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arrived, and the villagers were out fi shing last night.
“Sea lions were spotted in the river,” Uncle Don
said. “It’s strange to see them up that high.”
“And there’s excitement?” Willie asked.
Don raised an eyebrow. “Oh sure.”
Willie came to the guiding business in an organic
way. In 2013, he started a water-taxi service between
Alert Bay and neighbouring Telegraph Cove, and
en route he’d tell passengers about Kwakwaka’wakw
life. Back then, the creaky remains of the notorious
First Nations residential school in Alert Bay, which
housed aboriginal children from 1929 to 1975, were
still standing, and visitors were sometimes moved to
tears when he told them about the abuses that took
place there. But there was so much more: thetotem-pole ceremony; the death protocol; family
crests. You can look at a totem pole and appreciate the
art, Willie explained to his passengers, but true
appreciation comes from an understanding of its
meaning. As he put it, “Wouldn’t you rather see BC
through fourteen thousand years of history?”
Inside the U’mista Cultural Centre, in Alert Bay,
which was set up to protect the heritage of the
Kwakwaka’wakw community, I walked among the
masks—a collection of painted wooden beaks and faces
peering forth into the dimly lit exhibition room. In this
culture, masks function not only as decoration but also
as a form of historical and legal documentation. They
also serve as tools of social instruction. Willie and
I stopped in front of Gwalkwamł, or the Deaf Man,