Rick Garrick — Wawatay News

Aroland’s Mark Bell has been successful with growing peppers and other plants in two greenhouses he built out of recycled wood and other materials.
“I have about 100 tomatoes starting to turn red,” said the Aroland economic development officer. “I have chili peppers, I have jalapenos, I have broccoli, I have carrots, peas. You name it, I grow it. And it all grows really well.”

Two documentary films shot over a period of years kick off this year’s Biindigaate Film Festival, to be held Sept. 27-30 in Thunder Bay.
One of them documents the tobacco trade from a First Nations perspective, while the other explores Inuit history in the high arctic.

Although Nishnawbe Aski Police Services has been ordered to leave Eabametoong by a band council resolution, NAPS officers are still providing services along with Ontario Provincial Police officers.
“Chief and council have issued a band council resolution for NAPS to leave as soon as other policing alternatives can be found,” said NAPS Chief of Police Claude Chum. “Basically, their BCR states very simply: NAPS will not expire until an alternative policing service can be put in place. And obviously, that is the OPP.”

A bone marrow match has been found for an 18-year-old mother who is in hospital with a rare bone marrow failure disease.
“There is a big sigh of relief,” said Dolores Wawia, grandmother of Taylor Dawn Vermette-Wawia, who first noticed her aplastic anemia symptoms last fall. “She phoned me herself and was crying on the phone. She said ‘Mama, they found seven possible donors.’”
Aplastic anemia is a rare but extremely serious disorder resulting from the failure of bone marrow to produce blood cells. About two to 12 new cases are diagnosed each year per million people.

Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) Deputy Grand Chief Goyce Kakegamic is calling for a focus on cultural diversity and the philosophy of lifelong learning at an upcoming Assembly of First Nations education conference.
“Part of the national strategy really has to highlight the cultural diversity of First Nations and reflect the philosophy of lifelong learning, not just the academics of education,” Kakegamic said in an e-mail. “AFN can write any vision they wish but if they don’t push and support community ground work at the grassroots level, it will not move ahead.”