Students’ monument provides warmth to residential school survivors

Almost all of the roughly 150 students from Kitigan Zibi Kikinamadinan school, as well as teachers and a dozen or more residential school survivors took part in a respectful yet joyous ceremony on Thursday, honouring Indian Residential School attendees, both those who survived and those who didn’t.

On a hilltop near the school, they placed rocks, which the students had painted orange, in a circle, placing tobacco on each as an offering. In the centre of the circle sat a large boulder, also painted orange, under which were buried four large birchbark baskets containing the hundreds of youngsters’ shoes that had been left at Parliament Hill in memory of the residential school students. The shoes were buried by the school’s Grade-1 and -2 students in a June ceremony. It’s hard to imagine a better use for those small remembrances than to form the foundation of a celebratory monument.

“This is a monument where students, for years from now, can come and honour residential school students,” said Alison Commando, a guidance counsellor at the school. Approximately 100 children from Kitigan Zibi attended residential schools, she added, noting that the ceremony was not one of recrimination or redress, but one of celebration of Indigenous people’s spirit.

“Today is a joyous day, to see students walking up the hiking trail with their orange shirts. They’ve all painted rocks here to contribute to the memorial.

“It’s a great day. We are celebrating the resilience of our people. We’re not looking at the atrocities. We know what happened, but we’re here to say that we’re still here, and our culture is still here and our language is still here. So today is about resilience and coming together.”

Still, it was difficult not to be reminded of the past. Commando’s mother attended a residential school but was one of those who returned.

“Had she been one of those students who didn’t, I wouldn’t exist. My son wouldn’t exist. My family wouldn’t exist.

“As more and more remains kept turning up, that’s all I kept thinking about. We could’ve been totally killed off as a people. So this is my way of saying, yes, I feel sad about those remains, but now we’re saying we’re resilient.”

Thursday’s ceremony, which included prayer, a smudging ceremony, an honour song performed by nine student drummers, and a round dance, also brought residential school survivors together for a lunch. One such survivor, Tony Quewezence, who attended Pelican Falls Residential School in northwestern Ontario, is now a school bus driver for the Kikinamadinan school. Quewezence said he knows all the students at the school, “and it brings life to me when I watch them just being kids, after I had to grow up differently.”

He said the ceremony and monument are important to continue to tell people about those students who never returned home.

“I’m a survivor who did make it home, so I’m trying to make a difference now, to broaden awareness.

“I’m glad the government has started to recognize the truth of what happened. This will never happen again because the survivors that are here in Canada won’t let it. There are about 40,000 of us and if it does happen again, we will stand in front of these children to make sure they’re not taken away.”

Talking to some of the students, it was clear that this wasn’t simply a history lesson, but rather a part of history to which they are tied.

Grade 6 student Bree Tolley’s grandfather attended residential school and has told her stories about his experiences. “I feel bad for him because he had to go through all that bad stuff that they did at the school, but I’m happy he came back.

“I think about that a lot.”

The significance of the ceremony, held on the eve of the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, also resonated with classmate Althea Whiteduck. “They took them away from their moms and dads, and some of them didn’t come back, and that’s wrong,” she said. “This is to honour them.”

Nivea Chabot, meanwhile, summed things up succinctly when she said, “It’s important we remember them.”

The event lasted about four hours as the sun crept higher in the sky to eventually chase the morning’s chill. But Jenny Buckshot Tenasco, who was just six years old when she was sent to St. Mary’s residential school in Kenora in the late 1950s, was warmed by more than just the sun on Thursday.

“Today meant everything to me,” she said afterwards. “I feel very warm and appreciate the students’ words and actions. The ceremony that we had today brings me some peace.”

Have a peaceful National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, wherever you are and whatever you do.

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