“Your Osama Bin Laden is our freedom fighter. True. Hardout.”
Tu returns home to re-open the Boxing Gym 'Muhammads', in partnership with his brother Potiki and their cousin Eunice. Twenty years is a long time to be away and Taneatua aka Tan-knee isn't as Tu remembers. For one thing, Muhammad's is pretty run-down, the locals seem to have very little interest in the rejuvenation of what was a major community focal point, none of the agreed groundwork before his arrival has been completed and it's a month before the opening. It's also bringing up memories he thought he had buried a long time ago.
Fourteen year old Stevie survives off attitude and the sturdiness of her comic-drawing best friend, Chiefy. Neither are that thrilled about the intrusion into their world of Tu and his ideas. Yet, it provides welcome relief from the white vans parked up for days all over town, and the undercurrent of unsettling activity rumoured to be driven by Māori Sovereignty groups–Te Urewera Prophets aka the Tame-Itis.