Terewai Rikihana
Social Support Team Lead

How do you identify yourself?
Wahine Maori no Ngati Raukawa, Ngati Toarangatira, Te Ati Awa, Ngati Ruanui.

What is a fun fact about you?
My entire schooling growing up was done through total immersion Maori education.

If you had to introduce yourself in one paragraph, what would you say?
Otaki is my home and I am the eldest of 4 children (I have one sister and two brothers).  When I was about 15/16 years old I was fortunate enough to join a rangatahi roopu based within my iwi runanga that was all about doing things for rangatahi, by rangatahi. This ignited my passion for working alongside young people.  When I finished wharekura, I enrolled at Massey University in Palmerston North and graduated with a Bachelor of Social Work.  Since then I have had the privilege of working for my Iwi as a Family Start worker for almost two years and for the past 6 years have been working here at Evolve as a Youth Worker, Kaitautoko-i-te-Ora and currently the Social Support Team Leader.

What is your star sign?
Sagittarius.

What is your favorite food?
Loving Vietnamese kai right now.

Who is your celebrity crush?
Daveed Diggs.

If you weren’t in your current role, what would you be?
There’s a video of me as a 5 year old telling everyone that all I want to be when I grow up is a shop keeper that makes the ‘beep beep’ noise when scanning the items at the checkout. This probably explains why I love the ‘self-checkout’ option at the supermarket.

What were you like at school?
My school friends would probably say I was the teachers pet/nerd of the class and I’m not going to deny it. #proudnerd

What’s your karaoke song?
Anything that involves singing with a group- ‘We are the World’ is a fun waiata to sing with a group.

What’s something you’ve always wanted to learn?
I’ve always wanted to learn to read music and play the piano- I am about 20% towards achieving this goal lol.

What’s something that really annoys you?
Many things lol Lately I’ve discovered that I get quite annoyed when people don’t mute themselves during Zoom meetings if they’re not talking.

Do you have a treasured possession?
I have a little old brown teddy bear that I’ve kept since I was born, his name is Paki lol.