Offer respect to water world spirits

Spring run-off has created a temporary waterfall on a rock cut. White water spray touches black asphalt.

Turn left off of the Trans-Canada about 45 km west of Kenora, and a winding dirt road - water welling up at its sides - leads you to a sign announcing the community of Iskatewizaagegan (Shoal Lake) #39 First Nation.

#In the first home past the sign, Kathleen Greene walks past her grand-daughter and her daughter, who is making a star blanket, into the kitchen.

Her husband Robin joins her at the table.

The water for the tea has been pumped from Crowduck Lake, a stone's throw away, behind the house. Further down the dirt road is Shoal Lake, the source of Winnipeg's drinking water.

The Iskatewizaagegan couple work together as counsellors, healers and teachers.

"Just because we shower and cook with water all the time doesn't mean it will always be there for us like it is now," warns the soft-spoken 75-year-old Ojibway Elder, a former grand chief of Grand Council Treaty #3.

He says that his ancestors foretold that our water would become polluted to the point that clean water would become so scarce it would be rationed.

Last winter, he adds, locals turned to bottled water after a parasite was discovered in the Shoal Lake water that flows through an aqueduct to Winnipeg.

Robin says people are back to drinking from the lake and an improved water treatment system is now being built in Iskatewizaagegan.

But last winter's experience was cause for concern.

"It's scary when you have to go buy water from the shelf," Robin said.

"There's danger from the high amount of pollution in our air and rivers. What it all boils down to is respect."

Kathleen, 54, is a member of the Opaskwayak Cree First Nation in Manitoba, but has lived in Iskatewizaagegan for 13 years. She remembers being taught as a young girl to respect water.

"My grandmother used to take me down to the river - the Saskatchewan River runs through The Pas, [Man.] - to pray to the Creator and the spirits in the water; to give thanks for the many purposes we use it for."

Giving thanks meant placing tobacco, food and gifts in the water, she said.

"We were always told that each time we go on the water, to canoe, boat or fish, to offer tobacco to show respect for the water world.

"A long time ago when our people started to forget where life came from, they started to get sick. The Creator looked down and took pity on the people and said 'I will give you four medicines.' The first of those gifts is tobacco."

It is offered when you need to know something or to ask for something, Kathleen said. Teachings about the sacredness of water were connected to teachings of creation.

"When the Creator created mother earth, he put a balance here - man and women. There were certain responsibilities that were given to the women - to give life and to take care of the water," explains Kathleen, who once worked as a registered nurse in northern Manitoba and often assisted in the delivery of babies.

"When babies are born, that water comes first. It clears a path for our babies to travel to mother earth . . . The teachings tell us to treat that water and all of her aspects as you would your mother."

It's the woman's responsibility to teach her daughters and grand-daughters to make offerings to the water spirits, she said. The water spirits, in turn, will take care of children playing in the water, whether they are swimming or skiing.

Men were also given certain responsibilities, Kathleen says: to be providers, protectors and fire keepers for their families and to teach their sons those roles. Robin, who as a young man made a living for 17 years as a guide on Shoal Lake, said there is still room for the crush of visitors who converge on Kenora area lakes in summer.

"There's a lot of room out there," he said. "I guided all types of people in all kinds of professions, and I found them to be kind, sociable people in many ways. As long as people are careful - that's all I would like tosee. All of us have to learn to protect our interests in what is out there.

"You don't want to be in a situation where you have to move away from a place."