WATERLOO REGION — The All Nations Grand River Water Walk will proceed as planned this September.
“We believe the water needs us no matter what.” says Mary Anne Caibaiosai, the founder of the walk. “We see COVID as an opportunity to make sure she’s taken care of.”
All walkers will be asked to bring masks, gloves and hand sanitizer. Social distancing will be observed, and the method of relaying the pail may also be altered, Caibaiosai said.
This year walkers will start at the river’s mouth at Lake Erie on Sept. 12 and finish at the headwaters in Dundalk on Sept. 19.
Caibaiosai launched the initial walk in 2018 after being inspired by now-passed Anishinaabe Grandmother and Mother Earth Water Walk founder Josephine Mandamin’s original walks around the Great Lakes.
After consulting with another elders upon completion of her master’s in social work at Wilfrid Laurier University, Caibaiosai knew she was being led to walk for the Grand River. She started the local water walk to pray for the Grand River’s healing and raise awareness about how ultimately everyone depends on water. The ceremony is to take place for four years, from 2018 to 2021.
Since then, person by person, the local community is taking a deeper interest in the water walk and the Grand River itself.
Last week, in response to his deepening personal connection with the Grand River and experience participating in the water walk, local retired teacher Phillip Martin launched a website dedicated to community story telling of personal experiences with the Grand River: grandriverexplorations.ca
“Since my first Water Walk, when I go down to the river, I carry with me a deep sense of gratitude and belonging,” he writes in his story on the website. “What is tangible is the quality of relationship between the walkers and ‘Nibi’ (the water). There is a definite sense of being friends with the water.”
“One of the walk’s ideas is to reconnect people to water,” Caibaiosai said. “Often we’re so disconnected we don’t even know it’s flowing through our neighbourhood.”
Since the walks first started in 2018, the community surrounding it has grown. Each year, a group of core walkers travel the entire journey, and are joined by a group of community members who come and go throughout.
Shirley-Lynn Martin, a core organizer of the walk, said Waterloo Region’s community has responded to the water walk very well since it began. The Grand River Conservation Authority provided maps and technical support, local police have provided escorts through busy sections of the route, community members have given meals and accommodations, and many fundraisers have been organized from bike rides to online auctions, and a community concert.
To Martin, the momentum in the community is palpable, and the group is looking forward to this year’s walk going ahead despite the pandemic.
Said Caibaiosai, “Josephine-Baa would say, ‘The water’s waiting.’ There’s no reason not to walk if we’re keeping people safe.”
Anyone is invited to join. Donations of food, water and funds are also welcome.
“Water is life, and without water we wouldn’t be here,” Caibaiosai said. “Everyone is welcome to come pray and sing for the water. We all have a responsibility to care and nourish the water. We have a tendency to take all the time and not give back. The ceremony is our way of giving back.”
To find out more, visit grandriverwaterwalk.com.
- Leah Gerber, Local Journalism Initiative,
