I first met Laverne Gervais Contois at the Aboriginal Women of Montreal’s open house. As the president of the local chapter of the Quebec Native Women’s Association and a relapse prevention worker for Waseskun House, I knew I wanted to interview her when I met her. It was just a question of when.

I phoned her up and left a message. The following week she called back and said she had just arrived from a road trip and would call back to arrange a rendezvous. More phone calls and messages later and with deadline looming, we finally had our rendezvous set but only after she broke from her meeting and that was around 10 p.m. Oh well, another late production night, I thought. So what else is new? Laverne dropped by our offices and began telling me about herself…

Laverne Gervais Contois: I always tell people I grew up in the Winnipeg Reserve and now I live in the Montreal Reserve. I never grew up in a community. I have three grandparents who grew up in the communities. My grandfather Star is from Peguis where my membership is. My grandmother Daniels is from the Long Plains reserve. My grandfather Fontaine is from Fort Alexander. I think I visited a community twice when I was younger.

Ernest Webb: With Its large Native population does Winnipeg have Its unique Native culture?

You have to consider my age and generation. Those who lived with the devastation, they were not really trying to identify with their own culture. I believe I’m from that generation, where I hated brown eyes. I wasn’t really comfortable with who I was. In Winnipeg living with the stereotypes, I think back then it was extremely racist… Redneck country. I felt that I didn’t want to associate myself with Native people, even though I lived with a group where Native people lived. We worked very hard not to identify ourselves as Native. We had hard core issues to deal with. My generation, myself, I’ve had some hard core issues to deal with.

In terms of the residential schools and all that… assimilation?

My father himself was brought up in an orphanage where he lived with nuns. My mother had died; of course we lived at my grandparents’ where there was a lot of drugs and alcohol that ripped up the family. I remember a time when my grandfather and uncles would go out and build canoes by hand. I watched them. As soon as the drugs and alcohol took over, there was nothing to be proud of. I grew up in a time where it was like the best thing for survival was to assimilate.

As a little girl what did you want to be when you grew up?

OK… I wanted to be a policewoman and I did follow up when I was in grade I I. I went to the police station and asked how to apply for a position in the police force. But they had height standards where you had to be at least 5’7”. There was no way I was going to be 5’7″. So I was discouraged, I wasn’t encouraged to continue and become something like a policewoman. So I felt it was best to try and find a job and get on with trying to survive in that milieu. Back then it was difficult. It was hard to be Indian, it was hard to be Native, because you had the stereotypical ideas come at you, like the drunken Indians. We lived in the Logan and Main area. It was a hard core place to live at that time.

Did you see the conditions there which spawned the Native gangs there?

I can see and reflect on why there are gangs, because there is no pride in you as aNative human being. You weren’t brought up with that pride. But I never seen the gangs.I was trying very hard to be away from there… And… But I was part of a gang…to think about it. I was part of a group; we called ourselves “the motorcycle dub.” Wewent around telling people we were a motorcycle club, which was a distinction between agang. We got together to go on road rides. We weren’t there to create violence and beviolent with another gang. Yeah! Wow! (laughter)

So it was a sense of belonging…?

It was a sense of belonging with a group of people who had motorcycles…

So you rode a motorcycle?

Yes… Women weren’t supposed to do that back then. So it’s true… I never thought I belonged in a gang I always thought it was a club. We went camping and stuff.

Who was your biggest Influence?

My biggest influence was Mr. Art Solomon back in ’84. Also my aunt Ann who was a social worker who believed in the goodness of people and was very proud of who she was. My mother died when I was young; my grandmother played a very big influence in what I’m doing today. She was very stoic. She was a very caring, gentle human being. I saw her get beat up. But she never said anything. I just thought she didn’t care, but as I get older I realize that is a part of what they had to live through.

Do you think It’s different now?

Not much different, there’s a difference because Native people now are a little more organized; there’s a real strong sense of pride now. I remember kids back then whose eyes were dull. I come across that once in a while. But I see lots of children with brightness in their eyes. You can see it through their eyes, “a sense of who I am, I like who I am.” There’s some changes but we still have a long way to go.

So you’re optimistic?

Yes, very optimistic. It took me a time to get that way. Once I started working on my own personal issues, which was incest. So I’ve worked on my healing journey of sexual abuse issues. Family breakup has a strong impact on anybody. You see the devastation from the drugs and alcohol. I watched it. My grandfather’s house was very happy when they were building canoes and they would get together and play the fiddle and dancing as a family unit and inviting people to part take in that kind of time. And then watching my grandmother and grandfather getting eaten up by drugs and alcohol. There is a time where you just kind of quit inside. Something is dead inside. But once you start getting in touch with your own issues and when you take responsibility for what happened…

b there a snowball effect In the healing process?

There is a snowballing effect. When you realize you have your rights. I remember one of my issues when I was growing up was I felt I didn’t have any human rights. I didn’t have any rights. I didn’t have the right to say no to anything. When I started to deal with the fact that, hey, I’m a human being and I have human rights, a light went on and it was, like, wow. I have every right to say no or to do what I please with reason. What I want to do is, yes, I have rights and I enjoy this and I have every right to enjoy…

Ride your motorcycle…

Yes, ride my motorcycle. When you talk about these issues it just snowballs. But thenyou get tired and stuck in it. But there

is a progression. I believe that people are never healed, there is a constant healing going on…

b it just In term* of degree»?

Yeah, degrees of healing.

Degree* of devastation?

Depending on the degrees of devastation that you’re going through and when you get in touch with those feelings. It’s like you’re feeling broken-hearted. Like you don’t count at all. And you feel those feelings many times until you realize that this devastation and broken-heartedness happened but it doesn’t have to happen again. You take a responsibility for not allowing it to happen again.

So do you think that people are starting to communicate?

…Yes.

For Instance, sometimes It’s hard for men to communicate.

Yeah, I have to believe there is a change in there. I have to believe as a mother, as a sister, a niece, granddaughter, that men do feel, but they don’t express their feelings and if they do they express it differently. There is that mechanism to react. Sometimes you don’t realize you’re reacting, sometimes you have to take a breath and say, What the hell is happening here; why are we fighting? When we are saying the same thing.

When did you move from Winnipeg?

1983-84. My ex-husband was transferred out here by CN. So we accepted the transfer to Montreal. I was here three years before I realized there was a Native community in an urban area. When I was in Winnipeg I was oblivious to the Native community. Because we were very much into getting a job, getting a house, getting kids to school.

The last I heard was there were 44,000 Natives living In Montreal. And people keep saying, well, where are they?

It’s true they are there, but where do they get the stats? Winnipeg is a smaller area with 600 or 800,000 people. In Montreal there’s about 2 to 3 million people. In Winnipeg I felt more visibility. As in Montreal I fit in with the other ethnic groups.

We just blend In with the Latin community.

Yeah… even the Japanese.

When did you start at VWseskun house?

Actually I just started a couple of weeks ago. I’m officially a full-time employee.I was with Aboriginal Women of Montreal in 1993. Before that I was with the FriendshipCentre. I was president of the Friendship Centre from 1990 to 1994. Around that time Iwas going through a divorce, so I decided to withdraw and go to school. I went toConcordia and took applied social science with a specialization and a minor inpsychology. I just finished my BA. this May. In the meantime while I was going to school,Quebec Native Women contacted me and asked me to organize the Annual General Meeting forthe local. At that time it was inactive. I got a group of women together; therewere five of us. So we called all the membership in Montreal and told them about theA.G.M. But no one showed. So we had five of us who decided to take on the interim positions of president, vice-president, treasurer and secretary and we had one member. The reason why we took it on, even though we were full-time students, was that the Quebec Native Women Association’s was saying if we didn’t have an urban A.G.M. they would lose that funding for that A.G.M. There’s the local and then there’s the Urban General Council which sits on the Quebec Native Women’s Board. The Urban General Council represents Montreal, Quebec City and Hull, so they sit on the board for Quebec Native Women to represent Native women in the urban community.

Why Is It so hard to get Native people together In Montreal?

My question exactly. When we started Beverly Sabourin, Caroline Tate and my daughter Laverne, Crystal Hooper, Kara Sampson and myself, when we got together we asked ourselves, “what is it that Native women need to get together and get involved?” That was a big question. I think Native women are tired of the healing circle. Even though we want it. But there has to be more to life than just healing…

…Getting on?

So we decided in order to recruit Native women what we needed to do was have activities, fun activities. So we’re able to get together and have people come in through funding and staff the local. We have a fun activity fun night, a talent show. This is what Native women want.

More of a social scene?

A social aspect of things, so that’s what we did. Let’s recruit them but let them know that it could be fun, getting together.

It astounds me with the population versus what there Is In terms of organization… There’s no real scene besides the typical Indian bars.

(Laughter) Yeah, that’s the biggest thing. There’s the student association but besides that… They want to be there for education issues but there’s also family issues. And there’s actually no voice for urban

Aboriginal women. There’s no political voice for them except Quebec Native Women. The urban area was almost inactive, Hull is pretty active. We’re finally starting to get some activity in Montreal but a political voice is not really there for us. Quebec Native Women is starting to look at us with the same issues but different environment. So they’re starting to say, yes, there is a difference but there is the sameness about our issues. There isn’t a political voice somewhere for us.

Is there, for lack of a better word, a political revolution going on?

Urban Aboriginal issues is a hot potato, there is something happening. But there isn’t enough representation for Aboriginal women in the urban area. Out of sight, out of mind. There’s no need to deal with it

because no one’s there to represent it. But at the same time there is something happening in the urban area, 44,000 Native people in the Montreal area…

That’s a sizeable voting block…

Sure. So how come nothing’s happening?

For some people there may be a conflict of being Involved with mainstream politics.

Jurisdiction… That’s one of our difficulties. If you look in the Montreal urban areathere are 12 different nations coming down to Montreal. Plus the fact I myself am notfrom Quebec. I’ve met a few Navajo, they’re here. It’s difficult because of thelanguage barrier. There are a few things we can identify as barriers. One is how

Montreal is spread out, some are out in Dorval, some in Lachine, West Island, it’s hard to get people together who are so spread out. But they’re there.

Do you think there might be a need for something beyond an Interest group?

We need some specific services offered by Aboriginal women to Aboriginal women. We have to have that right now. We’re falling through the cracks because of the language barrier, education and poverty. A lot of Native women don’t want to go outside. They feeling totally isolated and there isn’t another person around. I know of one woman who is from Labrador. She was here with her six children and she was pregnant again. With no family support here she felt totally alone and there is no way she can maintain her culture. But she can’t afford to go back.

Wb have two kids and It’s hard enough without the extended family structure. I can only Imagine with six especially when you’re alone.

We have people coming to us concerning women who are on the street and feel that isolation and don’t want to go for help. They feel “why bother?”

How Is that as an issue, Native women on the street?

It is an issue. It is a marginalized issue because we aren’t organized to do what we need to do to acquire the funds to do something about it. There are women who are on the street and are HIV-positive and who are totally underground. That issue has been brought to our attention. We’re not there yet. We’re only in the recruiting stage. Getting the woman together.

Just building th« circle…

We’re just building the circle to say, “Hey we’re here, let’s work together.”

Which brings us to the Urban Aboriginal Women’s Wellness Resource Centre. That’s a goal you’re working on?

Yes, we targeted the year 2000. We’re really hoping we can get solid funding. We have a group of women who are very strong and we realize the needs and services that should be there. But we’re only a small group of women yet. We have one woman, Caroline Tait, a Métis from Saskatchewan who’s doing her Ph.D., who’s been doing a lot of the writing of proposals and the working copy. And we had Beverly Sabourin who is a full-time student who was at McGill but got transferred away. So we have women who are working on their masters or Ph.D’s and working at the same time for Quebec Native Women who are trying to say let’s do something.

What are your biggest needs, besides funding?

Besides funding our biggest need now is the resources getting women together. Gettingand retaining their interest and saying, yes, we’re there to support you. But in thatsupport we have to respect where we’re all coming from. We’re at different levels.We have women coming to us who are in need of counseling and babysitting services.And some advocacy and referral work. And the Native Friendship Centre, which is anexcellent organization. There isn’t a safe place for aboriginal women. When they go tothe Friendship Centre they want to be with other Aboriginal people but there are timeswhen they come across their perpetrators. They feel like there’s no safe place for them. That’s what AWM hopes to do, provide a safe place for these women. To have a sense of empowering each other to say, “Hey, I have support here, I can have aunties and uncles for my children.” That’s our goal and dream.

A family.

A family in a sense and also strong women who can learn from one another, exchange their culture. Native cultures are similar but there’s some distinctness in the way things are done. If they can have that exchange, more growth to us. More pride for our culture, our first nationness.

Is there enough of a link between the rural and the urban areas?

I’ve seen that link come together through the Quebec Native Women.

What’s coming up these days?

There’s a young Inuit woman who’s starting an Inuit women AA Group. We have fun night coming up, Mary’s doing that. Right now we’re hoping for support from the First Nations community and that we’ll have more women coming to us who want to participate in any activities and some of the work we have to do.

Is there any place for men within that?

We do have a man, Delbert Sampson, giving a caregiver circle, he comes in once a month.There’s a place for men, why not? We’re all mothers, I have a son.

Do you have a message for the people?

Yes, as an Aboriginal urban woman, there are Aboriginal women out there from thedifferent communities but for some reason they’re forgotten. Urban

Aboriginal people have the same issues as the rural area. In that there’s politicalinformation that we don’t get in the urban area. So we’re really struggling to find out what’s happening with self-government and what’s happening with our own rights as Native people. We don’t have a voice here. I don’t have any information from my reserve saying what decisions are being made there. Whether the medical benefits are being cut. the school allowances are being cut. I don’t have any connection so I can voice my concerns and be part of that decision-making process. This is the difficulty we’re in. But I want the rural to know that there are a lot of woman here who do want to go back home but feel so devastated from the abuse issues or because there’s no employment. They feel they can’t go back. But that’s where their heart is.

Thank you for your time.