Inside New Zealand's Lost Hippy Commune

[Music] to another community anymore things change I understand that that a certain related families will come and here again you know we want to live this kind of lifestyle it hasn't happened yet but you never know that guy's the one who builds down houses that's as far as you can see this Mahina pivoting you know right up to the top dear yes that's all my honey I don't say that my honor is about it I was you know leaving here is not easy well at the moment there's about 20 people that live here and I would say about 15 ages I've lived here proximately 35 years the peak of Mahana would have been about 20 years ago that's meant it was a thriving community everything was done voluntary people did everything on a voluntary basis and nobody was compelled to do anything and those days I was about but between 60 and 70 people lived here in that Haggai 27 children well that guy belong to a guy used to live in that house and when he left he lifts that gotta be hard but he's broken down you know mana status person festival in the nineteen seventies in Mombasa festival people put forward that to all problems in the world are caused by the ownership of land so the Mahana peopled of a deal that took part in that festival got induced by that and they decided to form a company to buy broccoli in Cedar City Lent free so that was not owned by anybody and anybody could come and live here they took out a mortgage and the mortgage was eventually paid off in the land is now what I call free halt an open community any person can be a member by signing the book agreed to these rules you don't have to pay a fee yeah there are hundreds of members of the manor society they're not necessarily live here but they agree with the rules and the object of the society of course over the years that philosophy is sort of been watered down by the ones who presently live here the rocks start at about twelve years ago people started drifting away and the ones that stayed here and I want to change the rules and have the land only foot themselves again which again as you can see that creates the problem they want to own in which there's you can come here [Music] this was a perfectly livable house and a lady with two children and her father they wanted to move in here in order to prevent us from moving in here that you dish to to that house because I meant the length of themselves there's actually dangerous now yeah but the people who did these they use all sorts of excuses they use the excuse that these house was a health hazard anybody one who did these live more than a kilometer away from here health hazard to whom this used to be a house restored to honey there's a concrete slab dear there used to be the kitchen he bend it down ready to eat he started a fire underneath under needed and and then walked away but you can say say the treasure a burnt he doesn't want anybody new to come to my Hannah so he bends down this is the old cook house that's we have used to have our communal meals and and better kits and everything it's a bit neglected at the moment but um but still it's still in use you know the cookers have used to be the sole of Mahana there was always people in the cook house there was always a pot to stay on the stove and there was always a cook you didn't have to cook that's not compulsory it was voluntary we had we had visitors from America here they found it incredible that that that that worked really fallen tree you know nobody else to that I remember sitting sitting here on the bench and I had what I call a religious experience I knew I had a raft at a place mirror I wanted to be the one but now been looking for all my life I was living in Wellington previously you live in a house in the street you're a sitting duck when you use marijuana the police used to come every year and raid me but eventually I thought well I don't want to work for society and I want to be part of society anymore and eventually I came to Mahana I didn't look for it consciously but subconsciously I never had found that I wanted this is where the kids used to measure how tall they are and the names are still on that you know it makes me want them back you know I would I'd love to have their whole other kids here again but the past is the past and can't bring it back you know you just have to look there was a future [Music] you can say this was ready to for somebody to move in here made a family and didn't happen and I don't know exactly but what the reason is somebody must have tried it but I came in there it wasn't locked it last time I was you know none man man man now see the dishes somebody's been doing their dumping here that's marking themselves and I also make money of it some of them could are enormous amounts it's one of the reasons they don't want people moving in because they're scared of their of their plots but deteriorated it even further here in the kids grew older the kids themselves didn't want to live at manna anymore because they were in thoughts about it though he suffered a mother unbilled after a long time we were hoping that we would get an influx of new ones but that hasn't happened and now they're trying to prevent it which is even worse [Music] usually I was driving to Diamond to go and see my green daughter and my name is Bruce Dodson originally Rose Moses and I'm a first granddaughter and I did graph Mahara um it was interesting it was good I think he learned like a value from people in relationships of people I think it's really sad with the residents there's a lot of angst and hate and yeah I'm not proud of it it's not my life I chose to live here in my own little world it's my grandfather and he's old and hopefully he's gonna move in here one day soon this is another reason of mahon I believe the others die Friskies is name we don't see eye to eye and lots of things but you can go and talk to him these guys are doing a documentary about my hand I wonder if you went out talk to them and tell them what do you think about Mahana yeah yeah yeah okay okay yeah what I'm David David Persky I love the freedom here I love I do enjoyed the isolation I enjoy the bush I enjoy not having neighboring houses that I can see for the last 15 years the place has been quite stable and the meetings have been well-behaved some of the ones who own houses up the top they grew up as children here now they've got their own children here they've built their own houses we've learned how to get along with each other we've tried to come up with a policy a number of years ago we've got a to sort of tear structure we have armed members who don't live here and then we have resident members Arthur's never liked wellhe's he'd like anyone to come in because at the moment someone can come down and we haven't met them and they can sign a book and they get a life membership and Mahana we had one example we had some people wanting to move in just before Christmas and Port Charles have been three houses burgled in a single night the property where these people were living a lot of the stolen stuff got found on their property we stopped these people moving in and we've been slammed for that there was a house deconstructed and because there was no policy to say no to certain people moving in it was seen as the only option to stop elements which we considered undesirable from moving in here and Arthur's got no children living here he's got no family here I've got the school-age child here Arthur doesn't seem to know anything about what a lot of us do he doesn't have much in the way of relationships with the other residents here so he's probably quite lonely the cookhouse doesn't operate anymore I mean people just didn't have the energy to put into it you know that they had their own families Dre's though building houses that just sort of died a natural death and there is a lot of and direction still among people but it's not done in one particular place and unless you've made friendships with those people you don't sort of have the interaction with them Arthur probably does miss there he hasn't really established relationships with a lot of us you know we don't want them growing their families [Music] that's not dismantling a disband ilysm dismantling is done systematically you take the roof down first they just saying that that's not an excuse at all there now right to demolish a house that belongs to Mahana that's not a community learning this is something I've never experienced in my life my own company is satisfactory and real lonely person is lonely in a crowd I don't need anybody [Music] you

Channel: VICE Asia

Views: 3,139,500

Rating: 4.8950877 out of 5

Keywords: vice, culture, wild, vice magazine, NEW ZEALAND, vice documentary, Cult, cults, community, utopian, 1970's, commune, Zealandia, MAhana, nambassa festival, best documentaries, New Zealand bush, New Zealand Documentary, Wild Wild Country, Osho, hippy, vice videos, vice guide, vice mag, documentary, lifestyle, independent, exclusive, underground, world, hippie, hippys

Id: sXDuZe2V7ks

Length: 13min 52sec (832 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 22 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/lightfeelings_]

Interesting to see how society sort of crept in and took a hold of the commune

[u/rondeline]

You stick 10 strangers in a room and within a few hours, there will be a natural social hierarchy.

It's an emergent characteristic of human beings.