Before Xbox and iPads, we had mist, mud, and pinecones - and we waged battles worthy of any history book. From Māori trenches to rice-gun rebellions, here’s how a quiet New Zealand hill turned a bunch of wholesome Sunday School kids into “savages.”
I grew up in a small rural community in the hills of New Zealand, where the mist and ever-present wind pummeled our hilltop - and we loved every soggy second. We also loved the wars - the pinecone wars - that left us with bruises, bleeding heads, and glorious victory speeches.
Even now, decades later, my idea of a perfect day is a misty, drizzly one where I can take life off the hook, snuggle in, and allow my mind to drift back to those days, as kids, when we roamed the paddocks, built campfires, and fought epic battles.
Just above our home was a dairy farm with the perfect staging post for war. We called it Pine Cone Hill, and this was where we staged our greatest battles of all.
A stand of pines provided endless ammunition, and it sat on the site of an old Māori Pā. Long before the French perfected their 17th-century trench systems, the Māori had mastered the art - something we kids took full advantage of.
The old trenches were perfect. My older brother, always the military commander, would divide us into armies and assign the positions. We’d race about like worker ants, piling pinecones in our chosen trench. When the stockpile was high enough, my brother would raise a hankie on a stick and, like the man who starts the Grand Prix, drop it with a cry:
“Commence battle!”
It wasn’t quite WWI, but in our heads, it was. Think less bayonets, more pinecones - and the occasional ‘I’ll hold the ladder’ moment.
Pinecones flew. Banter followed. The trick was to keep your head down - without a helmet, you were a sitting duck.
One day, I popped up too slow and took a pinecone to the head. At seven or eight years old, the shame of letting down my fellow soldiers was worse than the sting of the wound.
The winner was always the side with ammo left. Once a side was out, my brother would hoist the hankie and bellow:
“All hail the victors!”
That day, my brothers helped me limp home while I worried about explaining the blood to Mum. We decided I’d “fallen and hit my head.” She didn’t need the full report ... history is full of cover-ups.
Mum dabbed on iodine, gave me a lecture about getting blood out of cotton, and we lived to fight another day.
Artist’s impression of me, aged seven, seconds before taking a pinecone to the skull.
As we got older, our arsenal grew more sophisticated - or so we thought.
When I turned ten, I got my first slug gun - what others call an air rifle or BB gun. By twelve you could get a .22. Birthdays marked serious milestones in our world: you could drive a tractor, own a gun, or both.
One morning, we gathered at a friend’s place. His mother was our Sunday School teacher, the church organist, and a woman convinced that all children should look like the Bible-illustration versions of themselves: rosy-cheeked, wholesome, gazing at Christ with awe.
We’d brought our slug guns for battle. Real pellets were out of the question:
-
They were dangerous.
-
They were expensive.
Rice grains, however, were perfect. They left a visible welt and cost nothing from a conveniently raided pantry.
The battle was in full swing when our friend’s mother came home early. The look on her face is burned into my memory. The Sunday School cherubs she thought she knew were, in her words,
“Nothing but a bunch of savages!”
The following Sunday we sat in class, scrubbed and saintly, while she played the organ.
While the minister thundered about sin and salvation, we were already mapping our next campaign. After all, misty, drizzly days weren’t for staying inside - they were for war.
As I sit here reflecting on this I think that it’s a reminder of how kids, left to their own devices, create their own myths and battles, no screens required. The misty hills and makeshift wars feel almost mythic themselves, like a Kiwi Lord of the Flies with less tragedy and more iodine.
Makes you wonder what today’s kids would do with a hill, some pinecones, and no Wi-Fi. Probably upload the evidence - and then get banned for ‘violent content’.
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