Posts By: First Nations Drum

The largest employer of Native people in Canada, Casino Rama since opening its doors in 1996, has become the success story of First Nation’s business.

The casino has never stopped growing, last July the entertainment complex, a 5000-seat theatre was officially opened with country superstar Faith Hill as the opening act. This summer a 300-room hotel will be open for business, it promises to be 4-star all the way with hot tubs in some of the rooms.

Casino Rama has turned a profit since day one because nothing has been left to chance. No expense has been spared to make it a first class casino.

Kenny Rogers whose signature song is the gambler was the first entertainer to appear at Casino Rama and this was before the entertainment complex was built, since then the list of stars who have appeared there include former Beatle Ringo Starr, country sensation Martina McBride, Classic rock band Creedence Clearwater Revival and the godfather of jazz singers Tony Bennett.

The all-star lineup has help put the casino on the forefront of Ontario’s tourist attraction. And one of it’s premier entertainment facilities, not a easy feat considering that it’s a two hour drive from Toronto and the small town of Orillia is it’s only populated neighbor. The marketing has been effective and its reputation has grown as the premier casino in the province

It was conceived as a means of generating wealth for the collective First Nations population in Ontario and has delivered on it’s promise, 400 million dollars has been divided among all native bands in the province

Beyond the Financial gains is the employment opportunities the casino has created, from the beginning the premise has been to not only to create jobs but also open the door to apprenticeship and full time careers. Cindy St. Germain states that it was part of the original plan.

“It’s something that chief and council wanted to happen, since there was going to be such great opportunity here, we wanted to make sure our people got apprenticeships.”

For Lanny Beaver it has allowed him to follow in his father’s footsteps and pursue a electrician’s career with Guild Electric.” I work on the drawing and drafting. The job is so big and moving so fast there are always a lot of changes. It’s very exciting,” says Lanny.

Another worker Steve Simcoe saw a chance to discover his calling in a hands on situation,” They have us go through a 90 day period to see how you are, see if you’re interested in the trade or another one at that time. It gives you a chance to see how it is and it gives them a chance to see how you perform at the same time.”

Casino Rama also sponsors the ”Awards for Excellence” a program developed to provide financial support to aboriginal students who have completed one year of College or University, the applicants are judged on academic standing and of equal importance their record of community involvement.

Art Frank the president and CEO of Casino Rama sees the awards as a investment in the future of Native leaders, “As a large corporation, we are pleased to be able to assist aboriginal students with their education. It is an important way for us to motivate aboriginal students to excel, many of who struggle financially. By assisting students who are strong academically as well as excellent community workers, we encourage these future community leaders to do more.”

As a native business Casino Rama has done three things that most tribal councils should take note of the planning was done with professional who understood what guidelines to follow, the project was accomplished by creating employment for Natives.

Workers and not just a band aid that doesn’t go beyond the project but helping to develop a lifetime career and funding for professional who will become the future leaders.

By Cher Bloom

Sandy Scofield”With approximately 200 Aboriginal radio stations across Canada, Aboriginal record labels, a Juno category and the Aboriginal Music Awards now approaching its fourth year, the native Canadian music scene is stronger and more organized than ever,” says Juno-nominated Métis singer-songwriter Sandy Scofield.

The Aboriginal rock and pop scene is earning its place on the musical map. This year, native musicians were given the opportunity to present their sounds to the Grammy Awards voting committee, at the first annual Native American Grammy Nominee Showcase in Hollywood.

Sandy Scofield’s CD, “Riel’s Road,” was nominated for a Juno this year in the “Best Music of Aboriginal Canada” category; in 2001, it received two nominations for the 2001 West Coast Music Awards; and, took home the “Best Alternative Album” and “Beat Single” awards for the opening track, “Beat The Drum,” at the 2000 Aboriginal Music Awards. As well, Sandy performed live on this show at Toronto’s Skydome and, more recently, was filmed and interviewed by Star TV at her sold-out, standing room only Junofest showcase in St. John’s, NFLD.

Sandy has been described as a “transforming trickster. She can use melody and beautiful harmonies to carry weighty messages. Her keen ear for original arrangements, her experience articulated in powerful lyrics, and her beautiful vocal instrument, combine to form a growing body of incisive musical works which touch contemporary audiences of all cultures. At one moment she can sing delicate, satiny pop, creating a cracked and broken down scenario, and in another, can boldly harness robust rhythm, blues and rock. She brings a modern heartbeat to the singing of her Metis heritage.”

She has opened for artists such as Buffy Sainte Marie, Tom Jackson and Louisiana’s Buckwheat Zydeco. Her songs have appeared on compilations, film and documentary sound tracks and in theatre productions. Recently, she provided the music for a series of Diabetes Awareness radio broadcasts and previously co-wrote and performed CKLG Radio’s Christmas Toy Drive song in December rotation from 1996 to 2000.

She has just completed the commission of eight songs for Namgis playwright Laura Cranmer’s theatre play entitled “DP’s Colonial Cabaret,” and will be attending the Banff Centre in August to compose a piece for Blackfoot choreographer Byron Chief Moon and his dance ensemble.

The year “Riel’s Road” was released was a very emotional one for Sandy. Her stepmother and favorite Auntie passed away within months of each other. “My Aunt was the mainstay in my life. I was quite grief stricken when she passed into the spirit world in July of 2000. The record came out in September, and I won the awards in November.”

It was submitted to the 2001 Juno’s without being nominated. Because of the timing of the album’s release, there was a window in which it could also be submitted for the 2002 Juno’s as well.

The same thing occurred with Mishi Donovan, whose CD “The Spirit Within” was submitted in 1997 without garnering a nomination. The next year she was not only nominated for the same recording, she took home the award.

One of the people instrumental in encouraging Sandy to resubmit the album in the Aboriginal category was Elaine Bomberry. Sandy calls her “a real mover and shaker in Toronto. She has a radio show, she’s an events promoter at the Comfort Zone Club and she works for The Centre For Indigenous Theater.”

This year’s 2002 nominees in the “Best Music of Aboriginal Canada” category included Métis singer/songwriter Marcel Gagnon, Alberta’s Billy Joe Green, an established blues player, the youth Pow Wow group, Nakoda Lodge from Morley, and the Winnipeg based Eagle and Hawk led by Vince Fontaine.”Vince is a friend of mine and I was really happy that his group won. He’s been at this music thing as long as I have and totally deserved to win. Getting nominated was award enough for me. Being able to go to the Juno’s in St. John’s, NFLD was the trip of a lifetime!”

Sandy was honored to be invited by Sheila Copps, the Minister of Heritage Canada, who distributes all the arts funding money in the country, to take part in a round table discussion the day of the Juno’s, on how her ministry can better support music artists in this country.

“I was to speak from aboriginal perspective and stressed that we need more support in the mainstream industry. While education funding and programming is outside of the mandate of Ms. Copps’ ministry, I had to express the importance of Native kids needing opportunities and access to the same kind of education programs that dominant society kids do, like media, music and arts. These kids need professional people from their own communities to administer these programs. There are lots of successful aboriginal professionals in theatre, art, music and film who may not have a degree in education, but possess the cultural awareness, skills and expertise and who have demonstrated success in their fields, to go into the communities to mentor the kids.”

Sandy thinks that it’s great that the Juno’s are honoring the First people, and that this category exists. “Best Music of Aboriginal Canada”, however, encompasses everything from traditional Pow Wow music to straight ahead jazz, blues, pop, and everything in between. She would like to see Aboriginal artists whose work is specialized in a particular genre, be recognized in the dominant Juno categories.

“There’s a whole scene emerging in Native hip hop, for example. The kids identify very much with the issues of black Americans. Red Power Squad, is a native rap group with break dancers–they rap about issues directly related to the communities.”

For her fourth recording, Sandy is negotiating with Kinnie Starr, who is Mohawk by heritage and who works in hip-hop and beat poetry, to do collaboration. She has also begun writing with her guitar player, Stephen Nikleva, towards this end, and they have a few pseudo hip-hop songs already in the bag.

Scofield says the impact of contemporary aboriginal music is reaching more than just aboriginal audiences. “Think back to the days of Nirvana and the whole grunge scene in Seattle, and how they put alternative music on the map, ” Scofield says. “Before that, alternative music didn’t count. Now it’s been established as a viable genre. “That’s the stage I think we’re in now,” she says.” Our audience is expanding to include the greater society and the industry needs to recognize that.”

Sandy describes her players as “a really happening band.” Her drummer is Randall Stoll, (he plays with Tom Cochrane, and was k.d.lang’s drummer on her “Ingenue” tour). Her bass player is Brian Minato, who also works with Sarah McLachlan and Jack Tripper, and her guitar player (and Sandy’s co-producer on Riel’s Road), is long-time friend Stephen Nikleva (he plays with Ray Condo and the Ricochets and used to be Mae Moore’s guitarist).

Other players on “Riel’s Road” include Sue Leonard (a previous back-up singer or k.d. lang), trumpeter/fiddler Daniel Lapp and R&B songstress, Fara. The album features her glorious voice, her imaginative musical ideas and a very sharp pen. Cover art is from renowned Cree artist George Littlechild. Elements of folk, pop, jazz, country rock, rap and Cree music lead her to be called “alternative”.” Get High,” a track from Riel’s Road, is being re-released on the First Peoples Blues compilation from Sweetgrass Records out of Saskatoon, distributed by EMI Music, Canada, alongside tracks from Keith Secola, Murray Porter, Billy Jo Green and Jani Lauzon. First People’s Blues is due for release by late spring 2002.

The song “Yellowgrass” from “Riel’s Road” is dedicated to her father who grew up in La Pas, Manitoba. It speaks to a “homeland”, the closest she could identify with home, if the Metis had one.

There’s another song called “Bloodlines.” “It’s about the downtown east side (Vancouver)-the Native women who leave their communities, come into the city and who end up in the sex trade or addicted, and who have forgotten about ‘the strength and pride of their bloodlines’. We don’t have to be crackheads or be in the sex trade to know what despair is about. All human beings need to feel that we have something to offer and that we matter to someone. Sure there are ethnic differences between one group and another, cultural protocols that we may not understand, but the essence of humanity is the same. We all have fear, hurt, rage, hope, and joy. I’m especially interested in our condition here on this physical plane.”

“I’m aware that the spirit world is all around us. Ours is a three dimensional plane. My ancestors might be right here whispering in my ear, the words that are coming out of my mouth. That’s what fascinates me, the fact that we are spirit beings in the material plane, as Sting cited in one of his songs. I have a responsibility to make constructive use of the gifts that the Creator has imparted to me and of which I’ve inherited from my ancestors, many of whom were singers and musicians.”

Both Riel’s Road and Dirty River (her first album), took a long time to do, because of the financial challenges surrounding the production of a CD. Sandy is determined that the next project won’t take as long to produce. She’s basically invested everything she’s ever had into her career. In order to keep such a career afloat, an artist has to be in the public eye. Even when they’re out there, you’re subjected to the “flavour of the month,” as she puts it. “Sometimes all you come out with is a reputation (hopefully its a good one). I can’t even say objectively if I like playing live all the time. Its just what I do.”

Her greatest goal in life is to be able to continue creating and committing music to disc. The creative process is the thing for her. Once the songs have been recorded, she’s onto the next thing. The courtship is in the creation.

Sandy is about half way through recording her third record, which features Sandy and singers Lisa Sazama and Shakti Hayes. There are three songs in Algonquin, which Lisa has written and several in plains Cree, most of which Sandy has written. Five of the songs are round dances.

“I’ve taken four of these songs and arranged them with my band. This is pushing the envelope a little bit, I suppose.” Hand drums and/or rattles accompany the rest of the songs, some of which have additional, but minimal harmonic instrument accompaniment so that the whole hangs together. The working title is “Katoum,” a Cree word for ‘until we meet again’ since the word ‘goodbye,’ in itself, does not exist in the language.

“Any artist whose work I’ve truly admired has always said the same thing-to create from what is real and true for you. It is when your work is derived from your personal truths, it is that truth that comes through and touches others. I don’t profess to be a spokesperson, per se, for any artist or community. I write from my own truths about things I’ve witnessed, experienced personally and which have impacted my life and shaped my perspective as a result.”

Interestingly, Sandy was not involved in traditional native music until she attended a residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts in 1995. This program was a ten-week immersion in aboriginal musical traditions, featuring Native elder women from across North America, and led by Sadie Buck, the artistic director of the acclaimed “Aboriginal Women’s Voices”.

Sandy’s a strong believer in education, which is why she keeps going back to school to study different forms of music. Formally trained in classical and jazz after a two-year stint at Vancouver Community College, she hopes to attend SFU this fall towards the completion of a Bachelor in Music with a focus on electronic and digital music.

For more information on Sandy Scofield, please visit her website.

By Cher Bloom

Matthew LienMatthew Lien is a resident of Canada’s Yukon Territory, and he is a Superstar.

In some parts of the world, he is bigger than the Backstreet Boys, and can fill a concert hall with more than 30,000 people. In Taiwan, his fifth and sixth albums “Voyage to Paradise”, and “Touching the Earth”, occupied the Taiwanese International Top 20 pop charts ahead of such artists as Eric Clapton, and Celine Dion. His music and the voices that he represents have become household words–in Asia.

Why doesn’t Canada know about one of their most dynamic, outspoken and popular musical legends, here on his own turf?

Perhaps that will change now that the Yukon has been included in the West Coast Music Awards, (held at the Commodore Ballroom, on Thursday March 7, 2002), where Matthew Lien won “Yukon Artist of the Year” for his autobiographical seventh “world music” album, “In So Many Words”.

His unique approach to music produciton has yielded six solo albums, an album with the Wildlands ensemble, and numerous other projects and commissioned works.

“As a child, I remember being taken often into the mountainsby my mother who was an environmental activist and a deep lover of nature. The first time, (when I was only about five or six years old), I recall that it was very early in the morning. The sun was streaming through the trees. It was very wet, still and misty. It was cold, but the sun was warm, and we came into ameadow. There was a buck standing there, with a full rack –you could see his nostrils steaming. We all froze–the buck froze, we froze–we were locked in this moment in time which has lasted for me, an eternity. Maybe it only lasted for five or ten seconds before the buck bolted, but for that for that short expanse of time, I was looking God in the face.

It was later in my life that I began to research my aboriginal (Iroquois) roots. The things that have inspired me all of my life, have been based on a strong connection with the natural world. Even when I was a child, if I saw it being damaged or destroyed, I felt a compelling desire to defend what had no defense. It has always been my habit, that when I arrived in a new city, I would try to look through the cityscape and “see” what the landscape had been like before it had been “tamed” by men. I’ve always had many aboriginal friends. There are many community children who refer to me as “uncle”. When I was growing up, I spent all my summers in the Yukon with my father.

My family was very musical. We regularly had folk music gatherings at the house, and I started making music and writing right from the beginning.

Aboriginal spirituality has been alive in my blood all my life. It has obviously directed my path. I work very closely with aboriginal people. My values, my goals and my intent are the same as those people I admire among the people who are fighting for that synonymity of aboriginal culture and the natural world.

My first album was called “Bleeding Wolves”. The cover of the album is a closeup of a wolf staring the viewer straight in the face. The title track was inspired by the Yukon governement’s wolf kill program. It was a mournful lament about the tragedies and devastation that has been sufferred, at the hands of the hunters.

I was fortunate enough to get a copy of that first album, into the hands of the representative of a tiny Taiwanese record company at the MIDEM recording industry conference, in France.

The album was placed in record stores and listening kiosks–the people at the record company were receiving testimonials from people who said that the music was changing their lives. On my first trip over there, I performed at a federal penitentiary, because the prisoners had written a best selling book based on their emotional response to the album. Aboriginal groups there, were also identifying with this music.

Because of my music, the label doubled in size, and become the largest non-pop record label in Taiwan. Most of the music is instrumental, drawing from cultural influences from all over the world. The concert tours in Taiwan have been performed with an ensemble of up to 25 people, for audiences numbering over 30,000.

The Yukon government appointed me “Special Envoy” to Taiwan, somewhat like an ambassador. There are two aspects to this. As far as Canada goes, I was requested by aboriginal representatives, environmental activists and the Yukon government, who sought out my actions as an individual, to build a bridge between the two aboriginal cultures.

The Taiwan central government has requested that I assemble and lead a team of aboriginal representatives from Canada, who have experience in the aboriginal co-management of national parks. There is a phenomenal old growth forest in the northern region of Taiwan. It’s the last remaining intact area of first growth forest, comprised of red and white cypress trees that are as old as three thousand years. These trees are huge. They easily rival the California Redwoods. There are two indigenous tribes who have their traditional lands around this national park. They are the Bunan tribe, and the Attayal. The Taiwanese government wants to preserve the park as a heritage forest.

The governor of Kaohsuing Province invited me to travel throught the region and appointed me “Amabassador to Aborignal Culture”, of the Gau Ping River. He commissioned me to create a piece of music that celebrated thier aboriginal culture by meeting with these groups and recording their musical performances. I was requested by my record company in Taiwan to create an album which explored Taiwan’s traditional and aboriginal music and its environment.

I completed a commission by the Liana provincial government in Taiwan to produce a piece of music which explored their aboriginal and traditional culture through music as well. That piece was debuted for the President of Taiwan.

In Canada, I conceived of and executed a very ambitious language recording project, where I went out to a number of very remote communities and recorded languages through song and legend. I had attended several Elder’s Conferences here, and it became so clear to me that when they died, they were taking with them a window to the past. I approached the Aboriginal Language Council, and the Elder’s Council and told them that I felt I should start recording songs and legends in the original languages, because only the elders knew this part of their oral history, and that when they died, these languages would die with them.

Starting in 1994, I traveled around to several Yukon communities to record stories, legends and songs in the languages of the various tribes: i.e. Southern Tutchone, Northern Tutchone, Gwich’in, Tlingit. Over the course of about two years, as I began to develop an environmental project called the Caribou Commons Project, I continued recording aboriginal voices, thoughts and sentiments, in their native languages, and then used the voices in the environmental projects.

These were annual multimedia concert projects where we would go on expeditions in certain wilderness areas which were critical habitats, and faced some kind of threat. I would compose music out there, record sounds of the environment, with some aboriginal people speaking their thoughts about the issue, often elders in language. I was doing this in conjunction with my friend Ken Madsen who is an amazing wildlife photographer and environmental activist. He would capture images and I would compose music, record sounds and then produce these annual concert events. They were called Annual Wildlands Projects. We did about seven of them.

The last one was called the Caribou Commons Project, focusing on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, and the Canadian range of the Porcupine Caribou herd, which ranges through the Yukon and part of the Northwest Territories. That is currently the focus of this year’s efforts. The Caribou Commons Project was the biggest incarnation of the Wildlands Projects. It has been ongoing since 1999. We toured that across Canada and the US. But it wasn’t until we got into the States, where we performed at venues like the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, and eventually ended in the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC, that we played to really large houses on this side of the Pacific Ocean.

Our next event is the kickoff to the “Walk to Washington, DC.” event, in Seattle, in August. The advisory board to this event, (conceived to raise money and awareness for the environment.) include: the heads of the Sierra Club, the World Wildlife Fund, the Wilderness Society, the Gwich’in chiefs of Old Crow and Arctic Village, Norma Kassie of the Vuntut Gwich’in (Yukon Gwich’in), David Suzuki.”

The Canadian media has been really difficult to inspire.

Maybe it’s time for Canada to sit up and listen.

Discography:

2001: In So Many Words–Release in Canada & Taiwan, September 21, 2001

2000: Touching the Earth–recorded in Asia, Central America, & North America
13 weeks on Taiwan’s International Top 20 pop charts

1999: Voyage to Paradise–9 weeks on Taiwan’s International top 20 pop charts

1999: Caribou Commons (Wildlands with Matthew Lien)–featuring sound recordings from the
high arctic of Yukon and Alaska andthe Great Plains of Nebraska and South Dakota

1998: Confluence–recorded in China and North America

1997: Bleeding Wolves–sales in excess of 150,000 copies in Southeast Asia–3 weeks on Taiwan’s International Top 20 pop charts

1991: Music to See By

www.matthewlien.com

By Danny Beaton

The traditional Hopi spiritual elders say that we have not learned our lessons in the past from our use of technology. Technology is now having a world of its own. We are using technology to accumulate wealth and power. We are now using technology for the wrong reasons. Technology is now out of control.

Hopi elders say that developers only see money, profit and gain from Mother Earth. For one thousand years the Hopi have grown corn in the desert and offered eagle feathers to the spirits giving thanks. The Hopi say that we come from Mother Earth and we go back to Mother Earth when we die.

Native Americans have great respect for Hopi spiritual leaders, because the word Hopi means peaceful people and Hopi are praying for harmony and balance Mother Earth. Hopi spiritual elders believe they are caretakers of Mother Earth as do most Native Americans who follow their traditions.

Since the late 1800’s Hopi have been pressured, manipulated, threatened and coherced by church, military and government into giving up their land, freedom, culture and in many ways their health.

All across The United States Native Americans have suffered loss of identity and witness the destruction of Mother Earth from rape of their forest, rivers, lakes, streams and mountains. There are plenty of films, books, documentation from people of Sioux, Seminal, Arapaho, Cheyenne, Apache, Choctaw, Cherokee, Ojibwa, Penobscot, Iroquois tribes and many others who will testify to the atrocities and cultural/environmental genocide in North America.

The people have suffered so badly from past humiliation, lies of broken treaties, poverty and massacrers that it has taken Indians a lifetime to understand culture shock and tyranny. Our faith keepers, clan mothers, chiefs and medicine people are struggling to voice their concern for the health of our people, animals, fish, birds, rivers, lakes and sacred Mother Earth.

The Iroquois people have been giving the messages to the world, same as the Hopi and Traditional Native Americans that our Mother Earth is in great danger, that the earth is in a crisis. The old elders are saying that the natural powers demand respect and understanding if there is to be a future.

One of the most consistent sources of that understanding is Indigenous people. The old elders say that policies, agendas and laws are protecting corporations, developers and world banks to contaminate, rape and destroy Mother Earth.

It seems that although some of the dominant society, government and military have begun to learn from their unjustifiable mistakes of assimilation of Native People there is still a strong contingent of society who cannot understand their responsibilities to Mother Earth and Creation.

Our spiritual leaders and medicine people have taught our youth to give thanks for all that we have, they do not teach us to demand more from our Creator. Native People across the Americas have the same thinking when it comes to respecting Mother Earth and all the gifts that we receive from her.

Only lately since the arrival of non Natives are we forgetting our original instructions as ceremonies and our role as caretakers of Mother Earth.

I write these words today because there are native people who think it is acceptable to dam rivers, divert rivers, kill rivers and flood the land with reservoirs. There are Indians who think it is important to turn natural beauty into concrete, lights, wires, noise and pollution.

There are some native peoples in Quebec who think they have the right to sell the earth for profit and turn a beauty, so natural, original and awesome into a puzzle for engineers and architects, buyers, sellers and fools, to waste and destroy. The military nightmare and terrorists who have lost their spiritual path have become the extension of misguided opportunists.

Unfortunately some native people are forgetting their instructions and duties to natural law, to the forces and powers that govern human beings. The old elders are still giving thanks, still burning their medicines and still singing their songs for peace and harmony.
Our children need guidance, protection and wisdom, we need to show creativity, harmony, love and respect to the natural world so that all of Creation will be happy.

For thousands of years the Northern Cree Nation maintained harmony and respect for Mother Earth like Hopi, Iroquois and Traditional Native Americans. The Northern Cree are being threatened by the same invasion and colonization as did the rest of the Americas.

The Cree have lived rather isolated lives because of harsh climate and inaccessibility. The lack of interest over the last hundred years from Quebecers exploiting Cree territory was largely due to the fact that the land was thought to be worthless.

Lately, the Quebec government has put their minds to the idea of controlling Northern Rivers for their use to profit, separate from Canada and sell energy powers to The United States.

In reality, today, what the Cree Nation would face is assimilation and loss of culture and human rights if the handful of Cree leadership were to give up their territory for development.

As Matthew Mukash puts it, who is the deputy to Matthew Coon Come the National Chief of Elected Chiefs of Canada “What we are dealing with today is what our ancestors have been dealing with since day one of the contact with foreigners – the spirit of colonization and the effect of oppression that comes with it.

There is a plan by governments to eventually take full control and occupy Eeyou Istchee. This is a fact. Unfortunately, the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement (JBNQA) spills out the road map for this eventual takeover. We have to take a very serious look at this matter as a nation. I feel that we are blinding ourselves to a process that aims to restrict our freedom to exercise our sovereign authority as people over Eeyou Isthcee.”

Annie Mouse, Cree woman from James Bay put it this way “Our concept of property has always been different from the European view which is land represents wealth and exploitation of that land means more money, power and prestige. To us the land represents life and respect of that which ensures life for generations of Crees to inhabit the land. We are not concerned with the maximization of wealth by desecrating the land so that our children are left without a land to hunt or fish upon and cannot drink the water. The actions of this process go beyond a mere deal, they seek to redefine our identity and to diminish our relationship to the land and everything associated with it.”

Ever since Europeans came to this North American continent nothing is ever enough for them, having cities, having freedom, having families, having jobs. Native people have shared their territories in Canada, there were no wars fought in Canada for land.

There were sacred their territories made over the years to give each people red and white the needs required for each culture to be happy. Non natives have not stopped their minds from racing or their hands from grabbing everything that can be used to make money, no matter if things get damaged or it life suffers.

Today, because of the mentality of exploitation of natural resources, contamination from mining, pollution of lakes, rivers and streams have caused sickness, culture shock and hopelessness. Indian people have suffered all over the Americas from the destruction of their homelands by non natives neglecting environmental concerns.

Toxic chemicals are polluting our continent, genetic/bioengineering threatens to destroy every aspect of our earth. Non native scientists are lying for industry and government. The assault to nature has reached unimaginable proportions with no respect for natural law or nature or natives. The assault of nature for profit has created sickness and contamination to our water, air and earth.

We are experiencing an epidemic of cancer. Native people are suffering from a way of life that is still foreign and is superficial and unhealthy.

The world around us is in chaos from western thinking and western priorities. The lies initiated by Europeans destroy life and are threatening the natural world. For thousands of years natives lived in respect and in awe with the surrounding of forests and waters so beautiful, with animals, fish and life that they themselves are overcome with thanks. Natives created songs and prayers of thanksgiving to be one with nature.

If the mentality and values of non natives continue to hurt the natural world as it is, and continue to influence the native people in a negative way, all hope will be lost in protecting what should be natural and clean.

Our children need wisdom, guidance and protection so that they can think good and do good things, they need to be spiritual like our anestors were and were able to keep and withstand annihilation. Our children need spiritual medicine, spiritual wisdom from the protectors, peacekeepers and leaders of life.