First Peoples’ Bio-Regional Animism

Medicine Tree trips plants cultural seeds that ensure survival of the traditional Salish ways

MEDICINE TREE
By B.L. Azure 5/14/2008

Speakers Tony Incashola, Charlie Quequesah and Pat Pierre told the
gathered that the struggle for survival as Indian people is never
ending. Vigilance is required to maintain what the Creator gave to the
people ages ago and what the ancestors passed on to the present
generations. Perhaps the most important thing that has transited the
ages is the Salish language. The tribal language more than anything
opens the door to the soul of the Salish ancestors and is vital to
revealing the meaning behind their wisdom about the traditional tribal
ways and the need to continue the ways.
“I want to give thanks to the people especially those in the last three
or four years who have taken an interest in learning their culture, in
learning their language,” said Incashola, director of the Salish, Pend
d’Oreille Culture Committee, adding that those presently learning the
traditional ways and history of the Confederated Salish and Pend
d’Oreille people will be the ones that pass the mantle to others
ensuring the survival of the traditions and history. “As younger people
make sure you learn. Pay attention to the elders. Remember who you are
as a people. When we become individuals we are lost.”
Pat Pierre, Pend d’Oreille elder and Salish language teacher at Nkwusm
Salish Language Immersion School, echoed Incashola. “I am thankful to
see all the young people here today. You are the ones that will save
the culture,” he said. “Today we pray that we continue as one people,
as one nation that will continue to forward. We have to make a good
path for the children to follow. We need to keep working at preserving
our language, our culture. We need to continue as one people, we need
to keep talking our language; we need to keep telling our stories. This
is very important to me.”
Pierre said afterwards that he first came to the Medicine Tree in the
late-1930s when he was eight or nine years old. Back then the people
didn’t make the journey annually because of the distance and lack of
transportation among other reasons.
Pierre said although the tribal people didn’t make annual regular
pilgrimages the Medicine Tree, its significance to the Salish people
was ever on their minds and in their hearts.
“The old people (Bitterroot Salish) told us we had these kind of places
here to come to and carry on our cultural ways. They told the stories
in the Salish language,” Pierre said. “My first teacher was my dad’s
mom, my grandmother. My first words were Salish. I spoke the Salish
language until I was six years old than my parents said that I had to
go to school and learn English. I knew some English but I didn’t want
to go to school and learn about it.”
Nevertheless Pierre did go to school and learned the language, history
and ways of the non-Indian. However, he never put that above the Salish
traditional ways.
He said he was encouraged by the resurgent interest in the traditional
ways by the youth of today and was uplifted by the number of people
that were on hand Friday. “A long time ago only a few people would come
here,” he said, adding that the number of people making the pilgrimage
has steadily grown in the last 20 or so years. “This is a pretty good
crowd we have here today.”
Among the people at the Medicine Tree was 12-year-old Maii Pete, a
student at the Nkwusm Language Immersion School in Arlee. Pierre said
that Maii is well versed in the Salish language and that he could
freely converse with her in Salish.
Maii said she understands her mission in life: to learn the Salish
language and traditional ways from the fluent speakers like Pierre and
Stephan Small Salmon, both language teachers at Nkwusm. Then she will
become a teacher that passes the language on to children in the future.
“I feel pretty good about what I am doing,” Maii said. “People have
told me they respect me for this and I feel pretty good about that.”
“She is not afraid to do what she has to do,” Pierre said. “It is her
and the other young ones at Nkwusm that will help save our culture.”
Charlie Quequesah said he too has taken up the mantle of preservation
of the Salish and Pend d’Oreille traditional ways and language and was
thankful to see all the people especially the young ones at the
Medicine Tree.
“The Medicine Tree is part of our identity,” Quequesah said, adding
that he was torn between two emotions on the trip to the Medicine Tree.
On one hand he felt good to see all the people at the Medicine Tree and
on the other he felt a bit sad thinking of the old Indians who have
gone on - especially those who told and taught him the traditional
ways. “As I was driving up here today I thought about the old people
who I grew up with. It was a little sad. But I am thankful that we are
here today to say our prayers and that we are able to give thanks to
all of our ancestors.”
Stephan Small Salmon said he came to the Bitterroot Valley and the
Medicine Tree as a youngster with the Woodcock, Durglo and Incashola
families.
“Every year we used to come here. While we were here we used to pick
strawberries and potatoes for the farmers. With the money we earned
we’d go to Hamilton to eat Chinese food or go to a movie in Darby,”
Small Salmon said. “Those were good times.”
But tough times have always dogged Indian people and their quest for survival in the Western World. They continue to this day.
“Right now we are going through some tough times as an Indian Nation
and as Indian people. Indian people were the first people here but we
still continue to struggle to be recognized and understood. As Indian
people we need to understand where we come from. It is the words and
dreams of our parents, our grandparents, our ancestors that have helped
us survive,” Incashola said. “I can still see all the elders that were
here before. This is the homeland of the Salish people. Their
footprints are all over here. Their dreams, their wisdom is still here.
That’s why we are here in hopes of feeling their dreams, their wisdom.
I hope that what we do today resembles what our ancestors did here.
They didn’t do this as individuals but as a family. Someday these young
people will remember what we did here today and so they can pass on the
spirit and wisdom that will carry on. That is the only way we will
survive as a people, as a family.”
[Originally published in the Char-Koosta News. A news source for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.]

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 15th, 2008 at 10:38 pm and is filed under Bioregional News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.