There is an island in the Salish Sea that connects to another smaller Island. These two Islands are connected by two long sandy beaches that surround a lagoon that is situated directly between the islands. Not many places on our coast are more appealing for a canoe village site. There are a dozen or so soft sand landing sites all around the smaller island and even in the small lagoon. Hundreds of canoes would have once lined these beaches. Cooking fires would cover the rocky places processing an endless amount of shellfish that would grow on the sandy shoreline.
There are several sites that still appear to have been ideal house sites. Standing in this place I can almost see the houses, like my blood is trying desperately to show me something my eyes can’t see. This place, this public park, was one of those powerhouse villages of our lost Salish Nation. I don’t need anthropologists to show me, I stand there and I can smell the smoke from the generational cooking fires that burned there. The middens are deep and the surface that covers them is very thin, they stand like lulumexun* guarding the recent truth about what this place is.
The wind here is different and I bet it’s almost constant over the lagoon. I feel it would be good for drying fish. Free of bugs and full of salt and wind. I can see types of grass here that the elders have identified for weaving, funny they don’t have a special word for that type of grass, more a feeling. The elder who taught me talks about feeling three ridges on the grass. Anyway, that grass is here too.
There are so many of these powerful places hidden in plain sight all over the Salish Sea. We were a massive nation with resources, trade, economics, language, culture, food systems, and so much more. It’s all still just sitting there waiting to be seen, waiting to be used again. Our ancestors wait for us under a centimeter of soil. When we know this, and we look out on the land, we can still see them. Because they never left, we just forgot how to see them.
In times like this, with eyes like this, land back changes its meaning. The land will always be Indigenous, it is just waiting for us to return. The land, in all is power and glory, needs us as badly as we need it. We don’t need colonizers to “give” the land back, we need it to be set free so we can care for it again, as we always have, since time immemorial.
* Sum-nuw – Montague Harbour Galiano Island
* Lulumexun – Guardian or Sentry
Huy tseep q’u siiem nu siiye’yu, Huy tseep q’u.
About the Author
Jared “Qwustenuxun” Williams is a passionate traditional foods chef who works with elders and knowledge holders to keep traditional food practices alive. Jared spent much of his youth with his late grandmother, immersed in Salish culture. Raised in a world filled with smoke and fish Jared became familiar with many of the cooking methods and techniques used by his ancestors.
In 2001 Jared graduated from culinary arts and spent the next few years working in restaurants across Vancouver Island. After almost 10 years gaining western culinary experience in niche restaurants like Rebar Modern Food, Spinnakers Brew Pub, and Cherry Point Bistro, Jared decided moved back home to Quw’utsun (Cowichan) to blend his culinary experience with what he could remember of his traditional foods. Having spent his youth working with his family learning many traditional harvesting and preparation techniques it was no surprise when Jared became the kitchen manager at the Elder’s Building with Cowichan Tribes. After nearly a decade and a half of cooking for his communities elders Qwustenuxun now works as an indigenous foods educator, writer, and consultant.
Most recently, Qwustenuxun won a Canadian Online Publishing Award for best multicultural story. He was nominated for the 2022 BC Multiculturalism and Anti-Racism Award. And helped FNHA complete their first smoked salmon project, proving that Salish smoked salmon is a safe and effective technique for food preservation. Qwustenuxun has also been a featured guest on APTN’s hit series Moosemeat and Marmalade, cooked indigenous foods on Flavours of the Westcoast television show, and has been featured on CBC radio many times for his efforts in first nation’s food sovereignty.
Qwustenuxun also maintains a very popular and active social media presence. From sharing language videos on TikTok and funny Indigenous memes on Instagram, to a full blown lasting impacts of colonization blog on Facebook.
Find Qwustenuxun Online
Website: Qwustenuxun Consulting
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Instagram: @qwustenuxun
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