Cultural Day

Today was a PD Cultural Day for the staff. All schools in the NWT have two of these days each year. Cultural events are to be planned for the staff by the principal and the Aboriginal teachers in each school. So today we headed off to a lake to pick cranberries and to cook fish with some of the elders from the community. Here are some photos of our day.


This is the crew. Front: (lft-rt) Mary Rose (elder), Emily (elder), Loretta (gr456), Jenny (gr23) (sister to Loretta),Christine (visiting elder), Sheila (principal)
Back: Elizabeth (grk12) Vanessa (m&r), James (aboriginal culture&PE) and me.


These are the cranberries. People are wild about berry picking around here.


Relaxing by the fire.


James cooked the fish.


And James served it on a bed of spruce boughs.



The lake trout was cooked with the skin on and then the skin was lifted off after it was cooked. It was delicious!


Here is Sheila and the elders chowing down on the fish, potato salad and bannock.


This lake was surrounded by a sandy beach and a few camps.


We saw moose and caribou antlers.


The Dene can build their camps anywhere if they are treaty Indian (they call themselves that).


Most of the camps have a tipi beside them for smoking fish and meat. These camps are used all year round.





Here is a partially built camp.


It was a beautiful place to spend the day.
David and I picked about 2 quarts of cranberries. We'll freeze them for muffins and desserts.