Loading Events

« All Events

  • This event has passed.

Silheng Otel – Lummi Nation

May 9, 2018 @ 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm

Free

Peter has been invited to play as part of the celebration and invites you to join him!

The Lummi Nation, through the Nation’s House of Tears Carvers, will begin on May 9, 2018, a journey transporting a 18’ Killer Whale totem pole and two, 8’ Seal Poles through events in seven cities to Miami, Florida as part of its Salish Sea Campaign.

It is a journey about the trauma and resilience of a killer whale—Tokitae, aka Lolita—and her home waters: the Salish Sea. Tokitae, captured in 1970, belongs to the southern resident killer whale population that inhabits the traditional territory of the Lummi Indians.

When she is finally brought home from her small concrete tank in Miami Seaquarium to her Southern Resident Killer Whale “L-pod” after decades away she will go through a period of rehabilitation and rejoin her mother and family for whom she still calls out nightly and whose songs she still remembers.

She will represent a strengthening healing in body and spirit for her, for all of us, and for the sacred and endangered waters of the Salish Sea. The totem pole, carved by Lummi Master Caver Jewell James, presents the story of female killer whale and her two children. The killer whale is, of course, the iconic image of the Salish Sea, and is also the focus of the 2018 totem pole journey that concludes in Miami.

The Lummi Nation is now leading a team of experts to secure her release from the Miami Seaquarium, her rehabilitation in a designated sanctuary in the San Juan Islands, and her reunion with her family.

Her rescue, rehabilitation, and reunion represents our Xa xalh Xechnging (“our sacred obligation “) to honor qw’e lh’ol mèchen (“killer whale”), to rescue and rehabilitate the Salish Sea, reunite us with a healthy and vibrant Xwullmy (“Salish Sea”), and demonstrates the difference uniting diverse communities, groups and organizations can make against even the most formidable opponents. The Tokitae undertaking will be the subject of a full-length film produced and directed by the award-winning filmmakers Dennie Gordon and Geoff Schaaf. This message of resistance, resilience, and recovery is especially timely, today.

BUF Choir will perform, Totem Pole Journey crew members will speak, including Lummi Elders Jewell and Douglas James. Julie Trimingham and Denise Solomon will be performing “Calling the Home Blackfish” and BUF and local ministers will offer the Blessing.

A free will offering will be gathered to support the Journey crew along their way.

Parking is limited so please car pool or use other alternative modes of transportation.

They will be leaving here May 9th, and traveling cross country to Miami. They are still trying to raise funds, so if you are interested in supporting them: https://www.gofundme.com/58whntc

Look for the Blessing events here: https://www.facebook.com/pg/totempolejourney/events/?ref=page_internal. You can also follow the Journey on the facebook page as well as they’ll be posting videos, photos, etc while they are on the road.

Venue

Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship
1207 Ellsworth St
Bellingham, WA 98225 United States
+ Google Map
Phone:
3607333837
Website:
http://www.buf.org/3461