Vancouver Media Co-op, part 4

June 23, 2009

Vancouver Media Co-op, part 4

A few of us from the VMC (including a couple of recent volunteers), took a day trip up to Sutikalh, one of the most successful, and seemingly least talked about acts of Indigenous resistance to the Olympics. It's about three hours from Vancouver if you don't stop along the way.

Picture 1: In May of 2000, members of the St'at'imc nation and their supporters set up a permanent camp near Melvin Creek, located between Mt. Currie and Lillooet, in order to stop plans to build an all-season ski and recreation resort in time for the Olympics. They are still there today.

Picture 2: Words really can't describe how beautiful the mountains are, or how amazing and unfamiliar it feels to breathe the air there.

Picture 3: The water too, was the best I'd ever had.

Picture 4: The "camp" headquarters.

Picture 5: One of many photos from an album dating back to the St'at'imc 2000 blockade to save their land.

Picture 6: Hubert Jim, or Hubie, one of the people currently living at the "camp." This photo was taken during an interview. Hubie has lived at Sutikalh since the 2000 blockade, and will continue to stand guard. "It's my fate. I'm a hereditary chief," he said with a wry smile.

Picture 7: Doug, also living at Sutikalh, comes and goes between there and Vancouver. He showed me his cabin, which a "crew from Denman island" helped him build with discarded shingles from someone else's house. It's small and surprisingly beautiful, with a wood stove inside.

People from 110 different countries have stepped through the doors of the camp since 2000, all by word of mouth.