'This is my lifelong dream': Elder revives Mi'kmaq language, medicine

As we drive along the shore of the Bay of Chaleur to the Aboriginal Heritage Garden in Ugpi'Ganjig, Rebecca Labillois is picturing her grandmother walking along that same beach as a girl, crying.

At the end of the road there is now a garden filled with traditional Mi'kmaq medicines, but there was nothing here when her grandmother arrived in the early 1900s.

Labillois's ancestors lived in the nearby community of New Mills and on Heron Island, until the Eel River Bar Reserve was established.

"They were moved up on reservations to Eel River Bar, where on the record it shows it was a swampy water. And it said, 'Good enough for Indians.' It was stamped on there."

Even though it is a sad memory, Labillois feels lucky she knows this piece of her family history, especially since her grandmother only shared the story in her later years, and she only shared it in Mi'kmaq.

"She always told me … Labillois meant, 'The medicine people.' And I never really even thought about it until after her passing on.- Rebecca Labillois

"My grandmother had reverted back into speaking her own native tongue … and she told the story to my mom — that we originated from New Mills, where you go to Heron Island," she said. "We have descendants over there and that was our campgrounds in the summertime.

"My grandmother cried as a young child coming up. And walking the line of the railway. And that was the five original families that founded Eel River Bar — Ugpi'Ganjig today."

For years, Labillois has been working to establish a traditional medicine garden so every person who travels the same path as her grandmother will find "something from Mother Earth" to heal them.

Labillois meant 'the medicine people'

Labillois, who is not a fluent Mi'kmaq speaker, hates to think she could have missed out on knowing the story of her grandmother coming to Eel River Bar from New Mills.

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Like her grandmother, she also spent time on the nearby island.

"I remember being young and going over there and camping over there for the whole summer and digging clams."

Now 53, Labillois cherishes those common experiences and is trying to pass on everything that she's learned from her late mother and grandmother.

That includes the Mi'kmaq language and traditional medicines.

Her mother, Margaret Labillois, died in 2013. She was the first woman to be elected as chief of a New Brunswick First Nation and was well known for her work as a teacher of language, culture and tradition.

"She always told me … Labillois meant, 'The medicine people.' And I never really even thought about it until after her passing on."

'Our medicines are right in front of us'

Labillois is the language and cultural co-ordinator for education in Eel River Bar, but when she isn't in the classroom she is working on the community heritage garden.

"This is my lifelong dream," she said of the collection of plants like strawberries and balsam fir.

"It all ties in together because of my mother … she always talked about the culture being embedded in the language and the language being embedded in the culture," she said.

"We bring the children down here and we go out on a hike and we show them the medicines and they just love it. Even the teachers when they come here there's a sense of belonging.

"[My mother] said that our medicines are right in front of us, and it can cure anything that you have."

'I use it all'

Looking over the heritage garden, Labillois rhymes off some of the most common traditional medicines.

The first might be mistaken for a weed, but Labillois said plantain leaves, or ansalewipk in Mi'kmaq, were often used by her mother to treat the hockey injuries her brothers suffered.

"My mom would soak it for 10 minutes and then she would apply it onto a bruise or swelling and it would reduce the swelling." 

Many other plants were boiled to make teas. For instance, the leaves from a strawberry plant, or atu'omgemin in Mi'kmaq, were used to relieve menstrual cramps, and tea made from the bark of an elder tree was used to treat high blood pressure.

Labillois has arthritis in her knees and said her favourite medicine is a salve made from the balsam poplar tree and St. John's wort.

"I use this on my knees for the last four years now … and, you know, it allows me to be more flexible."

Passing it on

Labillois, who is in the early stages of being an elder at Ugpi'Ganjig, said she often thinks about how she can "pass on the messages to my people about our medicines."

She doesn't want to see any other stories or knowledge lost because the next generation is unable to speak or to understand their native language.

The language, Labillois pointed out, is very descriptive and based in nature. She worries that unless younger people learn Mi'kmaq, and use it, many of the secrets that exist in their language will be lost.

"That is my goal until I pass on to the spirit world as well."