Day 6: Soil Ingestion Research Project ~ Cold Lake First Nations (English Bay)

Day 6:

Please forgive my spelling errors etc., I’ve usually had a long day by the time I get to typing my journal & just want to get in my warm bed by the time I’m finished posting.  Also, I want to share with you so you are aware that all I write is my personal perceptive experience.  I also want to keep my fellow First Nations peers anonymity &/or will only use first names throughout this project.  However, the researchers names etc. are public knowledge.  It isn’t my place to share their experiences or perceptions, only mine but at the same time, we are all part of this together. They are all aware of my journaling & actually quite enjoy me reading it to them, when ever I can.  It isn’t that this project is a secret, it’s just that I want to be respectful of the others involved in this project. 

Beautiful Lands...
an Industrial Plant is just a hop skip & a jump away

Well, we had another busy day collecting samples this time most of the day.  The researchers wanted to get sediment samples from Ethel Lake this time.  So they went out on the boat & my other female peer & I were pretty much little scientists for the day collecting medicine, food, bear scat, & soil samples east of Ethel Lake because our coordinator advised us not to eat any of the gathering foods in the area because we are so close to industry.  This lake is also where a Cold Lake band member had bought land around the lake, a few years back, & the soil & water was so contaminated, she had to sell her land & move elsewhere.  It's scary to think people are still living & building beautiful cottages & homes around the lake.  It would be interesting (interesting as in curiosity only) to have a longitudinal study of all the residents over 20 years & see how their health is over those years right next to an oil plant....hmmmm...after all we are part of the environment...

Muskeg ~ excellent tea to clean the blood

Therefore, us two woman worked as a team & collected samples for the researchers.  It was hard not to eat the berries though because they were nice & juicy looking.  We work well together & as we gather more & more, we are becoming more aware of the environment and noticing the differences in vegetation health.  For instance, we are starting to notice which areas are affected by industry & which aren’t so much just by the look of the trees, plants etc..  It’s actually really obvious after you spent days out there gathering like we have, in different areas.  Another instance, was we went near the Esso plant area to see what medicines were out there & it was quite obvious as we got closer the trees & vegetation looked more sickly the more north we drove.  There was one spot where we parked in the bush along the border of the Esso plant (we could hear the plant in the distance), we saw floating oil & other pollutants beside a abandoned beaver dam & slough.  I was taking a soil sample & later realized the polluted water & the remnant’s of a dead bear scattered all throughout the bush.  I warned our researchers not to be surprised if they have bear cells in their sample.  It was so evident of the damage because most of the willow trees were dead from some unknown reason.  I have to go back there though tomorrow, to get more soil samples because I ran out of sample bags.

As we drove back to base camp, we went to go visit the Cold Lake Peace Camp north of Sandy Beach to see what the camp looks like & see what the peacekeepers are wanting to preserve.  We had a good 30 minute visit & left.  As we were driving along the road, we saw a beaver house, so we stopped & we hit the jackpot ~ MINT woo hoo!  We had been looking for mint for a few days now but it was hard to find, a lot of beaver houses had been abandoned or destroyed.  As few days before, I made mint tea for all of us & the others shared how much they enjoyed the tea because they slept like babies & a few even said they slept in but felt great.  Mint is a great sleep aid, good for colds, for fatigue, & other remedies.  We picked enough to take back to camp & we had a great evening with mint tea & laughs around the camp fire.  I don’t think we can go a day without teasing, laughing but tonight we are all pretty tired & the evening was quiet.  I was glad Ken came to visit for a while & he’s supposed to come back tomorrow & bring a few guns so we can go out & hunt more north of our base camp.

Graham expressed how much he wishes we could find more blueberries because he’s hooked on our rubarb-blueberry, & honey dessert.  The group was all impressed how good the dessert was yesterday without sugar & only honey.  As a result, when Ken came to visit tonight, they told him how much they enjoyed the honey.  Therefore, he promised to bring a pail of it, instead of the teaser sized one we demolished lol.  The organic honey, we buy from the Brown family across Kehewin Lake ~ it’s a hit!  I like using honey in my cooking, coffee, teas etc. instead of sugar.  It’s better anyways, when you think about it.

Aboriginal Plant Use in Canada's Northwest Boreal Forest

I've been using a excellent book called Aboriginal Plant Use in Canada's Northwest Boreal Forest ( thank you my friend, Roger McDonnell for the gift), as a guide, for finding medicines.  It was done years ago with the participation of Aboriginal people.  It's been a great guide along with the Aboriginal knowledge shared by Elders & active grassroots people raised & living off the land.  I am still learning, I don't claim to know all, I am a humble student of the land & our people.  I believe it is my responsibility to learn as much as I can since I am going to be taking on a great responsibility as a teacher next year.  I can't not take this responsibility lightly & I humbly accept it but know the weight I must bare.

As I type, I just received a text from Ken letting me know a thunder storm is approaching us.  I can hear it off in the distance & It sounds beautiful & tranquil.  I love thunderstorms, the thunder & the rain are comforting to me, I will sleep like a baby tonight!

Downside, I’ve gotten so much sun that ~ I look like a red-nosed alcoholic raccoon when I remove my glasses (lol jks) ~ it’s quite funny…I so have to use more sunscreen lol…oh well, that’s life I guess but the upside is I’m getting my vitamin D (haa, haa).

Sweet dreams all.  I am grateful for this opportunity to learn so much from the people, the land, the Creator!  The gifts out here are so amazing…I have seen so much beauty, now this is living!

Day 5: Soil Ingestion Research Project ~ Cold Lake First Nations (English Bay)

Day 5:

It’s looking like we aren’t going to move camp.  This seems to be a good place to stay & we have access to the E-bay facilities like water, a shower etc… it would be nice to be next to the lake, especially since it’s so hot but, I think there is a reason (not revealed yet) our camp is where it is.  I m okay with that too because it we would waste a valuable day of testing, gathering, hunting etc. if we moved.  We are all pretty much settled here at E-bay. 

The day started off slow but we eventually got going once the researches set up their sentiment sampling machine & all local member allowed our researchers to use his boat.  Dr. Blais arrived yesterday, he is a soft spoken gentleman with a eager demeanor respectful to learn who we are and what we are all about.  You can tell he is quite interested in ensuring this project succeeds to prove the wholistic environment is being affected.  For example, today they went & did soil samples at the bottom of Hilda Lake & just by the sediment samples strong odor, there is evidence of effect; however all these samples will be tested in a laboratory like our precious waste (laughingly). 

The researchers getting prepared to do sediment sampling
at bottom of Hilda Lake

As the researchers did there biological & scientific testing, we continued to gather food & medicines at Hilda Lake Park area.  I was quite disgusted & got turned off by this camping area.  These are provincial park areas set up beside beautiful lakes for “the public” to enjoy but all I see is beautiful land being violated & disrespected.  What I mean by this is, there wasn’t any garbage cans or bathrooms available for the public to use, so you can guess the state of the area.  I felt disgusted when we went & tried to pick berries & I had a hard time finding a good clean spot because there was garbage all over, or there was evidence of human or pet waste all throughout the bushes.  We tried to pick berries but then I quit after an hour when I knelt down to pick some blueberries & I could smell human urine.  It was quite sad!

Therefore, I left & went to find my other peers & we left that area & went back to our base camp. 

It was a quite hot today, so me & my other female peer went to Cold Lake, picked up some supplies at Canadian Tire & brought everyone else back Timmy’s coffee.  I know we are supposed to live off the land.  We are but can only do it to a certain extent.  On some days we are limited with what we can harvest or hunt or fish.  Just like today, we had whitefish & potatoes for supper after our fishermen collected from the net they set the night before.  We also had muskeg tea with birch bark.  It’s quite good & tasty.

Later on my female peer & I went to Sandy beach & waded in the lake and enjoyed the refreshing lake.  I tell you, Cold Lake is the best lake EVER lol.  It has been my favorite since I was a child, when we would spend almost whole summers out here with family.  However, Sandy beach has changed too, it is quite polluted & dirty like Hilda Lake.  It also lacks the resources to keep it clean & there is garbage all over & even people relieving themselves in the bushes too.  Even when I was a child, it wasn’t so populated but now it seems everyone knows about it.  It just amazes me with all the international talks about being Environmentally Conscious & Friendly, there is such little regard for the environment in this area ~ yet, this is one of the most beautiful areas so rich in beauty, vegetation, animal life…this area is a living “medicine chest” & it’s being so abused & raped daily…such violations…Our Mother ~ Earth is a Rape Victim & we all sit back & let her being violated over & over again.

I know this entry is bleak & sad but this is what my day was about…I felt so ashamed to be human…we are the most ignorant & arrogant mammals & the stupidest!  We are such parasites!

Everyday, I pray humans will change TODAY not tomorrow…because with the current path we are on, we are sure to exterminate OURSELVES!

Day 4: Soil Ingestion Research Project ~ Cold Lake First Nations (English Bay)

Day 4:

I had a hard time getting up this morning, it was cold & too warm & comfortable in my bed, so I laid in bed and listened to my fellow Ginny Pigs lol talk about how well their sleep was & what they are planning to do for the day.  I laid there hoping for bacon, thinking it’s been a long time since I had bacon.  As the morning light was trying to get out of my tent, I forced myself up to challenge the new day.  I needed to wake up because we’ve been all getting up at around 6:00 AM to 6:30 AM each morning and going out gathering or hunting etc.. all day then I get to bed late around 11:00 PM to midnight.  So getting up this morning was a challenge; therefore, I washed my hair & face with cold water and left my tent to see what the rainy day had to bring.

University of Ottawa Masters student
making his observational notes.

Ahhhhh bacon….what a good way to start the day, so glad for our Outfitter, Gerald & Mouse (our Outfitter’s helper's nickname) & their awesome cooking.  Our researchers left to Edmonton in the wee hours of the morning so we were on our own besides, Brian, our helper.  Our Masters student, Graham, was taking Jaime (Doctor Doyle, one of the researchers) to the airport & he was going to pick up the other doctor, Dr. Blay.  We couldn’t do too much with the drizzling rain, so we sat around the fire, organized camp etc. all morning & I also read some of my journal entries for this project to the others.  They enjoyed that.  The rain also gave me the opportunity to post all my journal entries on this blog with pictures.

We teased each other throughout the morning too and since our researchers were gone, I had them all enter their food journal so we could give it to our researcher when they got back.  They also teased by saying since they were gone, we should all run to McDonalds lol (we can’t go eat elsewhere), this research required a “controlled environment”, meaning…all our food is monitored & recorded daily; therefore, we've dubbed this recording by Graham as “confession” or “confessing our sins”.  Usually around two times a day,

Graham sits at the picnic table and asks us questions one by one:

What did you eat & how much?

How many bowel movements?

Did you do a urine sample?

What exercise did you do?

& so forth…

Our responses:

I had 5 bacon, 2 eggs, 2 coffee with cream…

Yes, yes, 2 hours gathering…

Then, when we are done confession, we tell the next people, “it’s your turn to confess your sins & don’t be making them up” (laughing jokingly)…

Everyone finds so many things to tease each other about, you can’t go very long without laughing here…everyone is so comical, they find humor in everything…even the fact about foods we can’t eat like bannock, pancakes etc.  because certain foods mess up the researchers tested readings.  SO sometimes you’ll hear every so often, “ohhh I can’t wait to have bannock" lol or "right on, we are done when the E-bay Community Centre has their Wednesday Soup & Bannock".  It’s so funny to listen too, you’d think we were all in jail with restrictions lol!

Our "Afghanistan Muskrat Warrior's" tent
~ ALL ARE WELCOME

The first half of the day was pretty slow & a few of the others went to check the fish net they set the evening before.  While they were gone, we noticed our one hunter/fisherman had put a t-shirt  with the word “Afghanistan” across it at the entrance of our camp.  So as a joke, I wrote a sign, just below & adjacent to his tent, “Our Muskrat Warrior” ~ All Are Welcome”.  I like teasing our hunter/fisherman, he is a cool guy that makes us laugh & he doesn’t even know he has the gift of humor.  We enjoy his demeanor & his stories!  He is so dedicated to this project but I can’t help but tease him.   He gets himself into little predicaments that are comical at times like today.  Him & our other hunter/fisherman got stuck after they checked their nets, so since they couldn’t call us (no cell phone), they walked with their one whitefish & five sucker fish to the Cold Lake First Nations Peace Camp & visited there & cooked & shared their one whitefish with the camp.  When they got back, we teased them about them not sharing their one fish with us.  We all laughed because they noticed we didn’t save them any dry moose meat either, which our Project Helper, Brian brought us.  All I know is eating traditionally is like eating in heaven, my stomach loves all the moose meat, blueberries, fish, and even the few raspberries I found today. 

In the afternoon, the other female project participant (only two woman on project) out of our group came with me to find more sweetgrass about a kilometer from our camp.  When we arrived there, we tried to find ratroot around the creek & a local lady, Maryanne came out of the bushes with her sweetgrass & berries saying, “hey, aren’t you Alma’s daughter”?  We started to talk & together we tried to find the ratroot.  She remembers picking it when she was younger.  It’s just been so amazing these last few days, we have been meeting up with so many people out looking for medicines.  Some are old veterans & others are new to learning the medicines like myself and a few others of us in the project.  The amazing thing is everyone is so willing to share their knowledge & help each other out to find the medicines.  Even though we didn’t find the ratroot, I invited Maryanne to come to our camp later & I would take her to where we found ayîkicâs the day before.

When we got back to camp, Ken was there & our Outfitter fed him moose soup & berries.  Then, other Dene locals like Christine & her 94 year old mother came to visit & have some sucker fish with us.  The old lady was so cute.  She helped me braid the sweetgrass & she was really curious about what we were doing out here, so I trying to explain the best I could while Christine translated in Dene for me…so here is how I told it…

Well, we are out here trying to find out how oil companies, the jets, and all affect our medicines, the animals, the fish, and the food we pick & eat.  These people come from Ottawa from those big schools out there (University) & they study us & test us and our food, medicines, and all that to see if it’s getting poisoned.  They even test us because we eat all this food.  You know how they test us?  Well, we have to pee in a bottle and poop in a bag.  The old lady laughed & laughed as Christine translated.  Then I told the old lady, “we are so important that our poop even goes all the way on a plane to OTTAWA”…she laughed so hard.  “Yes”, I said, they don’t want us in Ottawa, just our poop” (laughing & joking).  She found it so funny & then I told her they even collect animal poop too & test it.  So I showed her some bear poop I collected (in a bag).  As I handed it to her, she was looking at it so curiously, then I told her what it was… she just about through it across the camp.  It wasn classic to see the expression on her face & we all had a hearty laugh about it.

Us out looking for berries, mint, & medicines by Marie Lake

Participation in this project has been so awesome that I keep thanking the Creator for allowing me to be part of this.  I have learned so much & felt so much Indigenous kindness in these four days than I have felt in a long time.  It’s so refreshing to go back to the land & learn from so many teachers.  I feel so blessed…even today, when Maryanne, Ken & I went and got more medicines & Ken went into the muskeg almost up to his waist.  We had so much fun out there searching for this plant, nothing could have been better.  We were out there for a few hours & if the sun hadn’t been going down, we wouldn’t have stopped.  Maryanne dropped us off at the camp, we said our grateful goodbyes & we walked away with a message for my mother in-law from her old Blue Quills Residential School mate, Maryanne.

Being with & part of the land is the best experience ever, I am trying my best to soak it all up.  I am so anxious to be a teacher, so I can have the opportunity to take my kids (students) out here to do what I am doing & experience the richness of our people, our culture, & our valuable knowledge…you can’t get this in any four walled classroom…our land is the greatest classroom ever.

As I sit on my bed & type here in my HUGE tent lol & I reflect on my day…I asked myself, “what was the highlight of the day?”.

Well…the highlight of my day was sitting braiding sweetgrass with the 94 yr old Elder, listening to her, & the icing on the cake was making her laugh & seeing the pure joy on her face! 

Life is about precious moments, especially the moments we spend with each other!

Day 3: Soil Ingestion Research Project ~ Cold Lake First Nations (English Bay)

Day 3:

Oil floating in a stream by a Beaver Dam & creek

Today was a great day.  We went to about four different locations to gather.  I tried to do a mental map in my head of how to get back to those locations again but also as back up I made notes and even drew a map of how to return to these places.  We went West & North of our camp.  We hit Hilda Lake, Ethel Lake, & Marie Lake.  All are beautiful lakes but you could see how industry is already affecting the water & vegetation.  We saw floating oil on some streams and plants near those polluted streams are dying or sickly looking.  Also people are leaving a lot of garbage out there in the bushes etc..  It was quite frustrating & sad to see  garbage, beer cans, bottles, & trash in good berry & medicine areas.  The sad thing about beer cans etc.. is small animals like squirrels etc.. will put there paws in there & end up cutting them off.  Garbage is so damaging to the animals.  I so wish people would be more conscious of their actions.  This land is so beautiful and there are places so rich in color & beauty, then you see garbage & that just doesn’t belong in such tranquility.  If anything after you read my journal entries, you walk away with more appreciation & respect for the land and environment because we are part of the environment too.  We don’t respect our environment, we don’t respect ourselves.  I ask you know, would you throw oil or garbage on your precious children?  If not, then why are we leaving that behind for our children to inherit.

We ALL need to pay attention to the foot prints
we are leaving behind for our children.

I felt so grateful today because there is a medicine I have been trying to find that could help my uncle with his cancer & it’s hard to find now because it’s habitat is being threatened.  When we were taken to the sight,  we all did our tobacco offerings.  All five of us worked together to help me find this medicine for my uncle.  We walked in the muskeg so far in water & I felt so grateful for all the support, we worked together for one cause ~ to help my uncle!  As we walked, we looked and looked for about 30 minutes.  I showed them all a picture of the plant because most of us never saw this medicine, & we couldn’t find it right away.  So as I was walking, I started to pray for my uncle & asked the spirit medicine to show it’s self, within 5 minutes I saw it.  It was so amazing, I felt my heart warm & a tear drop, I felt kinânaskomotinan (so grateful with much humility & respect).  Once we all saw the medicine, it was like it was jumping out at us.  We made sure to leave some there.  For instance, if we saw four, we left one so they can still grow, repopulate, we never take more than we need.

Yes, was a great day of a lot of medicines and we gathered more berries than the day before by Hilda Lake.

When we got back to camp, I called my uncle & told him what we found, he was so happy.  I felt so happy to be able to tell him we found what could help him, hopefully I will see him tomorrow.  He might come out here to pick up the medicine & maybe then my new found friends can meet my nohtwayis (my little father) I love so much.

Well we ended our day sharing stories around the camp fire with brief periods of rain.  I hung my medicines to dry & laid the others out to dry.

Later I took our Elder out to Cold Lake to get rubber boots & I picked up a propane heater because it’s getting cold at nights now & my Half Inuit Oven (Ken hee, hee) is warm at home gathering medicines in the Kehewin area.

Today was a good day to be “Indigenous”!

Day 2: Soil Ingestion Project ~ Cold Lake First Nations (English Bay)

Day 2:

Cranberry

Today was a good day, we walked pretty far through a slough to get to one of the sites where we can pick berries, sweetgrass, & other medicines.  I was so amazed the sweetgrass was half my height (I am 5' 3") after I braided it.  These braids are defiantly for my mom :) ~ she'll just love me up lol.

I know for sure I have to bring my rubber boots because at one point I had to take my boots off & walk bare feet across the same exact place me & my auntie Alice got stuck the day before.  It was all good though because now I have smooth soft feet from the mud lol, jokes! 

One thing for sure, is Cold Lake First Nations if very beautiful, there is so much here in regards to medicines and everything we would need to sustain ourselves.  The people at the English Bay Community Centre have been so welcoming, kind, & hospitable to all of us who are on this project.

My "Hidalgo" tent lol

The funny thing we are having a hard time getting used to is being a Ginny Pig & having to do the urine & fecal samples.  We’ve had some funny laughs around the camp fire about this.  One thing about our people is we sure know how to laugh.  We are like a little family here and we help & share & are very respectful to each other.  One of the participants calls me “Princess” (jokingly) because I have the largest tent & even with an entrance way (ha ha ha).  I was laughing about it saying I feel like that blonde haired rich woman in the movie, “Hidalgo (not Horaldo, my son corrected me after reading my post)” where that woman has that huge tent in Arabia lol.

It rained a bit but it was only enough to slow people down & take a rest until the sun came out again.  I am learning so much about medicines and I love listening to one of my relatives share Dene stories about the old ways, the old people, & traditional ways our people collected, gathered, hunted, fished etc. in this area.  I have been trying to keep making mental notes to remember stuff.  For instance, I learned that “sus” is Dene for “bear” & “susas” is Dene for “little bear”.  In Cree, “bear” means “muskwa” & “little bear” means “muskwasis”.

I also met more family today & got a great hug from my auntie Melanie, loving is always special & worth paying attention too.  A hug maybe a small thing to others but a great gift when you need it.

Well today was a great day & know tomorrow will be awesome because I am surrounded by great people.