Erin - Deer Lake

Hello!

We have finished our first week of camp, and I'm already tired. But I'm absolutely loving it; this place is so incredible. Sometimes it's hard to believe I'm still in Canada, it's so different from anywhere or anything I've ever seen before. At the same time, it's hard to imagine Canada could be anywhere but here. The landscape is just trees and clear lakes for miles around.

Deer Lake is a First Nations community of about 900 people. It is very spread out though, and it takes over an hour to walk from one end of town to another. All the houses are very similar, wood buildings in various states of disrepair, usually with two or three families living in them. The roads are either so dusty that every time a car drives up it clogs your throat and nose, and you can barely see, or if it has been raining they are slick mud. You have to wear rainboots and every step has a very satisfying squelchy noise. The people are generally pretty friendly, and will often pick us up and give us a ride if we are walking home. On our first night here we were walking home from the grocery store and a man stopped to pick us up. He had seen a bear on the road up ahead and didn't think we should walk by it!

Not everyone loves us, you can tell that some people resent our presence. One of the hardest parts of our job is integrating ourself with the community. Alot of white people come through here - teachers, nurses, bible thumpers, and camp counselors alike - and not alot of people stay. The community is used to the 'just passing through' attitude that alot of the teachers and such have, so we have to make a definitive effort to show that we want to be a part of life here for the short time we are here.

Our staff consists of myself and Alex who are living together in the teacher's residence, and Tracy and Julie who are both from Deer Lake. We have very different styles as far as running camp goes. Julie, who is only 19, doesn't really seem to love kids or the idea of having to work every day. I think her parents pushed her into this, so it's a bit of a challenge to work with her. Especially considering they sent four southern counselors up last year, and we have only two. The kids keep asking "Where are the rest of you?"

It's funny how no one really makes plans here, they just show up at your door and tell you to get in the car. On Saturday Tracy, who is one of our counselors from Deer Lake, showed up and told us to get in the car, we were going to make pizza. We ended up going down to where the funeral was happening for an elder in the community who had just passed. Then we went and picked up stuff to make pizza, and she just dropped us back at our house and said she would pick us and the pizza up in two hours. It turned out she didn't have a stove of her own and wanted us to make pizzas for her sons birthday party, which we were subsequently invited to. It was buzz lightyear themed.

People don't say alot around here, so much of what is to be communicated needs to be inferred. If tracy had gone to anyone else in the community's door and said that they were going to make pizza, the person would have immidiately known that tracy didn't have a stove so they were making the pizza, and that the pizza was for her son's birthday and that she was inviting them over for dinner. All that from the sentence "Get in the car, we're going to make some pizza". So Alex and I are learning to just roll with it. When she shows up and tells us to get in the car, we're going to the beach, we don't ask, we just get in. Turns out most of the community was at the beach, and we got a chance to meet some more kids and tell them to sign up for camp.

Another wonderful thing in the community is the TV station. It looks exactly like any of the other houses, except that it has a huge dish outside. Inside there is just a camera pointed at a bulletin board where people can post community announcements. They also have auctions on TV where they auction off everything from video games and bikes to pizza and laundry detergent. It's pretty incredible. And it stands unlocked and empty most of the day; anyone can go in and put themselves on TV. We are hoping to use it with the kids... maybe get them to do some Deer Lake News on TV. We're also going to do some literacy programs of our own whcih will consist of Alex and I reading books on TV.

The kids have really loved camp so far, but it is often difficult because we have alot of kids and only the four of us. When we do crafts, every single one of them wants to show you what they did, and with almost 50 kids it can get a bit hectic. I'm practically swimming through children thrusting their crafts in my face, pulling on my hair, and shouting and asking for help gluing this or tying that. By the end of the day I am generally covered in paint. And they LOVE pulling on my braid. They find it completely baffling and will ask me constantly "Is this real?" "Why do you have that?"

But I love each and every one of them already. They are so eager and excited to be doing camp, they're just these little warm balls of potential. More than anywhere else I've ever worked I feel like these kids will benefit from being given the tools for knowledge and creating. They are so appreciative of our being here and giving them something to do with their summer, and for just paying attention to them. Alot of their parents are struggling with alcoholism, or are unemployed. Alot of kids come to camp just for the snacks and will tell us they didn't get any breakfast.

This past weekend we were hoping to go fishing on Saturday with a man from the community named Roland, but we couldn't go because there had been a shooting earlier Saturday morning. One guy is dead and the other is in critical care and had to be helicoptered out. Thirty police officers were flown in and there has been a full blown investigation. Some of the police officers are staying in the teacherages and we have made friends with them. When we told us what we were doing for the summer, they just asked "Why on earth would you want to come here?" I tried to tell them the value I felt the experience would have, and how good it feels to be helping people who need you. Their response was "Well it's not so bad here, at least you're not in Pikangikum" (That's where Mark is right now).

Even though our fishing trip had to be cancelled, Roland had us over for a fish fry for lunch anyways. He is an absolutely amazing man. He just recently had to step down from the school board, which is a crime, because he is so committed to the kids here, and their education. He is intelligent and very compassionate, and just overall an incredibly interesting person to talk to. He could have gotten a job in Winnipeg, he was saying, but he wanted to stay here, where the kids really need someone to fight for them. When he was on the board he used to have them put aside funding for the literacy camps. He showed us some videos of stuff they had done in the past and it looked amazing. We have very limited resources compared to what previous years have been allowed. It is a shame. I think he will be back on the board in the fall. For the sake of the kids here I hope so.

Anyways, I have to be heading off, I need to go buy snack supplies for next week and plan out some activities. I will try to post again before the end of the summer. I hope you are all happy and healthy in your own adventures,

Much love,

Erin