It is time for the federal and provincial governments to seriously deal with the annual flooding and evacuations of Kashechewan First Nation or Kash as we, the Cree people of the James Bay, refer to it. Kashechewan, which is Cree for ‘where the water flows fast’, sits on the banks of the Albany River and has been flooding for a very long time on an annual basis.
I am hearing way too often about wonderful young people right up here in Northern Ontario passing away because they took a drug that was so powerful they had no way of knowing it would easily kill them. All kinds of drugs have been doing that over the past decade or so with the opioid epidemic and lately with the arrival of fentanyl many more young people are dying.
At the start of this winter, when the snow began to accumulate and the cold temperatures had hardened the ground, my older brother Ah-twen headed out into the open tundra north of Attawapiskat. His English name is pronounced Antoine Kataquapit and he is a traditional hunter, trapper and knowledge keeper who has years of living on the land. The place he went to is called Mooshoowak, an area on the corner of land where the bays of the Hudson and James meet. The Cree word is a description that basically describes the land as ‘clear’ or ‘without features’.
I avoid our two lane highways like Highway 11 in the north as much as possible during the winter time. There is something frightening in the thought that the only thing that separates me from oncoming traffic is an imaginary line that no one should cross in the middle of the road. One might survive a collision with a vehicle of similar size but there is no chance if you happen to hit a tractor and its trailer. They are like little trains.
As First Nation people, I know most of us worry about development on our lands by companies in mining, forestry, hydro and other resource sectors. We come by these suspicions honestly, as we have been left out of the loop with all kinds of development on our traditional lands for a more than a hundred years.
I cannot recall many winters as cold as this one. This winter started with a lot of snowstorms in December of 2018 and then in January we got more snow and the temperatures here in Northern Ontario dropped to more than 30 below zero and more like minus 40 taking wind chill into account. Many Elders I know tell me that they do not remember this kind of extreme cold for many consecutive days and such huge snowfalls since the 1960s and 70s.
One of the most talked about news stories on social media and news sites recently had to do with a disturbing video of an Indigenous Elder and a group of young predominantly Caucasian teenagers in Washington DC. Video footage has shown the Elder, Nathan Phillips chanting and using his hand drum while participating in an Indigenous Peoples March as he walks peacefully into a group of young high school boys and is blocked by one of them. The boy is smirking at the Elder and his fellow students are making fun of Elder Phillips.
Here we are entering another new year and leaving the old one in our dust. A lot of good things happened in 2018 but in my own experience I also have had to deal with family loved ones with health issues and also the passing of family members and friends. So, hello 2019 and I say that with the hope for all of us that we will have a wonderful year and that the world will become a more peaceful, loving and tolerant place.
For some time now huge companies have been taking water from the ground, bottling it and selling it to make big profits. For the most part these companies like Nestle don’t pay all that much for the right to draw this water out of the ground and they do a good job of marketing it all across Canada.
Recently I have been dealing with sickness and the passing of family members and that certainly is a sad situation and does take its toll. However I am so happy to be able to welcome Hunter James John Francois Chum, a brand new baby boy into this world. Hunter was born on November 1 with the healthy weight of nine pounds. It is good to know that with the passing of loved ones hope springs eternal.
When I was a boy growing up in my home community of Attawapiskat on the James Bay coast, I was deathly afraid of looking at the full moon.
I grew up...
I’m happy to see the ongoing support and assistance in our northern remote communities to help our people cope with so many lifelong and generational issues...