Northland Tarara reconnecting with roots on Croatia rugby trip

The descendants of some of Northland's earliest European settlers are using rugby to reconnect with family left behind more than a century ago.

Every member of the Northland Tarara team travelling to Croatia next week is descended from Dalmatian settlers who came to the Far North in the late 1800s.

At that time Dalmatia was an impoverished corner of the Austrian Empire; later it became part of Yugoslavia, and in the 1990s, part of newly independent Croatia.

More than a century later, Dalmatians are well integrated into New Zealand society but retain a strong cultural identity.

They are visible in the distinctive surnames that fill Far North phone books, street and winery names, and signs on the outskirts of Kaitāia greeting visitors with the Croatian words for welcome, Dobro došli.

For team captain Nick Jurlina, a farmer from Karikari Peninsula, it will be the first time he sets foot in the land of his ancestors.

"I've never been to Europe before, I've never been to Croatia. So I'm really looking forward to seeing where we really came from."

Prop Nathan Edwards, a carpenter from Ahipara, is keen to explore his Māori-Dalmatian heritage and rekindle century-old family ties.

"I'm really excited to find out a lot more about where I come from. I've made contact with family over there, I've had a lot of other family members go to Croatia and meet them, so they've connected the dots for me. I'm looking forward to catching up with them."

Coach Dave Jurlina has dreamed of organising a tour for more than a decade.

It will be his fifth time in Croatia, but he says many of the younger players would otherwise never get a chance to see where their ancestors were born.

"For quite a few, this is going to be an opportunity of a lifetime. We really want them to realise where they come from, what their villages were like, and to know where their grandparents lived, all that sort of stuff."

Dave Jurlina says Kiwi-Croatian teams toured Yugoslavia from the 1970s until 1990, when the civil war put an end to sporting and family visits.

Now, he says it is time to renew those sporting bonds - but this time it will be an exclusively Northland team heading to Croatia.

The 24-strong team will be joined by more than 30 supporters on the two-week, four-match tour.

The schedule includes a much-anticipated clash with the Croatian national team in Sinj, near the coastal city of Split.

Dave Jurlina expects the teams will be well matched.

"One thing that the Croatians don't lack is heart and commitment. They just go hard out, but structurally, compared to our sort of rugby, it doesn't come natural to them. So, I think it'll be genuinely a good game. They should have the better of us but it's really hard to say."

Dave Jurlina says it is also a chance to promote rugby in a country where it is very much a minority sport.

"We're going over there with the attitude of playing open rugby. We want to promote the game and we're going to run the ball. We're certainly not there to play boring driving rugby or anything like that. Hopefully we'll play some real open, enjoyable rugby, and people will enjoy the the show we put on."

One team member, loose forward Hayden Jurlina, has spent a year playing rugby in Croatia.

The Karikari Peninsula farmer recalls the culture shock when he first arrived.

"It's totally different. It was like going to a new world, it's just such a different place. But I did feel at home and the boys over there are just so similar to how we are."

He says it was the Croatians' turn to be shocked when talk turned to farming.

"We're used to green pastures but there it's a lot more rocky. You talk to farmers over there, they have about five or six cows that they milk by hand. So when I told them how many cows we had, they were all shell-shocked, they couldn't believe it."

Heritage New Zealand's Northland manager, Bill Edwards, says Dalmatian settlers played an important part in the history of the north because they integrated with Māori in a way the British did not.

"They were mainly young men that came from the Adriatic coast because it was pretty tough there. And when they came out, the Māori and the Dalmatians ended up working in the gumfields together - and, as a result, many of the Dalmatian men married Māori women, and so you have these longstanding Māori-Dalmatian families."

Edwards says the Dalmatians' influence continues to this day, and extends well beyond Northland.

"Their contribution is huge. When you look at many of the industries they started off, the obvious one of course is gum digging, but also there's agriculture, there's fishing, and of course there's wine production. Also, locally contributions to politics, writing and music," he said.

Government Minister Shane Jones, who hails from Awanui in the Far North, describes himself as a proud blend of the Māori and the Dalmatian.

His Dalmatian ancestor, Andre Kleskovich, married into a Māori family in Te Kao in 1892.

"I'm incredibly proud of my Dalmatian whakapapa. They were stoic people. Very hard working. I've always found them to be extremely industrious. And I'm particularly proud that I have my own son and four nephews on the Dalmatian rugby trip."

Nineteenth-century Māori called the Dalmatian settlers Tarara, a name adopted by the rugby team.

Jones explains where the word came from.

"The old-time Māori, they couldn't understand the Dally lingo and all they heard was a rapid staccato sound, ta-ra-ra, coming out of their mouths. And that's where Tarara came from."

Dave Jurlina says the roughly $150,000 needed for the tour was raised from 60 individual sponsors, a cattle fattening scheme, and a fundraising event organised by the Rural Support Trust.

"It was a lot of money we had to raise, and there was a fair bit of scepticism whether or not we could get that. But we did it relatively comfortably, because we had such generous people."

The team's fundraising success, and the fact many donors have no ties to Croatia, is proof of the high regard for Dalmatians in the Far North, he says.

Dave Jurlina says the tour is likely to be an emotional time for the players, as it is for him every time he returns to his homeland.

"When you walk into a graveyard, and you see your surname plastered everywhere, you realise that's where you do actually come from. Or you walk into someone's house and see a photo of your own family on the mantelpiece. Or you go up to a village in the mountains, and there's a little stone hut, and that's where your grandmother or grandfather was born."

He recalls one especially moving encounter with a relative he had never met.

"An older lady came out and burst out crying when she saw me. Apparently I look exactly like her brother. So, yeah, it's quite an emotional time. We feel pretty privileged that we have some heritage like that, we do know where we come from, and that's real important."

The Northland Tarara depart for Zagreb, the Croatian capital, on 21 October.