EP.5: Sharing Gifts with the People - Reflections on Cultural Healing

In Episode 5, Doris invites Feast Centre Elders Wayne Seward (Snuneymuxw) and Catherine Martin (Mi'kmaw) to the table to talk about cultural healing and how each brings their gifts to the people. From speaking about the importance of cedar brushing, to acknowledging the four medicines, to acknowledging 'laughter' as the fifth medicine in our healing, these two Elders use the power of storytelling, mixed with a little bit of humor here and there, to speak about what they bring to community. You will not want to miss this episode! As we always do, this podcast will also feature a song from each Elder, songs that they were given permission to share with the people.


We would like to acknowledge the following for their contributions towards Episode 5 of Indigenous Sexual Futures 

Special Guest(s) 

Wayne Barry Seward - Snuneymuxw Coast Salish 

 Catherine Martin - Mi’kmaw Millbrook First Nations 

 
Songs featured in this episode:

Prayer Song – sung by Wayne Seward

Auntie Maudie’s Song – sung by Wayne Seward

IIGWANAY (Mi’kmaw Chant) – sung by Catherine Martin

Host Storyteller/Producer 

Doris Peltier 

Technical Producer

Paula Burrows - Jupiter Productions 

ISF Theme Music and Creative Sound

Cozmic Cat, Classic Roots, Elder Gayle Pruden 

Indigenous Knowledge Advisory 

Feast Centre Council of Elders and Gathering Lodge Committee  

 
 Executive Producers 

Feast Centre Co-Leads - Randall Jackson & Renée Masching 
 
 

Feast Centre Staff 

Will Gooding (National Director), Catherine Booker (Research Coordinator) and Doris Peltier (Community Engagement Coordinator)

 
 Podcast Branding Design 

Compassion Creative 

 Podcast Web Development 

Catherine Booker 

 Recorded at 

Lyons Media Centre (McMaster University)

 

We acknowledge our funders 

Canadian Institutes of Health Research  

Indigenous Sexual Futures is produced on the ancestral lands of the Mississauga and Haudenosaunee nations within the lands protected by the “Dish with One Spoon” wampum. We acknowledge the ancestors of this territory, and we also acknowledge the lands and territories of all our guests. 

Suggested Reading list coming soon...

Transcript

Indigenous Sexual Futures Podcast Episode 5: Sharing Gifts with the People – Reflections on Cultural Healing

In Episode 5, Doris invites Feast Centre Elders Wayne Seward (Snuneymuxw) and Catherine Martin (Mi'kmaw) to the table to talk about cultural healing and how each brings their gifts to the people. From speaking about the importance of cedar brushing, to acknowledging the four medicines, to acknowledging 'laughter' as the fifth medicine in our healing, these two Elders use the power of storytelling, mixed with a little bit of humor here and there, to speak about what they bring to community. You will not want to miss this episode! As we always do, this podcast will also feature a song from each Elder, songs that they were given permission to share with the people.

[Intro] (00:00 – 00:32) Doris Peltier:

Indigenous Sexual Features is produced by The Feast Centre for Indigenous STBBI Research on the ancestral lands of the Mississauga and Haudenosaunee Nations within the lands protected by the Dish with One Spoon wampum. We acknowledge the ancestors of this territory, and we also acknowledge the lands and territories of all our guests.

[Intro] (00: 57 – 02:00) Doris Peltier:

You are listening to Indigenous Sexual Futures, a podcast storytelling series that is produced by the Feast Centre For Indigenous STBBI Research. And, yes, you heard the word sexual, STBBI's, and research in my first sentence. Hope that caught your attention. But you also heard the word Feast, which is what we hope to do with all of you through this podcast storytelling series. You should also know that we are aligning this podcast series with a growing body of work by scholars, artists, writers, and community in Indigenous futurisms. You will have to listen to our series to learn more about what Indigenous futurisms is and why we dropped the word sexual into the middle of Indigenous futurisms. Stay with us, now let's get started.

(02:03 – 04:53) Doris Peltier:

Adiniwemaaganidook. E-amakawaataagoowazid dizhnigaas, waawaashkesh nidodem. Anishinaabe n’dow. Hello. Welcome to episode 5 of Indigenous Sexual Futures. My name is Doris Peltier. I am Anishinaabe and your host for this podcast storytelling series. In this episode, I invited two very special guests to the table to come and speak to us about cultural healing and was thrilled and honoured when they agreed to join us for this episode. Since time immemorial, our Indigenous knowledges and the transmitting of our knowledges has relied on our storytellers and orators. All guests featured in this storytelling podcast continue in that same vein and tradition, using story that weaves their own experiences to transmit knowledge about, say for example, cultural healing, which is the focus of this episode. Today's guests are known for the work they do on the ground, in community, and for the people. From Coast Salish Territory, we are thrilled to have Wayne Barry Seward. And from Mi'kmaq Territory, we have Catherine Martin, also known as Cathy. Their bios, by the way, are available on the Indigenous Sexual Futures podcast streaming platform and on the Feast Centre website. Both of my guests are also on the Council of Elders with the Feast Centre. I did something a little different in preparing this podcast. I decided to not insert myself too much into Cathy and Wayne's storytelling, only because they are both such amazing storytellers. I wanted the natural flow of the story to emerge and begin to happen. Both my guests also carry songs from their territories, and so I decided to wrap today's podcast storytelling segment with a song on the front end and back end of the segment. Let's just say their storytelling was amazing. As the host and producer of this storytelling podcast series, I had to make a choice in selecting parts of their storytelling to tell the story of cultural healing. Flow of story is important, after all. So, let's get started. We begin with a prayer song from the West. Let's listen.

(04:53 – 13:08) Wayne Seward:

Okay. This prayer song comes from my great grandmother who was not well in the Cowichan Valley, and she asked all the people to come together to help her pray. And what she was saying in our language, she was saying, please help me pray. I don't know how I'm going to be when I pray. Oh, poor me. And with those words, my granduncle, he turned into a prayer for her. So I like singing this in functions such as this when we're coming together to be as one, not so much following coming together to be as one.

[Sings – 05:30 – 09:45]

I am [Indigenous Language - 09:45] and my borrowed name is Wayne Seward. And I am from, Snueneymuxw First Nation. And who is Wayne Seward? You know, that was a question that that was brought to myself one day when we were moving out of our old house. I remember crawling up into the attic there. And our old house was really old. Like, we had two bedrooms and one for the girls and one for the boys. And my parents had a hide a bed in the living room. We had no running water. We had an outhouse. And we were moving out of there so they could build us a new house. And two... my other brothers and I were up in the attic getting stuff out. And we come across this box full of pictures. And there was a picture of a baby in a coffin. And on the back of that picture, it said Wayne Barrett Seaward. And I went, look, I'm dead. And my brothers laughed and... because we didn't know and we laughed. And I said, How come I'm in a coffin? And then we brought it to my parents. And my parents, or my mom actually, was the one that explained to me, when I was born, my dad cried. And he said... because my dad was married had a previous marriage and his son had died and his name was Wayne Barry Seward. And my dad said that I looked just like him and wanted to name me Wayne Barry. And my mom wouldn't let him for the longest time. She finally gave in and named me Wayne Barry Seward. So that's why I am Wayne Barry Seaward. That's who I am. And I always think about that every now and then. And, you know, it was named after my dad's son with his previous marriage. You know, growing up was I think it was okay. A lot of people think it was tough. I mean, you know, we lived in an old house where it had no running water. We had to carry our water in from outside to boil on the wood stove and, take our baths and that and do our dishes with that. And, you know, well not with the bathtub water, but you know. It was, really, something, you know, to grow up in, in that era. Yeah. It was, those were the days that was fun, you know. And, my parents were pretty strict with us when we were born and when they were raising us and she raised us. Mostly my mom. My dad really never really yelled at us or raised a hand to us. It was my mom and we'd always get a good whooping if we did something really bad. And it was really funny because I remember the very first time when we did something bad, you know. And and was really strange because if one of us did something bad, we all got a whooping. We all had to line up and we got a good whooping. And it wasn't just because of, or it wasn't because of what day it is, what that one person did.

(13:08 – 16:01) Catherine Martin:

Well, [Indigenous Language] my name is Catherine Anne Martin, and that's just the English translation into Mi'kmaq. [Indigenous Language] is the Martin and [Indigenous Language] is the Pine Martin, and that's who my family is, the Pine Martin, my dad's side. My parents are from Millbrook. That's where they were raised - in Nova Scotia. And my dad was the poorest of the poor, so, you know, hearing your story always reminds me of my dad's stories. And my dad's family, all of them are storytellers, but my dad, my granddad and his father, my great granddad were great storytellers. So just listening to you, Wayne, I started thinking of, oh, what could I say about something you don't know? So my dad was given an opportunity because he was a trapper and a hunter and a guide since he was a little guy. And, a guy from Boston used to come up and be guided by them and, or my dad and my grandfather would guide him. And he really liked my dad. He watched my dad grow up, and he told him if he ever wanted to come to the States and to Boston, he would bring them and he would sponsor him and he could go to school or learn a trade. And in Nova Scotia, being the poorest of the poor on a Mi'kmaq reserve is pretty pretty low. You can understand this too. Right? And so when he was 16, he decided to go to Boston. And my mom was living in Millbrook as well, and he left her there. And he chose a trade. He chose to learn how to plaster and then eventually drywall. And when he was 18, he ran into the Marines and the Marines recruited him. We were raised with stories. That's how we were always helped when we were having trouble. My dad was a singer, but he never sang publicly. He just sang all the time, and I learned all his songs, old songs. But, he used to tell us stories when like, you know, the heart of a trapper and a hunter is it's not a vicious heart. It's such a caring heart about animals. You know, baby animals and mother animals and making sure that you respect them. And my dad was a big guy, and he had a crew cut till he died because he was a Marine. You know, most people wouldn't think that he had such a heart for little things, and he did. So I was raised whenever any of us were hurting, it hurt him.

(16:02 – 23:21) Wayne Seward:

About 20 plus years ago, I was asked to be part of a cultural support team for, residential school survivors. And they asked me what I could bring to the table. And I said, well, I could probably do some cedar brushing and maybe washing of the tears, because that's what we were raised on doing growing up as children and how to look after ourselves. So they brought me on team and and I remember going to an event where it was just me. Normally, there's a team of us 2 or 3 maybe 4, depending on the amount of people that were gonna be there. When I showed up at this place and there was a lot of people there and it was just me. And I was thinking, wow, how am I gonna do this? Because that's a lot of work. Brush it... is a lot of work brushing people off. It takes a lot when you're brushing them because you're taking all their energy, their energy, the bad energy that they're carrying. And so I thought to myself, I can do this. I'm not gonna have no negative thoughts on this. I'm just gonna do it. And so I explained to the people when before I started. And there was quite a few people there and as the elders, the elderly people there. And I was explaining to them that I'm not a healer. I'm just showing you basically what we do to help ourselves to... as we're going through a lot of pain or hurt or anything, how we take care of ourselves. And we use the cedar to brush ourselves off and take away the bad energy that we're carrying. And it lifts us back up and gives us the good energy. It leaves the good energy that's there as well. So I brushed all these people off and, one at a time. And then I was singing while I was doing it. And then after they all got brushed off, I brought them in up to our tear bowl that I use to get them to wash their face. And after the last one was done, an elder spoke up and he said to me, I know in the beginning you told us you're not a healer. But in our eyes, I could see you're a healer because look, if you look around the room, look how many happy faces you see here today. Just from that, what you had just done for us. And that's healing. That's all a part of healing. And I say to myself still that I'm not a healer, but I allow the people to think, if that's what they wanna think, that I'm a healer. I'll let them say that. It's just because of what we were taught... is growing up. And so that was how I was taught growing up. Just allow them to if they want to call me a healer, then that's okay. So I thought that this would be a great idea to use this on everybody. Like we we've been doing it for quite a few years now, doing all the cedar brushing and things all across Canada. Even after the TRCs, we continue doing this for a lot of different people now. It's not just with people from residential school survivors. It's with everybody now. So it's a great idea to tie it in with, anybody who is going through any turmoils, any... and it's not I feel anyway, that's my feeling that it's not going to heal them but it's going to pick up their spirits. It's gonna help them move forward and carry on because it's, you know, it's gonna help them feel much better. But I guess, yeah, yeah, feel better about themselves and stuff because it does. But you gotta really believe in when you're getting brushed off and getting cleansed that this is going to help you. You can't, You know? So I do this quite a bit with people and help them. So bringing it to another little level, another level, I guess, you say, to help people in other works that I do now, with people who are contracted with maybe HIV and AIDS, that this is going to help them. It's not gonna heal them. No. It's not gonna heal them. But it would make them feel much better about themselves because they're in a deep place, right? Dark places, deep dark places at this point. So we need to bring them out with this. And not only was just just the washing of the tears, we can also after doing the cedar brushing, we can bring them to the river and the creek where we always go when we're doing this sort of work to take care of cleansing their whole spirit, their whole body. As they're going into the water, you turn and you face where the water's coming down and you face and you splash four times thanking the creator to ask for help. And then you dunk down in the water four times and then you back out of the water. And at the edge of the water, you'll have cedar branches and you brush yourself off before you come out of the water. And you don't dry yourself off with a towel because of that water's there on your body to heal you, to look after you, to protect you. And that's what the cedar also is doing. So you don't use a towel to dry off. I see people doing that. And what is the purpose of going in that water for that protection when you're drying it all off? So you just let it, I guess you drip dry. Is that what you call it? You know, put your clothes back out. You go in there on that trail. So you come out and just let that water drip off of you. One of our elders that I used to work with, he was diagnosed with cancer and he was going really fast. And he ended up in the hospital on his death bed. I went to go and visit him and I said, Ron, would you like a cedar brushing? And he said, Yes, please, please. And I brought cedar with me just in case he said yes. So I started brushing him off with cedar and I was ready to start singing while I was brushing him. And but he started singing. And his sisters were on the side of the bed there and they were crying. And, you know, really they thought that, you know, that was something really good for them to witness and see. And then I stopped and I thought that because I figured that was enough. And he says no more and more. So I brushed him off some more and he kept on singing. And then he finally just dozed off and went to sleep. And, his sisters really thanked me for that, for coming in to brush him off. So I sat with them for a little while and then I went home. And just a few hours later, he passed. And our belief was that's what he was waiting for. To help cleanse that way through his transitioning to the other side. The spirit world. He needed that. So yeah.

(23:22 – 23:38) Catherine Martin:

What is the cedar can you tell me about the cedar and why it's it seems we all have a medicine of choice for our tribe or whatever. What does cedar do mean for you?

(23:39 – 24:15) Wayne Seward:

What I can say about it is it's just our beliefs because of we have a lot of trees out there and but the cedar we find is stronger where we find that it does a lot of healing for us when we use it. So that's our belief. For many years they've used that. And they've also used it for making their clothing years back way back in the day out in the cedar bark when they made regalia out of it. I make my regalia out of the cedar bark. We believe it's a protection for us.

(24:16 – 24:22) Catherine Martin:

And does it have medicinal properties like actual that extract out, like, in the bath or…

(24:23 – 25:01) Wayne Seward:

Yes, it does. We use it for cedar bathing. I've never tried it but some people's also boiled it and drank it with other different medicines and drank it when they were either, you know, got cancer or there's something going on with them. They'll drink this, Boil it and drink it. I know my late aunt used to boil a lot of it with other different medicines to cleanse us all the time. She used to use a... dip that a cloth into the medicines that she has boiled and then wash our body with that. She used to use that a lot.

(25:01 – 25:04) Catherine Martin:

So the medicine helped your brain tumour?

(25:05 – 26:37) Wayne Seward:

Yeah. That... I believe it did because continuing with brushing myself off and going up to the mountains to bathe in the creek or the river on basis. When two months after they... I was diagnosed with the cancer, the doctor called me back in to go over the procedure of removing this tumour and starting with the radiation and chemo. And he said, first, I want to do another scan on your brain. And I thought another two more months because, I don't know, it took two or three months for them to do the first scan when they diagnosed me with cancer. But he got me into the hospital that day. And at about 7:30 that evening, he called me into his office. And my sister... older sister came with me. And he turns on this monitor, and he says, this is your... where your tumour is, and this is where your cancer is. Then he turned on this other monitor of the scan he'd done that day, and he says there's no tumor and there's no cancer. What did you do? And I said, I just prayed. He says, it's a miracle. When people get cancer that a lot of times it'll go into remission. But yours didn't go into remission. It's gone. It's disappeared. So you just keep doing what you're doing, he said. That's a miracle. So that's why I believe in that... the cedar brushing and the bathing that we do is it does help us when you believe in it.

(26:39 – 31:11) Wayne Seward:

The song that I'm gonna sing next is... comes from my great grandmother when she was a child. She was with her parents down in the states. They were picking berries and hops, and she was left in a cabin while her parents went out picking berries and hops. And she started crying, and she was asking for her parents. So when she started singing this, more or less crying, this song came out, and this is we call it [27:15 - Not sure what is being said - auntie Maudi?] song.

[Sings – 27:18 – 31:11]

(31:13 – 44:52) Catherine Martin:

We often will be brushed with the eagle fan, you know, and certain elders, certain healers use that, and it's very effective. And it has a similar feeling as I've been brushed with cedar by you a couple times. And it's the same feeling that, you know, you're brushing out a lot of the pain or the sickness, whatever it is, whether it's a physical or a spiritual sickness, that feather, and then at the end, you kind of push it away or put it out to get rid of it. Of course, we use different... the four medicines, the cedar, the sage, sweet grass, and tobacco for different things, smudging. The one medicine that I often... we've been talking about a lot is laughter. And for me, it's the 5th medicine that we all carry in our pocket. All you need to do is raise up those endorphins in your body and it helps. It takes away a lot of things. And so when we were talking about laughter earlier, I was thinking, you know, that's what's so much fun about being a Mi'kmaq is laughing all the time. And, you were speaking about, you know, when or we all were talking about our families laughing at us. Whenever any of us fell down or tripped or hurt ourselves, especially if you fell off a bike or something really funny the way you did it, we would laugh and laugh until we could compose ourselves to go and help the person. And I wondered all the time, like... and laugh like you couldn't move. You're laughing so hard at this poor person, whoever you know, whatever happened to them. And I think, you know, I think that had a lot to do with laughter is like crying. It's an emotion that comes out. And like many of the emotions, we hold them in and that makes you sick and your tears get held in and it makes you sick if you hold that that what is supposed to come out and you hold it in. And a lot of people, unfortunately, were taught in a bad way that you don't cry. You don't you know, you never show your tears. No, it's some of these ways of the settlers and other people just don't make any sense to me because they're telling you to defy the natural... what creator gave us. They gave us tears to cry. And and that's to... those are the most sacred that you can offer for any gift or any prayer is your tears because they come from our mother and they come from our very first grandmothers. And that's a long time ago. For us to continue to carry that ancient sacred water from that first time and now is a miracle. And it must be powerful. When we're when we're giving those sacred drops of water or loads of water, you know, that's so ancient and sacred. But to the question, I mean, there's everybody in the east, we all have different ways of healing. A lot of ours... we've been disconnected quite a bit from our traditional ways because of the 500 years being the longest in contact with the Europeans, you know, the disconnect. And then on top of that, the British and French connection, we had the Catholic religion just came in and told our people not to continue our traditional ways because they were so they were anti-Christian. And so the disconnect is great, but I believe we've... like the tears that we carry from our very first grandmothers, we still have all of that knowledge. It's about how do we bring it out, who helps you to bring it out. And, in terms of being a healer, I don't consider myself a healer, and I certainly don't consider myself an elder. I think that comes to you by the people from my world, that when you start to feel those things, it's because your people have started to acknowledge you. Not the outside people, not the people from outside of your community, your clan, your family, your nation, but the ones from within because it's just a natural thing. If they accept you and you become known as that, it's not like someone's... you don't get put in the phone book for being the healer or whatever. You just know. And for those of the people that are not following that well, it can only hurt them to be going around thinking that they are healing people when it's not there. They don't have... that hasn't been given to them yet. Maybe they're working on it, but you know who you are from your community. And even if your community is three people because you don't have connection to the rest of your nation for whatever reason, you start to understand, okay, I am. So as a healer, all I know is that I am a singer. I sing. And I don't know, like, unfortunately, like you, I don't know all those ancient songs or chants because of our disconnect. So a lot of things were borrowed, but there are some ones like the Eagle and [37:19 - Not sure of spelling - Kwanu'te'?], or ones that Sarah Denny gave to many of us and taught us not everybody is supposed to sing this, and you're not just to sing it at certain time anywhere. There are... there's a purpose. And that worries me when people are running around singing our songs and not understanding why they're singing, because you could be singing a death song at a, you know, at a wedding. And there you go. You know what's gonna happen to that wedding. No. No. Cut that part out. Yeah. So because so many of our ways have been borrowed until we ourselves, as Mi'kmaq, connect and get deeper into our ceremony, there are a lot of ways that have been borrowed, and they're not ours. And I worry about those using other people's knowledges and ways that aren't ours. I worry about that because I was taught by wonderful elders, wonderful knowledge keepers. I was taught and told, not just taught, like they tell you, this is what is and this is it and that's it. So I've been very lucky to be taught by Sarah Denny, by old, old people. The basket makers were my greatest teachers. I worked for them for many, many years. And there's so much in the baskets. There's so much knowledge and healing and information in those baskets. So I've only known, as I told you, the old Italian woman decided I was... told them I was gonna be the singer. And, they never called me a singer. They called me a crier, a screecher. I never... they didn't call it singing. But that would be getting your voice ready. Right? Like stretching the vocal cords, I would imagine. And so I was being taught by a different drummer who wasn't always present, but I knew they were there. So singing is what I am. And drumming, I found the drum probably in my early twenties, not in ceremony. I found it because I was a performer, and I was doing Mi'kmaq theater stories, and I sang, and I started to learn. Sometimes you wonder or people wonder, how did you get here? It's not something you wake up and, oh, or maybe you're groomed all your life, but maybe you're not. But there's always something in you that tells you you're supposed to be doing something. And as you get closer to that source, you understand what you're doing. And people are brought to you. You run into people in your life because you're supposed to, and they're supposed to come to help you. So Sarah Denny was one of the greatest teachers I had and Charlie Labrador, of Wildcat Mi'kmaq community. Lots of elders have been my teachers, but there's been some that were, you know, gently teaching me how to be and to help bring out my gifts. And Sarah said there was a little issue once over my grandfather. He died, and his second marriage was to a non native person. And she did not want me to sing at the funeral, and my dad wanted me to. And so I went to Sarah, and I said, I was broken hearted. And she said, you listen to your grandfather. He's asking you to sing. Don't listen to anybody else because your gift is singing, and you are supposed to share whatever gift you have with the people. And some of us have certain gifts that are a lot you know, they're maybe a little stronger than others, and that's when you are encouraged to use that to help the people. That's why you have it. If you're a great orator, if you're a great dancer, if you're, you know, a great writer, you are to share those gifts, not sell them and not charge for them. That's a different thing. If people are running around charging for their performance, it is not... has nothing to do with ceremony and medicine and healing. I say that for the public to understand, to be very careful when you ask somebody to come and help you. Know who they are because they could hurt. They can hurt themselves, first of all, but it cannot be useful for the people you're helping. So I started to understand. I always say the drum was my teacher. I was so fortunate to meet the drum, even at a time when I wasn't following any kind of traditional red road, sacred, any path. But the drum came, and it slowly, like my teachers, had patience with me to help me understand when I shouldn't have the drum, when I shouldn't have the feather. You know? And then I started to understand I can't live this lovely, fun life of mine and do this. I have to make a choice. So that's when I with the drum and my elders, I... and they weren't telling me to do it. They were telling me, but in a spiritual way, that I I chose to not do any more, you know, drugs or alcohol or... and I was gifted with two babies after that. And they were the greatest they are the greatest gifts of all. And they too helped me understand what I was supposed to do for the people. And my life is only richer because of community. And I'm so sad for people who don't have community because I would not be here without them. And, like, even the community you have a family that you're born into, but then you meet the rest of your family on your journey like you're my family that I'm part of here. And without this family, I would have very difficult time getting through the last couple years of my life since I've met you. You know, I've just had some pretty heavy challenges coming forward in with the illnesses and death. But, you learn from that experience when you're getting helped. You learn about more medicine. You learn about healing and what works. So my drum is the heartbeat of Mother Earth. It's the heartbeat of our mother and our very first grandmother because we carry that heartbeat through her blood and her beat and her water, her tears come from the very first grandmother. So how more powerful can it be when you sing or when you cry or when you drum, if that's if you believe in this, like you were saying, you have to believe or you have to try to believe.

(44:53 – 48:58) Catherine Martin:

This is a chant that we sing whenever we come together as clans, as hunting districts here in Mi'kma'ki. And Sarah Denny of Eskasoni was a Mi'kmaq knowledge keeper and also a cultural officer for Mi'kmaq Association of Cultural Studies. And in the sixties, when we were allowed to begin to vote and also in this country and also we were able to begin to sing again even though it was still against the law we were allowed. She asked the Mi'kmaq Grand Council if she, as a woman, could start to sing this again, and the grand chief at the time and the Grand Council gave her permission to bring this back to the people and, because of her knowledge of not just the language, but her ancient knowledges, she understood these were on a wax cylinder, she heard at the Museum of Civilization. So wax cylinders are a bit fast or slow, so you have to kind of figure out how it is really sung. So this, she started to sing it and brought it to this point. Lillian Marshall of Chapel Island showed me how it was done along with some Mi'kmaq women elders, Margaret Johnson, Rita Joe, Eileen Julian, and other women taught me that when we would come together at Chapel Island or any other of our summer gatherings, the 7 hunting districts from the East Coast would come together, and they would wait with their clans in their canoes until it was time for them to come to join the circle. Everybody knew when it was their time. So the hosting community would be there and one at a time, the clans would come in with their canoes. The lead would come in and with his hands behind his or her back, would greet each one in in the circle in a dance. And this is the chant that goes with it. It's a little different. People hear it differently, sing it differently. Ben Christmas was recorded, chief Ben Christmas of Membertou in, I think, on the wax cylinder. And so this is where this chant comes from.

[Sings: 47:38 – 48:58]

(48:59 – 52:22) Doris Peltier:

Miigwech To my 2 guests, Wayne Barry Seward and Cathy Martin. You know, I love when the flow of story begins to happen, when storytellers just naturally begin to speak to each other, which is why I decided to remove myself, and edit out any guiding questions that I had had. As that natural flow began to emerge, it stirred my own memory to remember the storytellers of my own childhood. It was beautiful. O’Siem, Wayne. Wela’lieg aq, Cathy. Miigwech. Now, two big takeaways for me, and there were many. I learned more about cedar from Wayne as he described how he uses cedar to work with the people, particularly on how it is used in the West Coast. My first takeaway, using cedar and our medicines is holistic. And for those who use cedar in the east, like in my own territory, there are similar uses. When we talk about using holistic approaches when responding to STBBI in our communities, if we just focus on the disease, that is part of the problem, as it opens the door to stigma. We need to incorporate our use of these medicines. I learned something new, especially how you can use cedar on the land and immerse yourself into a river stream as part of the cleansing. I love that. Despite colonial disruptions that caused our ceremonies to go underground we have not lost these cultural healing practices. They are being revitalized for the next 7 generations. Another big takeaway that also embraces holistic approaches was when Cathy said, there is a 5th medicine, and that is laughter. I agree. And I hope that you, our listeners, also agree. Perhaps the next time you laugh, think about how that laughter feels in your body. As an example, how do you feel when you see a group of aunties laughing? Think about it. There were deep and profound truths that we heard today. The power of story, when we hear story, is that each person takes what they need from story. Our spirits and our bodies remember and we will remember what we heard from Wayne and Cathy. Listeners, I want to thank you too for tuning in to this podcast. This wraps up episode 5. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. In closing, we would like to acknowledge our funders, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, for making yet another aspect of The Feast Centre possible. Thank you for tuning in. This is Auntie D, your host, signing off. Baamaa-pii miniwas kakinoodidme! Miigwech!

Outro (52:24 – 52:41):

There's so much healing that needs to take place. And we, as Anishinaabe, people have these sacred items that Creator left us that we can share with the world in our healing journey where ourselves and everybody else that walks with us equally.