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October 31, 2003

Escape from Babylon

RACHEL QITSUALIK

Last week, I wrote about my years at a residential school, and about being asked by a classmate what our teacher meant when she referred to "a harlot."

Obviously, it was us. To the abusive Mrs. Aech, it was all of us girls. There was never anything wrong with the boys; but to this strange, bejewelled teacher from the South, Inuit girls were all harlots.

The word became a trigger for my plan to get out of this hell. I wanted to be anywhere else, anywhere myself and the girls around me were not constantly dubbed harlots and the Whores of Babylon.

A desperate desire to never again be targeted by Mrs. Aech grew into an inner resolve. I would beat her at her own game. The way out, I reasoned, was to excel, to give her no ammunition for criticism. From that day on, I wore nondescript clothes. Everything I owned was navy or brown. I wore almost no makeup. Chapstick was all that touched my lips. I would comply, outwardly. Inside, I had promised myself a year of nothing but straight As (okay, B+). But it was a plan. Three more years, then freedom.

I more or less stuck to it. Involvement in sports characterized my "I'll show them" attitude toward the males. If they were going to be Mrs. Aech's favourites, I would simply play that much harder, that much better. They were not superior to this girl. Soccer, basketball, track-and-field, I was never a good athlete, but I did it all and it seemed the way to go.

A friend and I once jogged all the way out to the airport, 16 kilometres, just to see if we could do it (although we had to hitch a ride back). When I wasn't in the gym, I was studying. I went far beyond what was expected of me - more frighteningly, of what I expected of myself.

The harder I worked to dig myself out of the pit of self-pity, the more I got involved in activities that took me outside of myself. The harder I worked, the more there was to do.

Today, when I come across fellow residential school students (I hate that victim-word "survivor"), especially from Stringer Hall, I often see evidence of them having adopted the same game plan. Many became involved in politics, business, leadership, etc.

Ironic, since we were without positive role-models in "school." I also recognize what lurks behind their successes: the loneliness, the bitterness, the battles with self-esteem. The fatigue.

Nowadays, I have realized something about it all: The drive for success was a game strategy that worked then. I had intelligence, and the strategy helped me get through residential school. But there is a difference between intelligence and wisdom, and I have a bit of wisdom now.

These days, I work to live. No living to work. I live for the things that matter: immediate family, those I love best, living and dead. Maybe, in a way, Mrs. Aech was right. We were the Whores of Babylon anyway, but not in the way she meant. Are we not whoring out ourselves when we are passive, invisible, acquiescent in order to succeed in a system not of our making? Are we not whores, of a sort, when we sell ourselves out to get a little back?

Girls that I grew up with no longer joke about Mrs. Aech, the "Dragon Lady." It's not respectful to speak badly of the dead - a respect we pay her, in death, that she could never afford us in life.

If I could say one thing to Eva: Thanks for asking that question. It made me search for answers I would never have invented on my own. None of us ever thought to look up "harlot" or "whore" in the Bible. It's somewhere in Revelations, I guess. Like residential school itself, it is one of those things I could never figure out, and am probably better off not dwelling upon.

Some people say abuse builds character. Perhaps it does. Some say that the abused are survivors, victims needing therapy, sympathetic ears. This, too, may be true. Nevertheless, I say that it is also a game - like chess for your life. And you must play it with strategy. Just learn to recognize when it is finished, and time to turn your back on the board.

Pijariiqpunga.

School days, cruel days

RACHEL QITSUALIK

"Hey Rachel, what is a harlot?"

"Shut up, I'm trying to study," I replied with my usual teenage sensitivity. It was study time at Stringer Hall, our residential school, and that also meant it was officially quiet time.

My classmate had such a gift for asking jarring questions out of the blue. Questions like, "Where do you suppose that guy got his clothes?"

As though I knew the answers to everything. Mostly, I think she was just using her rhetorical inquiries to lead into something else she had on her mind. She had to do it now, of all times, when I had an urgent assignment due the next day.

But I was curious now, so I had to know:

"Why do you ask?"

"It's just that Mrs. Aech was razzing Ethel earlier about doing her makeup the way she does. She said she looked like a 'harlot.' Okay, so what's a harlot?"

"It's some kind of a whore from the Bible, okay?" I answered peevishly. "Anything else you want to ask me now that I can't concentrate?"

"Doing her makeup the way she does," meant too much blue eye-shadow, pasted on mascara, and any number of other garish colours collected from wherever it was that Ethel found her makeup.

Privately, the girls often joked that she had a secret supply of "ugliness" she would dip into from time to time. Cruel, but quite ordinary. It is one of life's mysteries that, while we are in our teens, our sense of cruelty for some reason becomes honed to a fine edge.

And then there are those who carry that cruelty into adulthood. Mrs. Aech (not her real name) was one of those, and she took every opportunity to humiliate Ethel (also not her real name) and the rest of us girls.

It seemed a trivial matter then, part of day-to-day existence, but looking back upon it all through adult eyes makes me shake my head at Mrs. Aech's complete tactlessness.

Back then, it seemed, we had no identity of our own. It was bad enough to be herded into a dining room like cattle for study period, but to have your appearance made the subject of comment for all to hear was bordering on abuse.

It was a given, though, that Mrs. Aech seemed to have it in for the older girls - especially in the looks department. A day didn't go by where an unfortunate wouldn't be sent back from sitting down to lunch or dinner, made to change a "too revealing" blouse or skirt. Sometimes, it was to re-style the hair.

The boys, oddly, didn't seem to become the objects of Mrs. Aech's wrath. The boys, it seemed, could get away with anything from ripped jeans to long hair. The girls could not.

This was not the only double standard. There was also the fact that Mrs. Aech herself was a livid mess of powders, bloody red lipstick and rouge. Her hair was a perpetual nest of thickly dyed purple.

It seemed strange to me that the least bit of makeup on us girls made us "The Whore of Babylon!" as Mrs. Aech liked to call us. All this from a woman armoured in cosmetics, whose every gesture was accompanied by the sparkle of numerous jewels.

Not only was this double standard damaging to a developing girl's self-esteem, but, in a way, it betrayed exactly what Mrs. Aech thought of Inuit girls.

Or wished to think of us? Were we, in her mind, really little Whores of Babylon? According to this overly made-up woman, the least bit of makeup on us (as well as giving us cancer, in her opinion) made us harlots.

Most of us Stringer Halls kids came from small Inuit communities, and almost all of us had no money to spend on clothing. We wore the school uniform of white, long-sleeved shirt, navy slacks, and boarding-school-issue mukluks. And, of course, when we needed glasses, we got the nice, big, black, standard, welfare issue things.

I have always felt that the residential school system was somewhat schizophrenic in its approach to raising kids. True, it was cruel as well, but this is a well-known fact. But what exactly did they think they wanted us to be?

Next week: Lessons in adversity

October 17, 2003

Vegetable, animal and medicinal

In last week's column, I described how the lack of consistency and predictability in the availability of plants made it difficult for Inuit to rely on them entirely as a source of medicines, as people in warmer climates did. Instead, Inuit medicine was typically based upon the most common Inuit resource: animals.

Numerous traditional treatments utilized specially prepared skins, fats, sinews and oils from a wide range of creatures. Seal fat, for example, was essential for treating snow blindness and burns. The neck skin from a ptarmigan was prized as a light dressing. Lemming skin was used to drain boils. The bile from a seal's gall bladder was good for skin problems.

Despite their tendency to rely upon animal-based materials, however, Inuit did possess reasonably extensive herbal knowledge. The exact knowledge varied from area to area, just as the plants did. Inuit near the treeline, for example, could access pine, the inner bark of which is rich in acetylsalicylic acid (natural Aspirin).

More importantly, treeline Inuit could gather juniper berries, known the world over for their antiseptic properties, as well as their utility in treating kidney and bladder problems, gas and mild infections.

Yet even Inuit without access to the treeline still had many uses for the plants available to them. One of the most important plants, at once medicine and utensil, was Arctic cotton grass. The oil from the stem was used to remove warts. Additionally, as one might imagine, the cottony head of the plant made an excellent all-purpose swab. A mixture of cotton grass and charcoal made a good temporary wound cover.

There were numerous other plant medicines, as well. Freshwater algae, boiled first, was used for just about anything relating to the skin, from boils to impetigo. Moss not only made a good lamp wick, but was used for extreme snow-blindness, skin problems, frostbite, and wound dressing.

Fireweed leaves, when chewed, supposedly stopped nose-bleeds. The roots of dwarf willow were peeled and held against a sore tooth (I still do this myself if I get a toothache while hiking). Some sorts of mushroom were used externally for cuts and frostbite. Mountain sandwort was good for diarrhea.

More often than not, Inuit used plants as tea, and various tea recipes have existed across the Arctic since time immemorial. Tea-drinking was both recreational and medicinal, but the former at least explains the modern Inuit fondness for store-bought (i.e., Asian) tea.

Fireweed has always been one of the most popular teas for universal intestinal complaints (everything except the root is boiled), although Inuit and other cultures found it useful for myriad things, including muscle spasms, nervous irritation, irritation of the mucous membranes, regulating menstruation, and healing sores and blisters (as an external balm). I have heard that the Blackfoot Indians rubbed on fireweed powder for cold protection, but I have never heard of this usage among Inuit.

Cloudberry leaves, bearberry leaves, and alpine smartweed were used for general stomach-aches and kidney problems. Bearberry tea, in particular, has strong diuretic and astringent properties, and is said to be good for bladder troubles. Some Inuit believed that rock tripe tea was good for tuberculosis, although I don't think this belief was widespread.

The most widely ingested tea, however, was Labrador tea. The entire plant (especially the leaves) is rich in a pungent, volatile oil called ledol. The more it is steeped or boiled, the more ledol is released, so that overdoing it can quickly turn an otherwise pleasant tea into a smelly mess. A strong solution of it can even remove lice or other skin parasites.

It has a reasonably strong sedative effect, being quite relaxing, although it shouldn't be used by people prone to heart problems and seizures. If one is unused to it, it can cause giddiness and lightheadedness the first time it is imbibed, but the body quickly adjusts to it. Medicinally, Inuit most often took it to relieve stomach problems, mild constipation, and fever.

While these herbs outlined above might at first seem like an impressive array of traditional medicine, bear in mind that most can be described in only a single article, such as this one. Southern herbal traditions, conversely, can fill volumes. So if Inuit elders do not talk a lot about their herbal lore, it isn't because they are without such. It is just that such lore is so undependable that it is not in the forefront of their minds.

Personally, I like my Labrador tea, but I have to tell you: If my finger is bleeding, I want a Band Aid.

Pijariiqpunga.

October 10, 2003

Arctic pharmacopia

I think I am safe in stating this as fact: Anyone who is unaware that Inuit are the consummate hunting culture has never heard of Inuit.

And since everyone knows that Inuit are a hunting culture, and since everyone knows that Inuit dwell in some of the coldest places on Earth, Inuit don't get a lot of questions about their traditional herbal knowledge. Most folks, in fact, assume that herbalism would be an alien concept to Inuit, that the Arctic doesn't hold enough variety, in its flora, to base a body of herbal knowledge upon.

Well, the truth is that the assumption is a bit true; but it is also a bit false. I'll explain.

It is true that pre-colonial Inuit, in general, were not especially engrossed in the pursuit of herbal lore. Plants were often not plentiful enough to command the attention of Inuit. This makes sense, since the Arctic can be maddeningly cold, and the time when plants are able to flourish represents a short window of opportunity - the all-to-brief summer months.

Arctic plants are evolved to lie in wait for that seasonal warmth, then explode into action. Three-quarters of the Arctic year is white, grey, black, and blue - until summer warmth elicits a sudden burst of orange, scarlet, violet and green from the patient, low-lying plants that carpet the landscape.

Those who are foreign to the North often have a difficult time understanding just how much plant life there is, all quite low to the ground, but thick and spongy underfoot. Such plant life seems to appear out of nowhere when the snow and ice recede.

Sometimes, it seems as though, in one moment, the world is all crisp, white, crunching angles. In the next, it is endless, moist, yielding colour, a thousand different floral shapes in which fat black spiders, dancing flies and numerous other creatures make innumerable homes.

And, believe it or not, the stuff is useful, too.

The truth is that Inuit have always known that the plants around them are medicinal. They have always known, just as southern aboriginal peoples have, that they are medicines waiting to be used.

Now, southern aboriginal peoples have always made a great deal out of their traditional herbal knowledge - and justifiably so.

Some of the stuff that I have learned from reading and from talking to Indian elders, can make a modern pharmacy look like a cheap candy-store by comparison.

And no human culture, if we look at its ancestry, is different from any other in this respect. We are all human, and therefore all heirs to the same genius, the ability to observe and learn whatever edge our environment might offer us in order to survive.

Ancient Celts, for example, once used the leafy branches of their sacred mistletoe (not the poisonous berries) to soothe nervous disorders. Zulu warriors rushed into battle after ingesting a complex concoction of roots and fungus that dulled pain and amplified aggression. The ancient Greeks and Romans both used lavender for its sedative effect - and in order to make a nice bath.

While many cultures have abandoned their traditional herbal knowledge in favour of modern pharmaceuticals (which I am not criticizing, by the way), the aboriginal peoples of North America were overrun with European colonists only recently, and so many of their elders still retain some useful herbal knowledge. Luckily, a lot of it has found its way into book form. This is due, in part, to the great importance southern aboriginal peoples (i.e., Indians) ascribe to their plant lore.

So why don't Inuit ascribe the same importance to their own herbal knowledge? Well, there are really two factors that combine to make up the answer to this question. One is that Inuit were nomadic over almost incomprehensible distances.

This is one of the reasons why different "Eskimoan" cultures can pretty much understand each other's languages and customs from one end of the continent to the other. The other is that the Arctic landscape varies greatly, causing the available plant life to do likewise.

In other words, unlike in the South, there was little consistency in the types of plants Inuit were able to access. And consistency - predictability - is what survival is based upon.

(Continued in part two.)

October 3, 2003

When spirits become demons

“My name is Rachel and I’m an alcoholic.”

I have used that line many times in jest, to break the ice during presentations. It always gets a laugh, as well as a few “Hello Rachels.” There was a time, though, when it was no laughing matter.

My battle with alcohol is not unlike that of many in my generation, with roots in residential schools, the uprooting of Inuit culture, dysfunctional family, a low sense of overall worth. From the inside, looking out, I somehow felt alone and different in my problems.

I was leaden with Monday mornings of sleep deprivation and hangovers, hidden under cosmetics, streamlined by cigarettes and caffeine.

People in recovery often talk about “hitting the bottom,” or words to that effect. It just never happened to me. Mine was a no-man’s-land of lukewarm life. Nothing great ever happened, nor were there any disasters. Just day-in day-out of the same old grey: go to work, pick up kid, pay bill, get food, go drink with work friend. A nice little self-perpetuating cycle. In between bouts of depression, throw in a few pills to go up, down, whatever — the exact direction didn’t matter.

There were a few rage moments in there, taxi drivers, waitresses, and telephone operators getting the brunt of it. And it all eventually spiralled up into one exceptionally bad night, which finally led me to someone who pointed out the path I was treading.

I was visited by a pastor (Lutheran, I think, but it was the man who mattered, not the religion). He kindly visited my apartment, holding up a mirror, showing me a not-so-flattering image of myself.

I tried to be as offensive and harsh as possible, throwing in a few “F” words, chain-smoking, lying on the floor. I think I was even still a little drunk from the night before. I tried to impress him with how unfair life had been to me.

(But, inside, I was glad he had come over, that someone was listening.)

I had a disease, he claimed, no less a disease than diabetes or cancer. “But the curse is the gift, and the gift is the curse,” he said. “Someday, you’ll understand that.”

What a flake, I thought. What a waste of time….

The encounter nevertheless drove me to seek help. Now, there were two things I was aware of about myself. First, I knew that a “typical” approach to healing would not work, since I did not trust non-native institutions. Second, I instinctively knew that a non-spiritual path would fail — the problem was so deeply rooted that only a healer could touch it.

To make a long (and, I hope, not predictable) story short, I ended up going for alcohol treatment at Poundmaker’s, a native treatment center in St. Albert, Alberta. And, next to having my children, next to my current marriage of nine years (which came afterward), it was the best thing I’ve ever done in my life.

The spiritual aspect of it was mind-boggling — the ultimate self-confrontation, sitting on the grass, literally relearning how to pray. One of the treatment steps went, “Come to believe in a power greater than yourself.”

At the time, I had no higher power. My power was false success, false egotism, false self. There, I became resigned to letting the creator be the maker, myself be the made. There, I learned of the cunning, baffling, powerful nature of addiction.

I unwove the web of crap I had spun around my being, examining the things that I felt were ugly about my life — and beautiful. And I wish I could say that light illuminated me from within, that I was cured! But that wasn’t the case. Instead, it began the long, rewarding, painful repatching of my life. My new path.

One day, I opened my eyes, looked around, saw some tiny brown birds flying about me. It seemed that I had dreamt of those birds upon that hill, overlooking the fields of Poundmaker.

Now, after a dozen years or so, I’ve begun to understand the gift side of the curse.

I try not to judge those I see staggering about. I even buy drinks for those not afflicted by the disease. I have no problem with those who like a bit of alcohol. Yet I can never again mistake its nature — cunning, baffling, powerful.

Pijariiqpunga.

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