My Rakino, wow. Where to start? At the beginning seems as good a place as any. Prior to moving to Rakino I had spent a couple of years reinventing my life as I was very unhappy. With support of family I stopped doing things in my life that were excruciatingly tedious and started to become quite selfish for myself. I’d been through an amicable relationship breakup and was looking for a shelter in the Auckland region. Being quite a cheapskate and not a man who has been successful financially I looked up “Cheapest options” on trademe and a beachfront property was available for $80/week in an Auckland suburb called Rakino. I’ve always been a water baby so my curiosity was piqued. A conversation with a landlord had me heading out to sea. The place was elegant in its simplicity and I refer to it as a plywood box on stilts. It sat beneath an ancient pohutukawa and looked out West to the enchanting Woody bay. The long drop toilet was an ex red phone booth which I affectionately named the “Turdis”. Rakino felt to me as a place to heal and have time to delight in the little things.
One could be sold on the exquisite natural beauty but there was more. The community embraced me and rolled out the red carpet. I grew up in a farming community with much neighborly love and this was something I’d missed along the way making tribes of similar and like minded people in large urban centers. Their pace of living was on my frequency and like myself Rakinoites cherished liberty and an absence of rules. The only real rule in the community I could discern was don’t be an asshole. In a small community if one is a prick the voodoo comes back real quick. I knew I was in love with this place and people immediately. People say the locals are crazy, eccentric or like characters from “Twin Peaks”. To me this is ignorance borne of an insecurity in others expressing their natural joy, delight, playfulness and freedom. People sometimes think we are hermetic folk and it’s true we value our own space. One of the phrases used when one doesn’t want humans about is, “I’m caving”. This is a particularly polite way of saying, I love ya but f**k off. We are also very social and create very festive events, share bathwater, have morning cuppas before our various toils, and “sundowners” which is taking a few magic potions and having a laugh, dance and song as the sun treats us to a mystical beauty over and over again.
Rakino has made me strong which has empowered me to pursue and realise dreams and for a change, be there for others as they go through their own struggles. We work hard on Rakino to keep the peace and yes it’s not always harmony in the community. These tiffs between each other are known as the “Gulf Wars”. Mostly they are resolved and usually with friends making sure we can see the others perspective. We don’t all necessarily enjoy each others company but when one needs help from trivial to desperate, it’s always there. I’ve lived in communities where fear and mistrust dominates. It’s awful and our community is vigilant in combating crime and less serious frictions. This creates a secure environment for our community to not have to waste energy on defences. I am hopeful that in our little puddle perhaps this will seep into mainstream New Zealand because, it works.
Dylan Hinchey
