The Land Of Plenty

February-March 2000

This is an article from WaveLength Magazine, available in print in North America and globally on the web.

by Tim Shiff

Tom stands before a totem pole in his regalia

Mound Island, in the southwest cornerof the Broughton Archipelago, is a welcome change from the exposure of paddling in Johnstone Strait and Blackfish Sound. The white shell beach is a perfect landing, sunning and swimming spot. Higher up, rich black soil speckled with white shell and bone fragments form a midden, indicating many thousands of years of prior use.

I set up camp on Mound Island in a flat, grassy clearing and cooked dinner in the frame shelter, enjoying my solitude, paying little heed to the sign requesting a five dollar fee for Tom Sewid and the Village Island Guardian Program. The next morning I was surprised to have two kayak groups move into the campsite while I ate breakfast. I packed hastily and paddled off in search of solitude.

On my return journey I stopped at Village Island, near Mound, and met Tom Sewid. In my memory he stands with arms outstretched beneath the enormous posts of a traditional big house structure overgrown with grasses, moss and small trees. "Gilakas'la," he said in the Kwakiutl language to a mixed group of kayakers and sailors-"Welcome to my territory."

In the hour-long tour, he explained how the village's popular name-Mamaliliculla, or "Village of the Last Potlatch"-is a misnomer. It refers to a grand illegal potlatch ceremony held here in 1921, when the RCMP arrested and imprisoned band members for violating anti-potlatch laws. But, Tom explained, "that last potlatch has never taken place and never will." The potlatch tradition carried on underground until the lifting of the anti-potlatch laws in 1951.

The correct name for the village, Tom said, is "Meem Quam Leese"-"The Village with the Rocks and the Islands Out Front." It stands at the heart of the traditional territory of the Mamaleleqala Que'Qua'Sot'Enox band of the Kwakwaka'wakw First Nations. The name of the territory is "Hee La Dee"-"The Land of Plenty".

The last villagers abandoned Meem Quam Leese in 1969. For twenty years the village's totem poles, traditional "big house" structures, and more recent dwellings weathered and became overgrown. In 1989, already working in the area as a commercial fisherman, Tom was appointed by his band's chief as native guardian of the traditional territories around Village Island, to respond to requests from kayak operators to clean up Meem Quam Leese and open up trails for growing numbers of visitors.

In 1989, Tom wasn't in the tourism business, but he began to interact with visitors, and he recalled the prophetic words of his grandfather, the late Chief James Sewid, who predicted an end to the days of cultural repression when the white people would come knocking at the doors of the Kwakwaka'wakw to learn about their culture. "He was right!" says Tom. People now come to Village Island from around the world, attracted to the area by the whales of Robson Bight and the renown of Kwakiutl culture.

But along with this interest, Tom began to observe that human waste in the intertidal zone was contaminating shellfish beds where his people harvested food. Trees were being cut down for firewood. Black bears were becoming habituated to campers' food. Cultural sites were also threatened. At Mound Island, erosion was damaging the midden and further threatening the shellfish beds. Burial sites were being used for camping. Valuable artifacts were being stolen.

Tom saw a role for himself and in 1996 he made Village Island Native Cultural Tours his full-time business. He began funding the maintenance of the village and the area's campsites out of revenues from the village tour. Tom now greets 6000 visitors a year at Village Island. Mound Island, the most popular campsite in the area, receives an average of ten visitors each night throughout peak season, and sometimes up to seventy at one time.

Tom feels a responsibility to his people that they will be able to continue harvesting food from Hee La Dee, yet his work now depends, paradoxically, on bringing more tourists into the area. He has to find a balance between use and preservation.

But he is optimistic. Sixty-five percent of visitors are kayakers who stay at the campsites in Hee La Dee. Collecting fees from them enables him to carry on his efforts to reduce their collective impact by delivering firewood, installing toilets and bear-proof food caches. He also hopes to add cooking shelters and provide other services.

The southern boundary of Broughton Archipelago Marine Park runs down Indian Channel in the heart of the traditional territory of Tom's people. Camping inside the park is free, but Tom collects camping fees in areas outside. Kayak companies pay the band to lease all the sites on Compton Island Indian Reserve for the season, or pay Tom for camping on Mound Island.

Mound Island is not an Indian Reserve even though it has been claimed by Tom's band and the signs of long-term use are obvious. This site was probably a summer village for as many as four hundred people. Their modification-the shell beach cleared of boulders, the flat, raised ground where the big houses once stood-are what attract kayakers today.

While commercial kayak groups typically pay to use the site, many recreational paddlers don't expect to pay for camping on crown land. But Tom feels it is only fair to charge for the privilege of camping in his band's traditional territory.

He is also concerned about what he sees as the permitting of lands within traditional territories to non-natives for recreational use and profit while these lands are the subject of ongoing Treaty negotiations. Currently the crown corporation BC Assets and Lands (formed under the BC government's 1998 Commercial Recreation on Crown Land Policy) is in the process of leasing out lands to non-natives for tourism, aquaculture and other uses.

Although Tom says his people shouldn't have to apply for leases, he has decided to cover his bases by applying for a lease to the campsite on Mound Island. He is also considering taking a series of leases to keep sites throughout the islands available for use by band members, and to pay for the leases by tourism. In a sense, this follows tradition. After all, Hee La Dee was the heart of a successful economy long before it was a white person's wilderness.

"My people have proven for thousands of years that they economically prospered by living at Mound Island. I'm not harvesting salmon, I'm harvesting tourists. The precedent was set thousands of years ago. It was a summer place of generating capital."

Although Tom has not been authorized by any official body to collect payments from campers, the band is aware of his business. And Chief Negotiator for the Kwakiutl Laich-Kwil-Tach Nations Treaty Society, Dan Smith, says that while Tom's is a private business, the Council of Chiefs thinks what he's doing is a good thing. "Both governments have been asking us to prove occupancy in traditional territories, so it's important to exercise our Aboriginal Rights in order to substantiate our claim."

"It is also helpful to have someone in the area, monitoring visitors, providing services, ensuring sacred sites are not despoiled, and that environment impacts are minimized."

Tom has big plans for the future include adding camping and kayak storage to make Village Island a kayaking base for those who arrive by air or water taxi to begin their paddling trip at his doorstep. He would like to have a map and guidebook to explain the system of campsites. Native carvers, basket-makers, painters, and dancers could benefit from Village Island's popularity, he points out. Bannock, dried salmon and other Kwakwaka'wakw foods and crafts could be displayed for sale. He is already offering tours in traditional dugout canoes and plans to offer food and other services this season.

Tom calls himself a "guardian" and speaks in a proprietary fashion about land which non-natives perceive as "wilderness". Meeting Tom, I learned that I have to question my concept of "wilderness" as a place "untramelled", where humans are only temporary visitors, oblivious to those who have lived there before and called it home.

One day there may be many such guardians throughout the BC coast. What we stand to gain is the revival of a culture by an entire network of tourism opportunities. The economic opportunity of tourism is an incentive for young people to learn old ways. Seen in this light, Tom's business is a seminal project, part of a potential economic and cultural renaissance in this once and future "Land of Plenty".

For information & bookings with Village Island Tours, call Tom or Kathleen at 250-287-2868 or cell 250-248-1438, or VHF "79-Alpha". Website: http://oberon.ark.com/~kwester/

Camping fees on Mound Island are $5 per night, payable to Village Island Tours. Fees for landing at Village Island are $7.50 or $5 per person for six or more, payable to Mamalilikulla-Que'Qwa'Sot'Enox band office (toll free 1-888-287-2955), or free if you take Tom's $10 tour.

Tim Shuff is a writer and forest firefighter with a degree in Outdoor Recreation and an M.A. in Geography

Photos by Kathleen Westergaard