Vancouver Island and British Columbia. Nature Beings, Ghosts, and Ancestor Spirits. The Earth is Sacred.
An increase in tanker traffic could be the death of the Coast Salish people, not an oil spill. A review of the Coast Salish and Nuu-chah-nulth testimony presented to the National Energy Board of Canada.
Continue reading “Why the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion Could Be Genocide”
This past weekend, I was fortunate enough to attend a Plant Medicine Workshop taught by Cowichan Elder Della Rice Sylvester. It was held in the Skutz Falls area near Cowichan Lake and hosted and organized by Rebecca Christofferson. Auntie Della (as I have been taught to refer to female elders) describes herself as a cultural keeper and healer. Continue reading “Cowichan Elder Della Rice Sylvester’s Medicinal Plants Workshop”
This is a short First Nations ghost story taken from Franz Boas’ 1895 text, Indian Myths and Legends from the North Pacific Coast of America, which was translated from German by Dietrich Bertz.
The city of Nanaimo – where I live – received its name from the Anglicized spelling of Snanaimuq (Snuneymuxw or Snuh-NAY-Moo), which is the name of the First Nations people whose traditional territory I live in.
The Origin of Fire
In the beginning, the ghosts (of the dead) owned fire.
Continue reading “The Origin of Fire: A Nanaimo First Nations Ghost Story”
