A special ceremony on Lac La Ronge Thursday saw survivors of residential schools gathering in hopes of putting the past behind them.
Members of the Indian Band built a wooden boat, a replica of one that patrolled Lac La Ronge for decades. Each September, it would pick students up from remote communities around the lake and take them to residential schools.
Helen Bizantyne was one of those students. She would be taken from her family in September and wouldn't see them again for months .”I was treated very very badly. I didn't forget for a long time. My dad told me, he was a minister you know, he said don't ever forget how you were treated."
The Indian Band built this boat for Helen and others survivors with the intention to set it ablaze and hopefully burn away a dark legacy that hangs over their people. But first, to bridge the past and the future, they invited school children to take a ride in it with the elders.
Lac la Ronge Chief Tammy Cook-Searson says moving on doesn't have to mean forgetting. She says she will always remember what happened to her.
“When I went to residential school the first thing they did was cut my hair. And I remember sitting there crying because I loved my long hair. And then not being allowed to speak Cree and that's the only language I knew."
But now, Tom Roberts, a support worker for residential survivors, says the community of the Lac La Ronge Indian Band is writing a new chapter in the history books.
“Know where you come from and where you’re going and you will have a good journey.”
