“Come in now, it’s time to eat,” my Ada hollered through the window.

We had been playing on the waterfront with other village kids, and both of us being very hungry, neither Na'di nor I did any protesting.
Dinner was unusually brief and quiet but I really didn’t give it much thought.

“I want you both to be in bed early and to get a good night’s rest, we are going to 'Yalis (Alert Bay) tomorrow morning,” Ada said, clearing our plates. Ada had fully taken on the role of mothering me, as my birth mother had not returned from the tuberculosis hospital.

A few days earlier, when Na'di and I had been sent to bed, I heard Ada, 'Nula'yi, and Anisbidu' whispering to each other in our little kitchen corner. Ada was being admonished for drinking too much in her grief over the passing of Sibalxola, my grandfather. She was told by her sisters that she would not be able to provide for us now.

While I hated going to bed early, I was thrilled about the trip to 'Yalis and thought little about what my Elders were saying. I tossed and turned and thought about the stores, cafés, and treats I would experience the next day. Just as I was finally dropping off to sleep, or so it seemed, Ada, my now-mother, was calling for us to get dressed and ready for breakfast. We packed our meagre belongings and trudged a short distance to the wharf. At the foot of the dock a little gas engine-driven boat was moored. Ada, Na'di, and I clambered aboard and settled in on the open stern.

It was a calm, sunny day with a slight breeze blowing. Luckily, Ada brought two blankets for us to share. As we moved farther out to the open sound, there was a steady, gentle roll of waves, and we giggled. Our view from the open stern was thrilling. First a pod of dolphins flanked us, as if an escort, for quite a distance. Then a pod of orcas saluted us as they passed us by, breaching spectacularly. If that were not enough, the sky world displayed its magnificence, as ducks and all manner of fowl serenaded us.

As we sailed past the southerly point of Cormorant Island, I spotted the Indian graveyard. There were so many totem poles towering, standing like eternal sentinels. The 'Namgis People had used Cormorant Island as a place to bring their people who had passed on. It was known as a place of eternal rest before the Europeans arrived.

Missionaries forced the 'Namgis to give up their traditional practice of lashing the dead, carefully wrapped and sometimes boxed, to the branches of large trees in that place. A Christian graveyard was demanded by the Europeans, but the Kwakwaka'wakw placed memorial poles alongside the gravesites to honour their ancestors.

A year earlier a young boy in our own community had died at birth. The parents, wanting to follow the old ways, wrapped him up and placed him in a heavy canvas atop a tall tree. I remember seeing him swaying in the breeze, serene, gentle, and sombre. The authorities arrived a day or so later and ordered the baby taken down and buried.

I was born on September 15, 1939, in St George’s Hospital, right next to the 'Namgis cemetery. In all of the trips we took over to Alert Bay almost weekly when I was a child, I don’t know how I missed spotting St Michael’s Indian Residential School on the north end of the island, but I did.

'Yalis, the Kwak'wala name for the place, means “sitting on the beach with legs spread apart,” in reference to the way in which the shoreline at the village is shaped. We finally arrived at the dock, which clearly marked the divide between the Indian population and the white population on Cormorant Island, in the middle of those legs. Our lodging for the night with relatives was just at the head of the wharf. We dropped off our belongings and visited for a short while. The exchange of pleasantries seemed to go on forever.

The island was changing quickly. A hundred years before I was born, there were a dozen large communal houses at 'Yalis, and many had added one or more totem poles to the front of their houses like eagles, Thunderbirds, Huxwhukw birds, and a raven whose beak opened and closed as guests arrived for a Pot-latch, along with human welcome figures to signal the ceremonies being held inside. Fifty years before my birth, there were only forty white settlers in the area; by 1900, there were 650; and by the time I arrived for school there were hundreds and hundreds more white people on the tiny island.

Now, both newcomers and the 'Namgis Peoples were flooding into Alert Bay to work the saltery and new salmon canneries, and it was filled with shops and excitement. I was restless and impatient. “When are we going shopping?” I whispered to my mother.

“We will go later,” she kept saying.

At last we were out the door. The first stop was a little Chinese restaurant. My mother ordered hamburger steaks. The bottle of Coke and the straw topped it all off. The next stop was a little general store where my mother bought a pair of runners for me. I was so happy, I felt I could outrun the wind. The next items Ada picked out for me were a pair of blue jeans and a little white shirt. I had no idea what all her generosity was about. At the end of the day, we returned to our relatives’ house for the night. “Coming to Alert Bay and receiving all of these goodies is reason enough to be anywhere,” I thought to myself. We were ordered to bed early, my sister and I, and I didn’t mind at all, even when I woke up a time or two to hear loud chatter and the singing of traditional songs. A rousing party was underway.

We were out the door early the next morning and started walking toward the uqsta lis, the north end of the island, in absolute silence. Our mother was walking in the middle and Na'di and I were catching up on either side of her.

“Where are we going?” I wondered to myself. “Why is no one saying anything?”

The silence continued, broken only by the sound of our footsteps over gravel. The streets were empty. We passed two older men sawing firewood on the beach. The only other signs of life came from columns of smoke rising from a few chimney tops. Still the silence prevailed. Suddenly, two adults came out of nowhere and grabbed Na'di. There was tussling and screaming, crying and shouting. It was total pandemonium. My mother, sister, and I tried to hold on to each other to no avail.

As quickly as the chaos erupted, it ended. I later realized that it was Na'di’s birth father who had grabbed her. Ada was afraid of the authorities and so was Na'di’s father, and yet neither of them knew what the better path was. Despite her father’s efforts, Na'di ended up at another tuberculosis hospital before eventually being remanded to join me at the residential school.

My Ada and I hugged and sobbed for what seemed like eternity. We finally got ourselves together and started walking again. The silence seemed even deeper and more ominous, as I am sure Ada was doubting herself, what she knew, and what she should do. I heard the eagles overhead, crying.

As I watched the bird kingdom in motion above me, I caught a glimpse of the multistorey red-brick building ahead. I had never seen a building like that before. A knot built up in my tummy. I had a sense that this place was our final destination. The school property was completely fenced off. Two towering totem poles stood sentinel at the entrance. Each pole had giant Thunderbirds perched with outspread wings atop monstrous-looking grizzly bears. Each bear embraced a child. All figures had piercing eyes that were discouraging rather than welcoming. Both mythological entities represented supernatural power and strength, but none of that mattered that day. We reached the front of the building and climbed a steep set of stairs to the first-storey entrance to the school.

The front door of the building swung open and a strange-looking man invited us in. I had never been up close to a white man before. He spoke to my mother in a language that neither of us understood. My mother could only stare at him hopelessly. My fear was coming back.

“What are we doing here?” I thought.

Excerpt from Namwayut - We Are All One: A Pathway to Reconciliation, copyright © 2022 by Chief Robert Joseph Reprinted with permission of Page Two Books.

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Learn more about Namwayut - We Are All One: A Pathway to Reconciliation:

We all share a common humanity. No matter how long or difficult the path ahead, we are all one.

Reconciliation belongs to everyone. In this profound book, Chief Robert Joseph, globally recognized peacebuilder and Hereditary Chief of the Gwawaenuk People, traces his journey from his childhood surviving residential school to his present-day role as a leader who inspires individual hope, collective change, and global transformation.

Before we get to know where we are going, we need to know where we came from. Reconciliation represents a long way forward, but it is a pathway toward our higher humanity, our highest selves, and an understanding that everybody matters. In Namwayut, Chief Joseph teaches us to transform our relationships with ourselves and each other. As we learn about, honour, and respect the truth of the stories we tell, we can also discover how to dismantle the walls of discrimination, hatred, and racism in our society.

Chief Joseph is known as one of the leading voices on peacebuilding in our time, and his dedication to reconciliation has been recognized with multiple honorary degrees and awards. As one of the remaining first-language speakers of Kwak'wala, his wisdom is grounded in Indigenous ways of knowing while making space for something bigger and better for all of us.