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‘Setting things right’

The Lil’wat people of Mount Currie look to their past for a new future

Lheltusa kwes zwatnem kwas tsuwa7lhkalh ts7a ti tmicwa.

These lands have been continually occupied by us from time out of mind.

Driving along a rough logging road high above where the Green River empties into Lillooet Lake, I feel the alternating sensations of warmth from the springtime sun and coolness from the shade of tall cedar trees.

My truck is in four-wheel drive and it labours up and down the road until I reach Ure Creek, about 30 kilometres east of Pemberton.

At the creek, I step out of my truck and glance at the water that races down from the Coast Mountains’ glaciers hiding behind the massif of Mount Currie.

The creek sluices its way over and around large boulders that were, at one time or another, part of a towering rock bluff above the creek. I scramble up towards the bluff on the forest’s moss-covered floor, weaving in and out of Douglas fir trees.

This is just a small part of the Lil’wat Nation’s traditional territory. It is a land of mountains and rivers.

The Lil’wat have been here since time immemorial – some archaeological sites in the area date back 8,000 years – and their story is one that is written on the land.

I’m here at Ure Creek to search for a pictograph, a red-ochre rock drawing, that is not shown on any maps. All I have are some loose directions and my sense of intuition.

I search all around the rock bluff but find nothing. After an hour and a half, I give up. Sometimes, the journey is the destination.

According to the Lil’wat, some pictographs are said to be the teachings of Atsemal, a supernatural being otherwise known as the Transformer.

The Whistler area is rich with tales of the Transformer. The Lil’wat say Atsemal travelled by canoe to the Pemberton-Mount Currie area via the Fraser River, Harrison Lake and the Lillooet River system "setting things right."

Another story says Atsemal turned a group of Squamish people who were camped too close to Lil’wat territory into a pile of rocks south of Whistler.

These days the Lil’wat and Squamish, whose traditional territories overlap in areas such as Rubble Creek, Green Lake and the Soo River Valley, are trying to work together to set things right.

The two nations signed a protocol agreement earlier this spring to establish a process that will allow, among other things, the Lil’wat and Squamish to take advantage of economic opportunities in the Whistler area.

"It’s a good thing," says Ruth Dick, editor of Mount Currie’s Lil’watmec Ts’ila Ts7a community newspaper. "Hopefully, it will open more doors for our people."

The Lil’wat and Squamish are in the early stages of developing a cultural tourism centre, in the form of a traditional bighouse. Local Native art is already being showcased regularly at the Roundhouse on top of Whistler Mountain.

The agreement is also aimed at giving the two nations more say in land-use issues, such as forestry, tourism and backcountry recreation, in order to protect aboriginal rights and title.

Meanwhile, the Mount Currie band has been meeting with the Resort Municipality of Whistler and Tourism Whistler to discuss training, employment and business opportunities within the resort town.

The talks have been successful to some extent and have included agreements on the Lil’wat’s participation in cultural events, such as this August’s upcoming Celebration of Aboriginal Culture festival, and an interpretive trail around Lost Lake.

"Tourists are not aware of Whistler’s Native heritage," says Rosemary Dan, a Mount Currie band councillor. "In the past, our elders have not been willing to share our culture or spirituality. Now we’re trying to figure out what to share and how to develop tourism."

Dan says the Mount Currie band is just starting to promote tourism and that the future looks promising.

But will tourism and its related businesses put the Lil’wat on the path to economic success?

The organizer of last week’s Aboriginal Tourism Trade Show in Vancouver seems to think so. "Aboriginal tourism is the largest growing sector of the tourism industry," says Math’ieya Alatini, the executive director of Aboriginal Tourism Association of B.C. "We as Native people have to create awareness of the unique authentic products and experiences that we have to offer."

According to Dick, the Lil’wat people live so close to the tourist mecca of Whistler that they might as well take advantage of it, or someone else will.

One example of a successful Lil’wat tourism venture is WD Bar Ranch Lil’wat Adventures, based near the village of Xit’olacw east of Mount Currie.

The ranch, privately owned and operated by a former North American First Nations bronco-riding champion, introduces tourists to Lil’wat history, landscape, food and current issues through horse-back trips along time-worn trails to old village sites.

Creekside Resources Inc., the business arm of the Mount Currie band, is another example of a successful Lil’wat business venture. The company runs a forestry and silviculture operation and also deals with land-use issues in Lil’wat territory.

CRI completed a traditional use study a couple of years ago that shows how the Lil’wat used land in the Whistler area for thousands of years before the first skier glissaded down the slopes.

Winters in the snow-covered Whistler Valley were too harsh for permanent settlement but the Lil’wat used the area for hunting, fishing and gathering during the rest of the year. Deer, bears and other animals were hunted in the valley bottom and fish were caught in the valley’s chain of lakes and rivers. Cranberries and squashberries were harvested near the base of Whistler Mountain while mushrooms, blueberries and ferns were taken from around Alta Lake.

Pictographs on the cliffs above Green Lake show the area was frequently used as a travel corridor and that the region held some spiritual significance.

Culturally modified cedar trees throughout the Whistler-Pemberton area, such as those near Cougar Mountain and Nairn Falls, were used to make water-repellent clothing and baskets.

Information such as this forms the bulk of the traditional use study and could be used to generate opportunities in tourism, such as the proposed cultural centre. "The traditional use study definitely plays a part in it," Dan says.

Other bright spots for the future include the band-owned Lil’wat Craft and Thrift Store in Mount Currie. The store sells locally made Native crafts and has seen a significant increase in tourists walking through its doors since it opened last year. "It’s been really busy," says Lorna Leo, the shop’s assistant manager.

But while the Mount Currie band pursues economic opportunities in the form of tourism, other issues from the past and present continue to affect band members’ lives as well.

Earlier this month, the Lil’wat celebrated the 90 th anniversary of the Declaration of the Lillooet Tribe with the 10 other bands that make up the St’at’imc First Nation.

The document states that the St’at’imc’s rights and jurisdiction over traditional land, rivers and resources have never been extinguished.

Unlike six other St’at’imc bands – the In-SHUCK-ch (Douglas, Skookumchuck and Samahquam), N’Quat’qua (Anderson Lake), Xaxl’ip (Fountain) and Ts’kw’aylaxw (Pavillion) – the Lil’wat have never engaged in any treaty or land claim negotiations with either the federal or provincial governments.

The neighbouring Squamish Nation is also involved in treaty talks, but the Lil’wat view the treaty process as the signing away of their inherent rights to traditional lands. "It’s something our people have always agreed upon," says Dick.

The Mount Currie band is, however, currently involved with the British Columbia Assets and Lands Corp. in the backcountry recreation tenure process, which is stirring up some controversy within the band itself. "If you talk to 20 different people about it," says Dick, "you’ll probably get 20 different answers."

Some members are asking the band council to reject the whole tenure process because they feel it will once again take advantage of the Lil’wat and destroy their traditional lands. But the Lil’wat have been involved from the start and BCAL says they will avoid infringing on potential aboriginal rights or title.

Also, the Mount Currie band – along with the rest of the St’at’imc bands – voted last October against the proposed Cayoosh Creek ski resort development, located just off the Duffey Lake Road between Pemberton and Lillooet, because of environmental concerns.

"Almost 700 members of the band population are under the age of 25 so there’s always the idea of developing different economic ventures for them," Lyle Leo, a Mount Currie band councillor, told The First Perspective aboriginal newspaper after the vote. "But unfortunately it won’t be this ski resort."

According to Leo, the Lil’wat people want to be control of their own destiny. Dick agrees and says the Lil’wat are reluctant to state their opinions or talk with outsiders or the media because they are often misunderstood.

Their world moves at a slower speed. The laid-back pace of Mount Currie and the Lil’wat people are in sharp contrast to that of Whistler and its residents.

So a week after not being able to find the pictograph at Ure Creek, I get on my mountain bike and ride up towards Mosquito Lake, near Pemberton. I huff and puff my way up to a clearing on a ridge and then stop to drink in the panorama of Mount Currie. The Lil’wat call it Ts’zil. Every time I look at the mountain I am entranced by its beauty.

I get back on my bike and start descending down through the thick forest towards the green valley floor.

There used to be Native trading routes, known as grease trails, that passed through this valley from the coast to the Interior. Now, there’s a crowded highway, a busy railway and a hydroelectric power line that bring resources from B.C.’s hinterland to the populous Lower Mainland.

On a rock bluff about three-quarters the way down, there’s fluorescent flagging tape stretched across the trail. A couple of metres away I discover the reason.

It’s not a pictograph, but a petroglyph – a rock carving hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of years old – that is etched into the hard surface of the bluff.

The petroglyph depicts a woman or some sort of supernatural being giving birth. From the old comes the new.

This is a powerful place, one where Atsemal, the Transformer, might have stopped to gaze upon Ts’zil. It is a place where prophecies and legends are intertwined with the past and present.

And it is here that I realize the journey truly is the destination, just like the Lil’wat’s struggle to come to terms with their past and move forward to a more prosperous future.



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