Noggin the Nog

            On Saturday morning I finished my search of the chords for “On n’est pas la pour se faire engueuler” (We Didn’t Come Here to Be Shouted At) by Boris Vian. Over the next few days I’ll figure out which chords fit.

            I memorized lines nine to twelve of “Le bras méchanique” by Serge Gainsbourg.

            I worked on my journal.

            I got off Twitter before the morning was over but not by much. I’m caught up with old tweets now so I don’t think I’ll be spending as much time there as I have since being off Twitter for a week.

            I went to No Frills where I skipped buying grapes because they were all too soft. I got a pint of strawberries, vine tomatoes, two bags of avocadoes, cilantro, dill, two bunches of asparagus, two English cucumbers, some mushrooms, two packs of roasted seaweed, two cartons of soymilk, and some mouthwash. They have plexiglass cough shields installed at all the checkout counters now, except of course the automatic ones.

            For lunch I had a lettuce, cucumber, dill, green onion, tomato and avocado salad with balsamic dressing.

            I took a siesta at 14:30 but only slept for twenty minutes and then felt restless. It’s been like that since I started drinking caffeinated tea again.

            I did my exercises while listening to Amos and Andy. This story was basically a repeat of an episode from a few years before. There is a vacant lot next door to the lodge hall and Kingfish and Andy decide to open a parking lot there. Kingfish gets his brother-in-law Leroy to watch the lot for a few minutes but Leroy thinks it’s a used car lot and sells one of the automobiles for $600. To get out of trouble Kingfish gives his half of the lot to Andy and gives him the $600 so Andy will be blamed and not him for the lost car. When Andy asks where he got the $600 Kingfish says he took it out of his unemployment insurance. They only give clients that much if they never plan on getting a job and are absolute bums. After Andy has spent $100 he meets the guy looking for his car. Instead of getting punched in the nose Kingfish decides to help Andy. They have to find the guy that bought the car and give him back the $600 to get the car back but Andy needs to raise the extra $100, which he does. Then Kingfish wants Andy to sign the lot over to him and so Andy agrees. Then Kingfish asks Andy how he raised the $100 so fast. He tells him Leroy sold a Cadillac from the lot for $100.

            I was able to listen to part A of Gomer White’s lecture on Rose-Redwood’s “Reclaim, Rename and Reoccupy. It’s a thirty-five minute video but because of my connection it took about two hours.

            The power of naming places and people are powerful tools. Places are important to people and culture.

            Europe is considered the “old world” and the sacred places of the settlers of North America tend to be outside of the Americas and in Europe or the Middle East. Settlers must leave North America to make pilgrimages to those sacred places because they are not connected here. But Indigenous people of North America make their pilgrimages here.

            The fact is that most settlers don’t make any pilgrimages. Why would what a few people do define anything meaningful about the majority? Even among religious Christians there are some sacred sites in Canada, especially in Quebec and people do make pilgrimages here. There are special tours taking people to all of the shrines of Quebec.

            The names of streets and places in Canada like Queensway refer Kingsway allude to a connection to the crown. Those kinds of names probably make up less than one percent of the names of places in Canada. Most of the places named after people refer to people that had something to do with Canada.

            He draws the lamest conclusions.

            He said giving European names to places that already had Indigenous names is a form of erasure. But then he mentions that the Humber River has had many names given it by different groups such as the Anishnaabe, the Mississauga, the Wendat and the Seneca. He seems to be defeating his own argument here. He says the Humber and Toronto all fall under the “dish with one spoon” treaty and so it was common territory. If naming other people’s places is erasure then why didn’t the other nations call the Humber by the name of the first group that named it? If it was common territory then how could the Mississauga sell Toronto?

            He started to talk about the US again. He can’t help himself. He should go home.

            He says that in the northeastern States and upstate New York there are a lot of blue and gold plaques evoking settler history but it is usually a history of war and chaos.

            Renaming Indigenous places is the language of erasure of Indigenous connectivity to their land. Well, inadvertently but probably not intentionally.

            The Onondaga lived in Toronto in 1740 and it’s still Onondaga territory. Their territory is upstate New York.

            Reclaiming storyscapes. Stories are part of the collecti9ve that lived near the place in the story. Parts of towns are named after ethnic enclaves. They invoke their own places and subcultures. Names and images are supposed to invoke certain things and bring out identity. Well duh!

            There are older stories than the historical markers. Some of the histories recounted on the plaques are inaccurate, but they don't correct them. More about States.

            Naming reinforces ownership. So is Alberta more owned than Saskatchewan?

            Stories of the fabric of the land and relationships. Several nations agreed on the dish with one spoon sharing treaty of this part of Ontario. But if the Mississauga sold Toronto does it still fall under the dish with one spoon agreement?

            Mount Douglas on Vancouver Island was once called PKOLS.

            Are land acknowledgements enough.

            More about the States. His old institution in Hooterville was the College of Oswego. It’s in Onondaga territory. Part of reconciliation lies in recognizing where institutions sit. Oswego sits on unceded land. The lawyers preferred “The traditional lands of the Onondaga over “homelands" because there had been no permanent structures. The area had been a place for hunting and fishing camps. Gomer wanted to call them “unceded traditional homelands" blah blah blah USA. The lawyer says treaties are bills of sale.

            Wet’suwet’en is truly unceded. Gaslink had no right. But the elected chiefs gave them the right.

            Names connect and recognize particular groups or peoples through the land to the ancestors.

            The idea of “turtle island” is quite common among Indigenous people. He says North America is roughly shaped like a turtle. I say if you want badly enough for something to look like something else then it will look like it to you.

Stories tell of specific locations and connect with the land.

Settlers give the names of sacred places far away to locations here. Sometimes,

but more often the names have something to do with here.
Indigenous places have names that connect to the culture here.

Devil’s Tower in Wyoming looks like it has claw marks on its side. He says it’s in a national park but it’s just the first declared national monument in the United States. The Indigenous story is that some children climbed it while escaping an angry bear. Again, I see from research that the place has had many Indigenous names given by different nations erasing each other’s names.

The location has become a hotspot for legal issues because it is a favourite spot

 for rock climbers. Officials encouraged climbers to take Indigenous people into consideration in June when they go there for ceremonies. 85% of climbers honour that request but some have tried to sue because they claim the ban violates the separation of church and state.

There are sacred places all over the Americas.

Belleville (He said “Belleview”) in the Tyendinaga Mohawk territory where the

OPP raided the blockade is the area from which the Great Peacemaker began his journey. The Peacemaker first met the Mohawks at Cohoes Falls on the Mohawk River near Waterford New York. They told him that they would only listen to him if he climbed a tree. They cut the tree down with him in it and sent it over the falls. They said that if they found him cooking mushy the next morning they would listen to him. So it’s like this, “We are going to try to kill you and if you survive we will listen to you.” I don’t see the connection between being able to survive a murder attempt and being worth listening to. I also don’t see why someone would think that people that tried to kill them would be worth talking to.

Cohoes Falls is a sacred place with signage all over the place about the Great

Law.

Even among settlers renaming happens all the time. Albany used to be Fort

Orange. Throughout Europe the maps have changed because of changes of place names.

In Oswego four or five nations have streets named after them. It was proposed

that the Onondaga also have a street. More about States.

Declaration of Cultural Resurgence. The right to authorize the decolonisation of a

place. In 2015 the Seneca petitioned to have the name "Squaw Island" in Buffalo changed because the name was racist. The city council voted unanimously to change it to Unity Island.

Reconciliation is about the power of naming.

Even when he’s at home and has the opportunity to read from a script he decides

to adlib badly and repeats himself several times.

It was already after 20:00 when I finished listening to part A of the lecture.

I had a salad for dinner and watched episodes two and three of Noggin the Nog.

Prince Noggin’s father King Knut has just died and now Noggin must choose a

bride and marry or else the kingdom will fall under the rule of Noggin’s Uncle Nogbad the Bad. All of the eligible maidens have gathered for Noggin to choose but Noggin goes down the line and finds none that he wants. At the end of the line is a human-sized green bird named Graculas who begins to speak to Noggin and tell him that he represents King Nan of the Nooks in the far north and he presents him with a knife decorated with the image of the king’s daughter Nooka. Noggin falls in love with Nooka’s likeness and declares that he will build a ship and travel to the north to ask for Nooka’s hand in marriage. A ship0 is built and a crew of twenty men travel with him along with Graculas as their guide. Out at sea after they survive a wicked storm, Graculas has become seasick and falls into unconsciousness. The wind stops and but they have no idea which direction to row without the guidance of the green bird. Suddenly they spot a small island. One of the men steps onto it and tries to dig into the soil but the island begins to rise and reveals itself to be a giant seal.