Montagnais culture
We leave the Saguenay on our way to Lac-Saint-Jean where we'll meet Pierre Gill, a Montagnais from Pointe-Bleue, or Mashteuiatsh in his native language. The original seven-member crew is shrinking slowly. Only three of us are left: the two cameramen and me. In the car before our departure, we tell each other traditional jokes about natives; the "tenderfoots" we where then were full of preconceptions! But after the first few minutes of our encounter, our prejudices make us pale with shame.
Pierre Gill is sitting in front of his computer, the fax is spitting out page after page, and the telephone rings constantly. On top of running his adventure-tourism company, our host is a writer, editor, and composer, owns a communications firm and a travel company, and is also the young father of three children. And he's quite good looking! Our curiosity is piqued; we want to know everything about him. Yanick Rose and Daniel Desrosiers have even momentarily dropped their cameras to listen to him talk.
"The Pointe-Bleue wildlife reserve was created in 1856 by the Ministry of Indian Affairs, to settle the First Nations. Since the Montagnais are nomads, I would say it was the first cultural shock for our people. Put yourself in a native person's place; the idea of being given a house was completely ridiculous at the time. Some used the boards to heat their tents, set up at the back or in the basement of their homes. Others didn't understand why the wood was painted since it kept it from breathing! It's evident that if you put yourself in a white person's place, destroying a house is incomprehensible. One should always see both angles of history to understand how actions are perceived on each side.
Raised by parents who spoke French and loved the language, Pierre Gill was rapidly drawn toward literature and French songs. It was only later, after he received his Bachelor's degree in French literature at Université du Québec in Chicoutimi, that he understood how useful that language could be to tell others the history of his people. His book, Les Montagnais, which tells the story of the first inhabitants of Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, sold 10,000 copies, mainly in France. "Because there were no books written by natives at the time, one can see why there is often a lack of understanding between white people and us. That's why I wanted to tell this story", Pierre Gill explains. "It's also the goal of my tourism company: to make people understand who we are."
I learned your language to understand you better.
In the prose he writes, which he sometimes writes music for, Pierre Gill follows the same goal: to express in poetic language the history of his people.
If somewhere tomorrow we still ask ourselves The reason why, we Indians, grow up in the fog May a more serious white person defend our dawns By speaking of our rights more often than our feathers
"The only way to understand each other is to talk to one another. That's why I think someone who just passes through the reserve won't find much of interest and will be disappointed. We must stop and take our time, or we're wasting our time," says Pierre Gill. Ilnu Tepishkau offers visitors different types of packages, ranging from a traditional meal under the tent to total immersion in a Montagnais family for a few days. That way, people can really experience an exchange with a family, and, who knows, an elder might decide to tell a legend at the fireside!
In a song he recently wrote, Pierre Gill decided to rewrite colonization "the other way around." It's the story of a native Indian who builds a bark canoe to cross the oceans and conquer the world. In his luggage, he brings containers of water, air, as well as seeds. Instead of building cities, he plants trees and flowers and, soon, he "deindustrializes" the world. "Artistic expression often tells much more than many a history book," Pierre Gill declares as he leaves.
