Coffee Shop Adds Mi’kma’ki to #Canada150 Sign

It's getting a lot of attention!

Just Us! Coffee in Nova Scotia recently added to their #Canada150 sign.

The General Manager, Joey Pittoello, tells the Huffington Post that adding Mi Kmaki 13000 wasn’t meant to be unCanadian, rather, “It was meant as we need to recognize multiple communities in our country and some of them get under-represented I think.”
“Mi’kmaw elders say the earliest settlers on Mi’kma’ki territory go all the way back to the end of the Ice Age, 13,000 years ago”, Huffpo points out.

What do you think of this sign that recognizes the indigenous community?
Personally, I think this should be happening everywhere. In Simcoe County, what should we have on our signs? #Wendat550 (1) #Haudenosaunee875 (3)

Here is a problem: I have spent the last 2 hours looking up the information on first nations in our region and I’m not sure what nation was here first, nor the approximate date of settlement. I don’t know what name to use- names of multiple nations that form a bigger union or the union? Ex: Attinniaoenten, Hatingeennonniahak, Arendaenronnon, Atahontaenrat and Ataronchronon make up the Huron-Wendat (1)

June is National Aboriginal History Month and I should know more than I do about the First Nations in our area and in Canada.

You know that I love my country. I think Canada is the best country in the world and I am, every day, thankful that my mother and her family chose Canada (and that Canada chose them); that my Opa came here from Holland after WW2.

But, the more I think about #Canada150, the more I think about the people in our community whose family have been here for as long as anyone can remember.

#Canada150 is about celebrating this wonderful, modern multinational-state, that is our home and a place of refuge for so many. But is our home ON native land; real people with real histories. Maybe we can take this opportunity of celebration to expand the way we think and talk about the history of this country.
Phil Fontaine, former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, recently said this during a convocation address at the University of Toronto:

Recognition of First Nations as founding peoples is the ultimate expression of reconciliation that Canada can extend to first peoples.” (2)

When I first read this, I felt “Wait… why haven’t we done this? It makes sense!”

What do you think about using Canada’s 150th birthday to expand the way we think about our history and include First Nation histories in the narrative?

If you are an Indigenous person, how do you feel about #Canada150?

 

Photo: Facebook/Just Us! Coffee