By Jessica Wind (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: June 19, 2013
Speakers, drummers and crafts were some of the attractions at yesterday’s National Aboriginal Day event. Held on the green at the Abbotsford Campus, the event marked the biggest SUS event held this year and is second only in size to their annual fall Weeks of Welcome.
Aboriginal representative Ashley Camille organized the event in order to bring all the aboriginal students on campus together.
Camille says approximately 400 students self-identify as Aboriginal.
“But you wouldn’t think that if you go to the aboriginal room or if you just hang out in those areas,” she notes. “There aren’t 400 that come in and out of there,” she said.
Plans for the event started out as a simple awareness day, but quickly grew into a full National Aboriginal Day celebration after Camille noticed a need for it in the area.
“Last year when I was taking classes in the summer, I googled it, I didn’t come up with anything local,” she explained. “There’s no event in the Fraser Valley right now … of this nature that happens this time of year, so that’s why we opened it up to the community,” she explained.
Students from surrounding schools including Terry Fox Elementary and W.J. Mouat Secondary attended the event along with students and members of UFV and the surrounding communities.
Camille commented on the challenges she faced with putting on such a sizable event.
“I have not had to plan an event of this size before and I wasn’t intending to,” she explained. “The thing was learning the ins and outs, what you can and can’t do on campus and collaborating with all the different areas.”
The day was comprised of a variety of tents and presentations, with something new happening every 15 minutes. A troupe of dancers and performing drummers provided entertainment and SUS sold $2 food tickets, each providing a salmon kebab, local produce, authentic bannock and a drink.
The demonstrations and vendors included Wendy Richie’s discussion of the Earth and cedar, Métis finger weaving, crafts by Helena Mussel, carving demonstrations and Michael Forbes glassware.
Apart from the various performances and displays, two speakers were also present at the event.
Bev Sellars, chief of the Soda Creek band near Williams Lake has recently released the book They Called Me Number One: Secrets and Survival at an Indian Residential School. She spoke about her book and the place of Aboriginal individuals in the world today.
Eddie Gardner, current UFV elder-in-residence, was also invited to speak on the medicine wheel.
“There are actually a lot of students who are interested in it, who had heard about it, but they’re a little bit shy to go up and ask somebody, ‘Hey, can you tell me about the medicine wheel?’” Camille explained.
The event began at 10 a.m. on the green and in U-House and the Centre for Indo-Canadian Studies, and ran into the afternoon. As the first event of its size and nature to be held by SUS, Camille is well on her way to fulfilling her campaign promises in her term as Aboriginal rep.
