Nikki

“Sonia, shy by nature, had been quite aware of her own social vulnerability; she knew that anyone could insult her and get away with it. And yet until that very moment she had thought she might somehow avoid trouble by being careful and meek and humble to everybody. Her disillusionment was more than she could bear.”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment

“They had once dug the earth for yams and planted seeds and prayed for rain. Now they dug for life and planted the dead and prayed for the end.”
― Shankari Chandran, Song of the Sun God

“After tea [Nanny Ripeka] began to tell me the old photographs, which I already knew, fading on every wall. Tell me who they were and what they were to me. Then she told me of the ones before that, who were not on the walls but whom she had known. Then back before that to the ones she had never known or seen. And her voice that had been slow at the beginning and thoughtful began to chant out the ancient names coming from far back, so I could know them. I was beginning to know them because I had heard them many times before. Beginning to know, yet knowing there was more to understand.”
― Patricia Grace, Mutuwhenua : the moon sleeps

“You didn't change, Amma, you've never had to. If we let this tradition go, what's next? We do these traditions to remind ourselves - to remind the children - who they are and where they've come from.”
― Shankari Chandran, Song of the Sun God