Metis Heritage Day is adding major touches of authenticity this year. For the first time in their annual fete at Fort George Park, a Red River cart and a teepee will be on display.
The cart, one of the seminal symbols of Metis life dating back to their beginnings in the general area of Manitoba / Saskatchewan, was built by the young inmates of the youth containment centre.
The teepee was also a common amenity for the culture born out of mixing aboriginal (mostly Cree and Ojibway) and European (mostly French and Scottish) parentage. It will be erected as a visual attraction and an education opportunity.
The term Metis today recognizes a broad Canadian socio-landscape of aboriginal people from mixed ethnicity. It is rooted, however, in that Red River region during the late 1700s and early 1800s. Although young as an official culture, Metisism has had a colourful, interesting, tragic, dramatic path to modern times, most notably the military and political calamities centred on their main folk hero Louis Riel - hung for treason in 1885 but celebrated today as a Father of Canada.
"I'm a modern Metis. This is my first teepee," said Raymond Hourie, president of the Prince George Metis Community Association, and he won't be the only one. Due to intense prejudice and intolerance within Canadian culture over the last 100 years, it is only in recent decades that being Metis has become a point of pride once again.
"We are really relearning a lot of what it means to be Metis, but that's a lot of fun for us, and important that we do it for the next generations," Riel said.
Putting up the teepee is a Metis 101 course in itself. One of the people best able to convey those lessons is Dennis Ouellette, the association's designated cultural guide. He is a direct descendent of Battle of Batouche veteran Joe Ouellette who was killed in the conflict at the age of 93. According to family lore, the fatal shot hit him on the last day of the battle after he refused an escape option because he wanted to kill redcoat insurgents with his few remaining musket balls.
Ouellette said the teepee is seen through Hollywood eyes as some mobile home for Indians, but each one is a spiritual symbol from top to bottom. They are not put together haphazardly.
"A teepee is like a sweat lodge, only it has a hole in the top to release the energy, the smoke," he said. "It represents the womb, the woman, the giver of life and caretaker of community."
Each teepee has 15 poles, all of them possessing a meaning. The first three are linked together on the ground then pushed upwards as the main basis for building, and those three poles represent obedience, respect and humility "the three bases of life," Ouellette said.
The next ones are happiness, love "but not romantic love, it's the acceptance of self and connection to community," then faith, "but not in the religious sense - in the sense of that raw curiosity inherent in all of us about where all this is going as people and humanity."
The seventh pole is kinship, the eighth is cleanliness which includes the mind as well as physical grooming, the ninth represents thankfulness or gratitude, number 10 is sharing which includes volunteering and recycling and empathy as much as physical partaking, and the 11th pole is for strength, which Ouellette said "definitely means physical power but also autonomy of self and the ability to problem-solve."
Twelve is representative of good parenting, 13 is for hope, and the two remaining poles are the ones guiding the top-flaps so their symbolism - dutifulness and self-control - is tied to the moderation of smoke and energy from within the teepee.
"The tapered skirt that wraps around the poles is symbolic of the woman, how she wraps around the family and the community in protection and love," he explained.
The placement of the door - always facing east - has meaning. It looks at the sunrise in deference to the power of the new day dawning, renewal, rebirth, rising up and standing to face the challenges of the day and the world.
Even inside the teepee there is symbolism, in that movement is counterclockwise "because clockwise is seen as a typically male movement, so inside the symbol of the female one does the opposite in respect to women."
All these lessons and more form some of the new features the local group is implementing at the commemorative event being held on Father's Day. Also there will be the usual slate of entertainers and food and crafts that touch on Metis heritage. The master of ceremonies is celebrated local musician and social advocate Ivan Paquette.
All this happens at the Fort George Park bandshell on Sunday while at the same time, at the other end of the park, the Cruisin' Classics Show 'n' Shine is going on. The Metis organizers encourage families to enjoy the spectacular automobiles on display then wander over for some songs and refreshments in the style of a truly Canadian culture that is part of all founding societies within our diverse nation.
The events at the park run from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday.
