Fruit of Guilt

Three or four years ago one could get here without any appointments and other formalities. The beautiful lake, verdant islands and banks, as well as its whimsically shaped boulders make the landscape inimitably authentic and a very strong tourist attraction. Now a visitor without an appointment will not feel comfortable here, for the land has been returned to the Ojibwa (Chippewa) Indians, descendants of those in the burial mounds. Now they have their lake, islands, forests, and ancestors' skeletons. Of course, this does not mean that an outsider will be ordered to get out of Serpent Mount, just that every visit must be agreed with the chief.

Greg Kowi, Chief of Hiawatha First Nation, was waiting for us at the agreed time and place, a special compact building facing the entrance to the park-reserve. We were greeted by a real legendary giant, some two meters in height, very hefty, about my age, wearing jeans, a Windbraker, and sporting a long jet-black ponytail. To me he looked like a huge veteran rock star of the 1970s. On the way to the lake and museum he told us about how he became chief. He was elected several years ago for the first time. By Ojibwa tradition he had addressed a speech to the "electorate" and together with the other contenders stood in a line facing the people. Then the vote started, using the running ballot, meaning that people would run up and behind each candidate; the winner had to have the largest number of runners lined up behind him. In other words, the largest number of people ready to follow him. Incidentally, this Indian law caused a sort of collision as the Canadian law seems to provide for secret ballot, meaning that the running ballot was, strictly speaking, invalid as undemocratic. Fortunately, Canadian society is increasingly aware of its historical guilt before indigenous peoples, and it was on public initiative that Serpent Mount was returned to the Indians. Now this guilt says schools must open with instruction in the Chipewyan language. This guilt also influences political decisions: among other things the indigenous people are exempt from all taxes.

Of course, there are problems. Western liberalism multiplied by Western value universalism sometimes yields absurd results. In order to be tax-exempt the Indians must preserve their ethnic purity, in other words conform to Article 6-1. Once he or she transgresses that rule by marrying someone from a different ethnic group their children's tax immunity will lower substantially (Article 6-2). Chief Greg said that his nation was rather small, some 400 persons. To prevent genetic degradation, they had to be exogamous, thus losing substantial advantages. After all there is the chimera as love, and love does not take orders.

It was simple to decide to give the Indians back their land, but the Indians could not accept it - not because they did not want to, but because they were unable. Man cannot own the land, because the land is a living thing, a deity. In Ukraine our fat-ass collective farm feudal lords balancing somewhere to the left of the Parliament's Left-Center would never dream of such an argument against land privatization.

This land and lake were once used to grow rice. In fact, the Chief's ancestors were called Rice People. We saw their canoes, arrowheads, eating utensils, pottery, carved bone decorations in the museum and the chief commented on every item. We had to strain our ears to hear the wind whisper, grass and leaves rustle, noises in the grass, and voices from and behind the burial mounds. "The serpent is my people's totem, hence the shape of the burial sites," he told us and then identified himself in full (I suppose as a sign of special trust): Nimke Kwa Ni Ni, meaning Thunder-Bird-Man, because on the night he was born there had been thunderstorm and the lake bird's cawing screeched out her own Song of Hiawatha.