July 7, 2006–Grassy Narrows

A spambot left a comment on a blog post i wrote several years ago for freegrassy.livejournal, so a notification email landed in my inbox and reminded me about the post.. Id forgotten about that blog all together; it was set up during an “internship” i did with Rainforest Action Network in the summer of 2006. That was a big summer for me, so i figured i’d post up the entry on this blog.

Much thanks and love to David and Leah for putting that experience together, to all the other “interns” who were up there with us, and to all my dear friends and everyone else from Asubpeeschoseewagong, aka Grassy Narrows First Nation.

Journal pt.1

So… I have been at the Grassy Narrows blockade site now for over a month. We are camped at Slant Lake, the site of the longest standing Indigenous blockade in Canada. Right near the middle of our camp is a sign that declares the location as the center of Grassy Narrows’ traditional land use area. I find spending time here to be most inspirational, and have seen this place be the same for many others; members of our group, other activists, and members of the Grassy Narrows First Nation as well as people from other First Nations communities. It has been personally inspirational in many, many ways. I have had trouble articulating these emotions. Maybe if I were a more spiritual person I would have more and more meaningful things to say about that. Maybe later.

Now, I am writing (I think) to recap some of the events from the past month, and to talk about what they have meant to me, how I have interpreted them, and perhaps even how they have affected me. I feel like this might be one of those life-changing experiences that people so often speak about. I have in the past chosen not to put much stock in that notion – that a short period of time might create drastic change in a person. I have often felt that critical, informed, self-aware people should be more prepared for the situations that they are entering than to allow themselves to be changed in such ways by them. It is looking like I might have to rethink that some. Whether it means that I am less informed and self-aware than I thought I was, or that short intense experiences can, in fact, have life altering effects on people, is something that I will have to consider more deeply. However, I suspect that both are probably true.

Where to begin? I suppose I should begin at the beginning. At least that is what linear logic would dictate. And short of any other new schemes, it seems like a good place to start. I suppose the first question worth answering would be the one that asks why I am here. Perhaps before that even, a little bit of back ground info (about myself). I spent the better part of a decade wasted. The privilege afforded me due to my gender, skin colour, and class are all crucial factors in my having survived that period of my life. I found myself out in Whistler BC, and on New Years Eve 2003, I was smoked by a pick up truck on the Sea to Sky Highway. Still in bed, almost four months later, I decided to go back to school and enrolled at Wilfred Laurier University in Waterloo. In the fall I will be entering the third year of a combined honours degree in Religion & Culture and Global Studies. It was at Laurier that I substantially picked up both activism and journalism for the first time.

Now here I am at Grassy Narrows, interning for RAN and Forest Ethics, and allegedly covering the Struggle for my school magazine and paper. And why am I here? As a Canadian I feel that I have an obligation to do all that I can to help prevent further atrocities being committed against this lands Indigenous peoples. I am here because while so many of our peers are running off to Africa and Asia and South America to do human rights work, we have tragic violations of those rights right here in my home province of Ontario. In Canada, we commit genocide. And I feel as a Canadian, born on stolen land, I have a responsibility to do my part in ending the egregious acts that are committed in my name and for my benefit. I feel that I have enjoyed those benefits for too long. And while I don’t really know how to entirely stop reaping my privilege in my day-to-day life, I do know that I have to do something. I have to try. I think that I also know that the only way that I might figure out exactly what to do is by doing what I can. And doing it now. That is why I am here at Grassy Narrows – because I can be. And because I can be here, I have to be here.

Every time I try and explain why I am here, either in writing or in conversation, it comes out fairly different each time. But the sentiment is always the same. And, while varying factors are mentioned or not in the telling of this story, its message always remains fairly constant.

I suppose that I owe whoever may be reading some information about what I have actually been up to for the past month. Here, for starters, is a list of some highlights, with details to follow. First, there was a thirty-hour adventure from Toronto to Grassy in an over-packed van with five other people. There is a blog post at www.freegrassy.org about this voyage. On the second night out here, we went to ‘Pow Wow Island’ for a (you guessed it) Pow Wow. It was cool. There is also a blog post about this night on the same web site.

In the first few days here we met many, many people – some of whom I had read a fair bit about while learning about the history of Grassy Narrows’ Struggle with governments and corporations. I am hoping that fairly soon there will be links to interviews with some of these people up on the net and info as well, so I wont write much about anyone right now. A few days in, we met with a pair of Indigenous Rights Campaigners from Amnesty Intl. I interviewed Craig Benjamin and will post excerpts from that conversation. Accompanying the campaigners was a Chiapas woman from Mexico. She was an activist and an organizer, and I got the impression that she was pretty badass. Still early in our time here, we visited some of the areas that were clear-cut prior to the starting of the blockade. Were we taken on a tour with some of the leading grassroots activists here, including Chrissie Swain, one of the two sisters who felled the first tree in the longest standing blockade in Canada. We met Charles Wagamese, an ex-school teacher in Grassy. He and others we have met are featured in the film As Long as the Rivers Flow; I highly suggest everyone see it. Ways to view it can be found at www.FreeGrassy.org.

On June 2nd, I wound up being a pallbearer at a funeral in Grassy. At first, I was just recruited to be one of the gravediggers. Then I was taken to go fetch the coffin. Then I was in the hall, and then carrying the occupied coffin out and into the truck – all this in front of more the 60 grieving friends and relatives. It was heavy. There is a blog about this as well at FreeGrassy.org. A prominent community member told me that there are many ways in which a community comes together, many things that bring people together, death is a very powerful one of them. Being involved in the funeral of Emile Fontaine made me feel as if I was being called in; called into having a personal stake in the community. And as it was said, it was a bringing together, and it was an honour and a to be part of it.

In our second week here, we received the rest of our team. There are some awesome border crossing stories, hopefully some of them will get posted on this site.

Preparations for the Youth Gathering and Pow Wow that took place at the blockade were until recently what had occupied most of our time. Now we are working on preparations for a large social justice gathering that is taking place here. I will definitely be writing more about both gatherings and the Pow Wow later. There are lots and lots of stories to tell there – I could probably write for months. Somewhere in all this time, Matt Shaaf, an ex-member of Christian Peacemaker Teams who had lived for three years in and around Grassy came to visit us for a weekend. He ran a two-day anti-oppression workshop, helped put up a teepee, taught us how to make grease-fire mushroom clouds, and also indulged me in a lengthy interview. Again, sections of it, or even video clips will eventually be posted here. That’s a bit of a run down. I will get into much more detail telling stories about the youth gathering and Pow Wow, and others.

PEACE
-alex.