Kahnawake honours residential school survivors with Orange Shirt Day

An emotional ceremony was held in Kahnawake on Friday to honour the survivors of Indian residential schools as part of a growing annual movement.

Orange Shirt Day brings awareness to one of the darkest chapters in Canada's history and remembers how thousands of children were taken from their homes to boarding schools — where many were beaten, abused and humiliated simply for being Indigenous.

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Students met with survivors like Kakaionstha Betty Deer, who was sent to a residential school in Spanish, Ont. when she was only six.

For several years, she tried to bury the memories and the pain of the sexual abuse she endured at the hands of nuns.

"I went through a healing journey for 25 years in order to find out who I really was," she said.

"You don't know who you are — you have no culture, no language, you're like the walking dead. You're alive but you don't know who you are."

'It causes multi-generational trauma'

The impact of residential schools lives on in Kahnawake, where many are still trying to recover from what their loved ones endured.

Helen Montour says her father's experience in a residential school has had long-lasting consequences for her entire family.

"He would shy away from to hug you or anything like that," she said. "I never knew why as I was young, I found out why as I got older and all this came out and I understand why.

"It causes multi-generational trauma."

Deer said that everyone across Canada should acknowledge the dark legacy of residential schools and address the issues that First Nations communities face today.

"Not enough people know about what happened — still happening today," she said. "How many reserves with no water, no housing, suicides?"

"Canadian people cannot say it is not happening."