Learning from the land: Indigenous youths connect with elders in Labrador

A group of Indigenous youths got the chance to connect with the lands of Labrador and the elders who inhabit it this week.

The group of more than 20 people recently spent four days on the land as part of the Nutshemit Youth Walk, full of activities from fishing and camping to storytelling with Indigenous elders. The group spent time in the Mealy Mountains while camping at Park Lake Fishing Lodge in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. 

The trip was organized in part by Candace Simon, a Mi'kmaw woman from St. George's, on Newfoundland's west coast, who works with a group called Empowering Indigenous Women for Stronger Communities. The group is a provincewide partnership of Indigenous groups working to promote positive mental health through culture-based programming.

"We've been working with these women and also working with men, and now we're bringing the youth into the picture," Simon told CBC News on Monday. "We want to work with communities to help create the positive things in and for communities, and have our youth experiencing the land-based teachings."

Simon's 15-year-old son, Griffin, says he had fun fishing, spending time in a Labrador tent — an outdoor tent that comes equipped with a woodstove — and making new friends like Billie Anderson, 18, of Labrador City.

"It's cool fishing and talking to people.… I bonded with some people, and I just think that nature is very healing," said Griffin. "I went fishing before, but I never caught a lake trout, and I caught one up there."

Anderson added, "It was cool seeing the fireplace inside the tent with all the people."

Simon said she was honoured to see the connections made among the children — many of whom meeting for the first time on the trip — and their eagerness to share and learn from the Indigenous elders.

"I think that was incredible, to see the elders and the knowledge keepers just teaching these things to the youth, and for them to be absorbing it as they did," she said. "[To] come home with all those experiences … they're still on a high."

Simon said she hopes the trip will become an annual event and is already planning a reunion in Newfoundland.

"We are so honoured to have been invited by the Newfoundland and Labrador culture. For them to teach us in that way, it was so welcoming, she said. "We would love to be able to turn those tables and offer that same type of experience from our perspective. Giving back in that same way."

Read more from CBC Newfoundland and Labrador