Interview with Albert Beck

SENECA CHARTRAND: I am Seneca Chartrand. I'm here with Duane (Albert) Morrisseau-Beck. It is August 5th. We are at the Two-Spirit Gathering in Beausejour, Manitoba. Is this your first gathering?

ALBERT BECK: No, actually it's not my first gathering [laughs]. I think this is my fourth gathering now. The last one that I was at was in Ontario, I think, and that's about twelve or thirteen years ago. The experiences that I have at each and every one of them is very special. For me, I remember the first one I went to. I was young-ish I guess I could say in my mid-twenties. I'm part of Sixties Scoop, so I was taken away from my family. I'm from the Métis Nation and I'm 00:01:00from Crane River, Manitoba, which is in Manitoba not very far from -- a few hours away from Winnipeg, I guess? I grew up in a Ukrainian family. I grew up with the Ukrainian culture, language, and lived in that world for a number of years. So when I finally made it to the International Two-Spirit Gathering for the first time, it was a culture shock for me. Because I didn't understand native or indigenous spirituality, more specifically First Nation spirituality. Coming from the Métis Nation, not connected to my community-- I think at that time I was just learning who I was. A lot of it was very strange to me and it 00:02:00was really more about ... to me at that point I think it was -- I was away from Winnipeg, away from everything, and I realized that I was somewhere where I could just relax. I use the analogy "plugging in" and "recharging". We get disconnected when we leave from here, and I've always tried to figure out how I could create an extension cord, or an umbilical cord, to the two-spirited space that we're in so that I could continue to get that energy and that feeling that I have when we come together. The first experience was sort of a culture shock. And after that the second, and the third, I took part in sweats and helped out 00:03:00when I could. But I'm still learning. I'm forty-nine now, and I'm still learning about things. And I was away from it for quite some time actually. Just simply because of life, and work that I need to pursue, my career, and the colonial piece took over and consumed me. It was just recently last year, when I saw that it was coming back to my home territory that I felt that it was really important that I come back. This time around, it's been very beautiful, again. I feel my experience now, is moving from that young adult -- moving into the next phase of my life as an older person and just experiencing that with those eyes and seeing those that were older than me hosting these gatherings and how they're moving 00:04:00into their different life stages. It's just beautiful. Here, in this space, I know that everybody -- the people who have been doing this work have been through a vetting process, so I don't feel like I'm afraid when two-spirit people begin to explore their two-spirituality. There's a lot of people out there that are saying that they are healers and they want to teach -- they want to teach you, and you're eager enough to take it on. And sometimes those teachings and those experiences are extremely, extremely toxic and it could be really -- they could hurt you, well they do hurt, right? So here, the people that are here have gone through, have the teachings, have the permission to do 00:05:00that ceremony in this territory, and have the full confidence of the elders and the planning committee. I get to relax and I don't have to worry about going through filter processes because I know automatically that the people that are doing his work are supposed to do it. But that took some time, right? It takes a time for that understanding and that maturity to take effect. It's not just a one-time experience. This needs to be sort of part of your ... you know, we do powwows and gatherings in our own nations. We do that sometimes annually -- even during the seasons. This should be something that's got to be part of your practice. Like I said, I'm from here. So it's really great to be home. As I 00:06:00mentioned before, I was a Sixties Scoop survivor. I say "thriver" now, because I'm not surviving, I'm thriving. But I was taken away from my family at birth, and so I grew up in a very Eurocentric world. And coming into the two-spirit world was actually through HIV and AIDS. Part of the movement for two-spirited is the HIV/AIDS movement. My introduction to indigenous spirituality and to the indigenous community was through the Manitoba Aboriginal Aids Task Force. My first meeting with Albert McLeod, who I call "Mama". When I made it through that 00:07:00door, and I think of it as a miracle, my world changed and shifted from a very Eurocentric perspective to one that [interview interruption].

SENECA CHARTRAND: We were just talking about the Manitoba Aids Task Force.

ALBERT BECK: For me, my spirituality and my introduction to the indigenous community was through that space. I was actually going though crisis. I had been already HIV for probably three-four years, I wasn't on any anti-retrovirals, and so I didn't know where to go. I was actually getting sick. I just remember walking through that space and actually feeling the same feeling that I kind of 00:08:00have when I come to the Two-Spirit gathering. Albert welcomed me. The word to me welcome means a big -- Its's huge. Especially when I was living on the streets, and dealing with violence, and not having any money, and just a number of social, economic issues that I was facing, including health, right? And so I was able to walk through those doors, and feel welcomed. I began to learn First Nation's culture because at that time I didn't know I was Métis. I didn't actually repatriate back to my home until -- maybe about three or four years later after I started doing a lot of volunteering within the Manitoba Aids Task Force and became a front line worker. I started to begin to live. I started the 00:09:00anti-retrovirals for the first phase of them, the AZT DDI [zidovudine didanosine] which were basically -- to me were poison. But they managed to sustain my life. I tell people I'm on borrowed time because I'm on anti-retrovirals. Naturally, I should actually not be here speaking to you today. I think I was given these opportunities. Albert just kept giving me these different opportunities. I started off in administration and answering phones. He just took the time to gently sort of help me move through that, but I still was not connected to who I was. The two-spirited family, through the first gathering really actually introduced me to my first family, the two-spirit family, the HIV/AIDS family, right? Like I said, I went to my first gathering 00:10:00and I was really in shock, I was very emotional most of the time. I was very angry. I was very disconnected and I was angry why I wasn't connected to anything. But I didn't understand what anybody was doing. When I think about what goes on when a youth comes into this door, the social anxiety and inexperience, I know what they're going through. I really do. I feel for the most part the Two-Spirit gathering and its ways and introduction to indigenous culture and language and spirituality have really helped me move forward in my life. I identify myself as Two-Spirit. I remember a very long time ago I thought that being gay was actually supposed to be a woman. And I was moving into that direction until I got into mainstream gay GLBTQ in Winnipeg, and realized it 00:11:00wasn't just that, but I was extremely feminine. I still am. And I feel like I'm digressing into a femassy right now [laughs]. Lots of lisping and lots of swishing and just having a great time. I feel like I'm just decolonizing right now. I feel I'm going back ... sort of an onion. I've just been peeling away very quickly. It's been wonderful. My community is the Métis community, and the Métis Nation is slowly working on two-spirited issues. There are a number of movers and shakers in the Métis community. Barbara Bruce is Métis, from Manitoba, and there are few others across the country that have been slowly moving forward on GLBTQ two-spirited issues. The Métis nation of Ontario, 00:12:00Margaret Froh, is actually a high profile president of the Métis Nation of Ontario, and she's lesbian. There's a number of Métis people that are very prominent that have been sort of leading or moving this yard stick. The Métis Nation I think is now starting its conversations on two-spirited issues. And what does that mean to us as people? I wouldn't steer or go very far from the original intent or the original ... how people would define what Two-Spirited means to them. But for the most part, for us, I think that Métis will look at that in the same way that all indigenous people look at Two-Spirited as another level of being. Because I feel in my view, Two-Spirited -- is that I think that 00:13:00each person actually is Two-Spirited but it's not about sexuality, it's another level of -- it's almost like another sense of being. And so when I go into those spaces in my mind or wherever I go, I'm in a very very powerful space and I have to be very respectful of that space when I go there. But before, I think young people look at Two-Spiritedness as being GLBTQ, and there is an element of that, but I think as you get older and you start to see things in a different way -- and then moving towards that understanding. I think Two-Spiritedness is fluid like our sexuality and our gender identification. So I think Two-Spirited is also fluid and changes as you go through your different cycles, right? So like I said, for me, my journey as a two-spirited person started with a diagnoses of 00:14:00HIV and walking into the Manitoba Aboriginal Aids Task Force and doing all these different things. They gave me different responsibilities. For the most part, I keep thinking Albert was testing me in the community and sometimes I would make it and then I'd fail, and then I would succeed. But each failure was less and less as long as I kept trying I kept moving forward. In the all two-spirited space where I learnt, and part of the journey as a Two-Spirit person, is being able to live in two different worlds. I think being an adopted child, living in two worlds, I was able to sort of figure out how that could be in mainstream colonial world, and then in indigenous spirituality, and two-spirited world, 00:15:00right? Now I'm getting older, and I'm seeing things as they don't need to be that way. I feel comfortable in my skin, in my body, and my spirit that I can be who I need to be. But the two-spirited gatherings are really the place where I charge. To plug in and charge my spirituality, create these beautiful memories, new friendships. And those memories that can help you when you start to sort of feel disconnected. You can go back to those memories of that sweat -- when you remember the naming of that person, that's your sister, she'll be you sister for life, and you think about that spiritual connection. So you don't necessarily have to have people with you. You can think about those memories and it reconnects you back to that space and that time. So I've been lucky. I started 00:16:00the anti-retrovirals in the mid '95 [1995]. And I've been taking them for over -- let's see, 1995, twenty some years already. It's kind of shocking, but I've been taking pills every day for over twenty-some five years or so? Something like that? It's allowed me to do what I needed to do to carry on, to move forward on the HIV/AIDS stuff. I'm the president of the Ontario Aboriginal HIV Strategy, which is a service organization that provides services to people with HIV and AIDS. I've done a lot of work on child welfare and the Sixties Scoop at the national and international level. I've been very, very fortunate to be able 00:17:00to use the teachings and the knowledge that I got from theses spaces from teachers before me, and teachers that are teaching me now. I will take some of the stuff that I've learnt even here back home and use it. It's not necessarily skills -- it's thoughts that help me sort of move around some of the things that people will get caught up in. I would get caught up in different things. When someone says something towards me, instead of taking it personally, I will take that with a breath of ... let it go because that person is going through what they need. I had a teaching on where people are and respecting where they are, right? I mentioned a little bit about family. My mother is a nurse, she's 00:18:00retired. My father works I think its general labour. That's my biological family when I speak, because it's kind of confusing when you have an adopted family and then you have a biological family, and that family is blended. So I have two sisters and two brothers in my biological family. And my adopted family I had one brother and two sisters. When I grew up in my Ukrainian family, the adopted family, it was a good life. There were some situations towards the end of our relationship which was -- I terminated around age twenty. I think it was around age twenty I terminated our relationship with my adopted family just because it was very toxic and very violent. There was lateral violence, and physical 00:19:00violence, and it just did a number of things that for me, part of protecting myself was that I was able to protect myself by just disconnecting. I've been home since 1997 with my biological family. My family is a beautiful family. I'm very lucky as a sixties scoop survivor that I was able to return back home and actually be with my family. There is a lot of Sixties Scoop survivors that have come home that have never been able to actually return home. For me, my family was looking for me actually. They were looking for me. My mom said ever since she was eighteen years old. I had three family members that had put their name into the registry to look for me. They were looking for me as soon as she was 00:20:00old enough to look for me. They never gave me up. I was taken away fraudulently by the government and placed into a non-indigenous family. The funny thing was, is that I was actually living in the same territory. My grandparents lived in my territory where I'm from. I lived five hundred kilometers away from my territory up north in The Pas. Albert's from The Pas and there's a number of two-spirited people that are from The Pas actually that I know. I moved to the city in '80 -- I think it was 1987 when I received a lot of services and stuff. And I was around my family all time, I just didn't know. It's heartbreaking in some ways because I was always looking on the streets -- looking for my family. But I was dealing with those identity issues. I had a double whammy as a two-spirited person because I didn't know who I was. Then I was dealing with my sexuality, 00:21:00and I didn't know what that even meant. And then I found out I was in indigenous, and I had to deal with that identity. So it didn't come in the phases that it was supposed to be. It was all disrupted. My whole life was very disrupted. I spent the better part of twenty, thirty years of my life trying to figure out where I came from, who I am, who my family is, and to come to terms with my own sexuality and the way that I wanted to identify myself as. Even being a two-spirited person it was very binary. I never ever thought about pansexual or bisexual or anything of that sort. That wasn't in the cards. To see what I see today and the community, our youth are identifying themselves in many very different ... non-binary, and all these different terminologies. I'm just lost sometimes [laughs]. But I'm learning -- so I use pronouns they/them he/she 00:22:00or whatever. You look at how you can accommodate and learn -- and that's coming from our communities. I think our indigenous peoples have actually lead those conversations. We've had many, many transgendered and non-binary indigenous peoples living their lives, and they were ghosts, and now they're there. They're starting to become a place in prominence and it's beautiful to see that and to learn about that -- I think is really important. I feel like it's going to shift again [laughs]. Coming to this Two-Spirit gathering, or coming to places where two-spirited people can be who they want to be, for me is a very, very safe space. Having the right people doing the ceremonies, having the right educated 00:23:00elders -- creates a safe space for two-spirited people. It's so critical right now with our youth. It was interesting to see what was going -- the dynamics that were happening in the space when I arrived on Friday. We had youth. There was beautiful youth here. And I was so excited to just grab them. I told them actually when I met them "you need to get involved. Don't wait to start feeling something. Don't wait to not say hi to somebody. Go and introduce yourself to them. Say hi. Ask questions. Do it now because on the third day, you're going to 00:24:00start to feel like you're going to start to connect, and it's going to be time to go home" so I said "do it as soon as you can. Somebody sees someone standing there by themselves, say hi to them. Introduce yourself. Go talk to an elder. They've identified themselves in the space. If you have a question, or if you have a thought ask them. Bring some tobacco, and ask them if you can have a few minutes of their time. They're here, they are telling you that they're here". What I saw yesterday was amazing. You could just see how they were coming out of their shell. They have to protect themselves when they're out in the real world, and here, we've already created that shell of protection. And I pray in my heart and my soul that that shell is around them when they take off and leave -- they take part of that protection with them when they go wherever they're going to go, and it's going to be with them until they come back and plug in again. I 00:25:00hope to see them again next year and so forth. It was very beautiful to see. So that's a safe space. They feel safe and it's a totally different safety space. It has parental safety feelings in it, it's got community feelings inside of it, it has spiritual safety-ness, cultural safety-ness, it has happy safety-ness. It has that place where you can mourn, and you can cry, and you can release safety spaces. You could just see how they're just growing, I was just like "aww my little hatchlings" they're just like growing into little chickadees. I'm a mother hen. I'm just very proud to see that even though I didn't rear them, but 00:26:00I look at them as our children, my babies. I just think of that, and that's important to me that I think that way because then I can honour them, and if they come and talk to me, I'll be ready for them. For me, safety spaces is really key. I think one of the things that I want to sort of close off with my thoughts are is it's important for us to continue this type of stuff. In fact, yesterday we were sitting around the sacred fire and a lot of us were saying we wish we could do this all the time -- to get those teaching that are just coming once a year, like a conference? And actually be able to come out and do this. For example, if you wanted to be here for a month. It's a space for two-spirited 00:27:00people that they can come, it's like a refuge. And they can come and they can learn the sacred fires, and learn all the stuff, and be here over a period of time if they wanted -- to be here for the whole summer for god's sakes. And it's run in a community way, right? But being able to come here and have that and be able to have that space to be able to continue doing that. For me, I really pray that we get to that point where that can happen. Whether we actually have a facility that's ours that we can come whenever we want. It's opened all the time. It has all the safety and teachings, protocols, and processes like naming ceremonies, and rites of passage, and all those different ceremonies that we need to have so that we can go back into the world and function in a proud and honourable way. I'm just very happy that you guys are doing this project. I 00:28:00think having the archival piece of this two-spirited movement. I think a lot of it rests in Albert's head because he's been able to survive a lot of everything and talk about the HIV/AIDS movement, that's part of our history. Those people that are gone, that fought HIV, they fought for rights for two-spirited people. And that's why we have these gatherings to honour those people, right? So, I'm really excited that you guys are doing that. I'm very proud of our youth that you're actually taking this on because you're using technology to get it done. I appreciate this opportunity to share and I look forward to hearing and hopefully listening to other two-spirited people's perspectives.

SENECA CHARTRAND: Thank you so much.