Introduction-E

consider the fact that the child she is carrying has feelings. The foetus she is carrying is
human also. He will find out later where he is from. The ones that are adopted tend to
break the law and face court. We deal with them through the community justice
program. It’s the ones who were adopted who tend to break the law. The adoptive
mother says she loves him very much. I think if one shows too much love when they are
young, that’s probably why they tend to break the law. You should treat them equal to
your other children. Don’t favor them. They have to be well taken care of and given a
good home like the rest of us as they are only human. Don’t tell them you love them
more than others, or then they will start breaking the law. If they have a short temper
and aren’t like your natural children, you shouldn’t tell them they take after their natural
family. Or, if they tend to sleep a lot and it’s really noticeable, you shouldn’t tell them that
they take after their natural family. This is their own personality. When one is called
“half-white,” there’s nothing you can do to change that.
I am going to ask something about teaching. What do you think
of the way students are taught today?
Elisapee: In our community, school started in 1963. It seemed to be good then. Not all
of my children attended school. The younger of the two older ones was in school. It
turns out it was wrong of us to agree to send them to school when the teaching material
was irrelevant to the North. We were wrong in some ways and right in other ways. It is
good to learn to read and write in English, to be able to understand the language. But
they were not taught about the lifestyle in the North. All our children in Mittimatalik
have been taught as though they were to continue on to Ottawa. They are not taught the
way of life in our community. They are not taught what to do when food becomes
scarce. They start asking, “Do you have money?” They have no qualms about asking
that question. They sure know how to ask for money now in our community. We were
not like that. We wouldn’t ask for anything. We were respectful and didn’t want to ask
for anything. If we didn’t have it, then we didn’t have it. Children today seem to think
it’s okay not to eat meat; as long as they have junk food they are happy. And we are not
used to having Inuit teachers. They are teaching using the qallunaat method, doing
paperwork. Kids today need to be outside more. Back then, before our children went to
school, they tended to be more relaxed if they had been playing outside. Now they sit
in school all day. You probably get students who can’t settle down, because they have a
need to be outside. They are in the building all the time. The girls enjoy being in the
school. They should be taught in Inuktitut if they’re going to be in the North.
26 Introduction to the Oral Traditions