers, which were becoming extinct and their forest rangers were trying to raise them up again so to fill in but it never worked. They all died out eventually.
So, my husband and I were in a long boat. A long boat is an open canoe with about five men in a row. It has a wide seat and that seat, as long as you are on the long boat, is your home. If you want to go to the toilet, you have to go over the side of the boat. If you want to go to sleep, you pull up a blanket and curl up on the side of the seat.
We travelled that way for two days; from New Zealand to Tasmania. We saw the animals, we saw them being fed. We saw then being raised. Then we turned around and they gave that food that they brought for those animals. Then we turned around and came back again, also in a long boat. And, we were very very good friends with these Mauris."