When people from Croatia and the Lebanon came to New Zealand they brought with them from Europe the culture of wine. It was part of their identity. In an earlier enforced migration, for people torn from the vastness of Africa and taken as slaves to America, their most enduring possessions were the chants and tales of their folklore, which evolved as the music of Dixie; the Blues, Gospel, and later on Rock and Roll. Music soothed their loss. These thoughts came to mind as I listened to Soul music, while driving out to Henderson in late July 2010 to celebrate the refurbishment and reopening of the Falls Hotel. I was invited by Garry Bates, the manager, and by the Winemakers of West Auckland, whose wines were served at the banquet.
The Falls Hotel is a Heritage building dating back to 1854. It was named after a spectacular water fall at Waitakere, which became a trickle when its river was dammed for the Waitakere Reservoir to be built. Early black and white photographs on the walls of the pub evoke the flickering images of silent Wild West movies; as in femmes fatales with bustles, boas, and cleavages; poker players - drone males with eye shades and braces; and cowboys with Colt 45s. The restoration of the old hotel preserves the feel of the 1880s, in stud heights, proportions, colours and finishes. You can imagine cussing fighting cowhands being thrown out onto a clay road, under the restless hooves of tethered horses. The Falls Hotel, it should be said, is as much modern sophistication as Wild West. The food served at the dinner was in the style of nouvelle cuisine, in small portions of carefully matched and mixed textures and tastes. For me the best of them was rare cooked Cervena. It was tender, juicy and slightly spiced.
At the Falls Hotel I found faces I had not seen for 20 years or more, faces altered by the passage of time to add creases to features and grey to hair, something you don’t necessarily think about, even if you own a face and use a mirror to shave. There were speeches. Brian Corban, grandson of Assid Abraham Corban, founder of the Corban family wine company at Henderson, talked about the history of Corban’s Wines, a history with much in common for all the first wine making families in New Zealand, whether from the Lebanon or from Croatia. They fled here as families from the turmoil of the Balkans in the death throes of the Ottoman Empire. They packed what they could carry into suitcases and walked to the nearest seaport, to catch a ship to the other side of the world. In New Zealand the Croatians laboured in the gum fields of the North. People from Lebanon became small traders.
The Corban family name is still a major brand in New Zealand wine. In 1979, a century after the earliest pioneers of the family arrived in New Zealand, the Corban family sold a majority stake in Corban’s Wines, to Rothmans. This led ultimately to DB becoming the owner of the Corban brand. The wine interests of the Corban family are now in Hawkes Bay, where Alwyn Corban, a cousin of Brian, is the winemaker for the family wine company Ngatarawa Wines, making wine from its vineyards on the Heretaunga Plains.
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