More than 200 people gathered last night on the Tseshaht Reserve to be together and support each other in the wake of the discovery of 215 children buried outside a Residential School in Kamloops.
Organiser Naa-simius (Ed Ross) says while the Tseshaht First Nation may have been the site of a Residential School, they want to help survivors heal.
“We don’t want Tseshaht to be remembered as ‘that community that had the Residential School'”, he said. “We want to be now recognized as that community that is giving the survivors a chance to come and heal, and do what they need to do, and our door is always open for anybody that wants to come here and heal, and tell their story, or sing their songs, and take their power back.”
The Tseshaht Nation hosted events throughout the day yesterday, and lined the Orange Bridge with children’s shoes and teddy bears.
Naa-simius says he hopes a Residential School Healing Centre can eventually be built on Tseshaht lands, after generations of Indigenous children throughout the province were forced to attend the Alberni Indian Residential School where they suffered neglect and abuse.
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