It was a tremendous honour to attend Cultural Camp at Sweetgrass First Nation these last few days. It’s also a great personal honour to be part of Wes Fineday’s vision for cultural repatriation, along with Cree Literacy Network colleagues Aaron Fay and Samara Harp as well as Dawn Marie Marchand and Dorothy Thunder. I’m afraid to name names, for fear of omitting so many important participants, but I think special thanks are owed to Chief Lorie Whitecalf, who believed in the event, and trusted its organization and planning to sisters Pamela Peterson and Kim Weenie. In what must have felt like a super-marathon run in tandem, they planned the event on short notice, hard on the heels of the Sweetgrass Powwow. I’m also happy to send thanks to Greta Fineday, who warmly greeted me at the camp’s cooking station, when I arrived at 6:30am and wondered (môniyaw-like) where everybody was!
Charlene Bonnar, the visionary behind Wes Fineday’s Telus Storyhive podcast series, Asokân: Building Bridges allowed me to share her words:
Thank you to Sweetgrass First Nation – Official for an amazing 5 days at the powwow and culture camp! I have always enjoyed my time at Sweetgrass visiting Wes Fineday, but over the past few days, my daughter and I were welcomed by the entire community. As events wrapped up on Sunday and we were packing up, I didn’t want to go home! Thank you for sharing the beauty and energy of this space. Of course, I appreciated the stories and teachings, but visiting Spirit Drumming Hill was a personal highlight. I look forward to connecting with newly made friends and returning next summer!
And while breathtaking, unspoiled Spirit Drumming Hill will always be a privlege to visit, I think my own might have been visiting Wisahkecahk’s Sliding Hill in the company of two dear friends: Dorothy Thunder and Dawn Marie Marchand who travelled from Edmonton and St Paul to be part of the event.
I hope you’ll all forgive me for sharing so many photos! It really was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that I’ll be hoping to repeat some time soon! I’ll be telling stories for years. kinanâskomitinâwâw: I am grateful to you all.
(Apologies that the photos are unattributed: Some were provided by Charlene Bonnar, some are from the Sweetgrass FaceBook group, and others are my own.)
