Charlene Hindsley: I come from the Ho Chunk Nation at Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin.
Valene Stoney-Smokyday: We left Saskatchewan, Canada, on Thursday.
Gwendolyn Howard: We're from Selma, Arizona. We drove for 17 hours. We left since yesterday morning. Came in this morning about five o'clock this morning.
Analee Morris: The most important or formal for Umoⁿhoⁿis to even say who you come from. My father is, my mother is, and even their parents. Like that.
Doran Morris: There's a herd of buffalo on a horizon in a pasture or in a green field. They're eating, and there's a herd, and there's one that stands out in front. He's at a ready position to defend or watch for danger. That's what my name means.
Charlene: My ho Chunk name is Weepomukrenga, I come from the Thunder clan.
Gwendolyn: Hi, everyone. My name is Gwendolyn Howard. My clan is Bitter Water and Salt and Coyote Path in Tingle. Our grandparents... Yeah, my grandfather was a medicine man. His name was Ben de Sose. And we have our own fireplace, too. It's Navajo Talker.
Valene: We have a registered chapter in Saskatchewan. My name is Valene, v a l e n e, Stoney Smokyday, and I come from Yellow Quill First Nation. Our chapter is called Stoney Ceremonial Fireplace Incorporated. And the reason why it's important for us to be affiliated with NACNA, the acronym for Native American Church of North America, is because we need their documents to be able to come into the United States and transport this peyote from Texas.
Analee: The government, United States government, had a hand in there in forming the stipulations for our church. So my english name is Analee Morris. And so you see where a lot of the different Native American church chapters, the different tribes, they carry out different ways because of their culture, because of their traditions, but also because of the government.
Wellington Spence: Wellington Spence, I come from Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation in Manitoba, and I traveled here with my wife and my son. Back in Canada, the residential schools kind of forced our people into churches and to follow their way of life. So... I wasn't raised that way, I was raised traditional, and I was raised to pray to Creator.
Valene: That was like back in the sixties, eh? Where all the native, the indigenous ceremonies had to go underground, and they had to practice our ways in secret because our government was against it.
Gwendolyn: Well, as long as we support North America Peyote Way to show our loved ones, our kids, our grandkids, to show them that everything is possible through them praying, eating them, and showing them the way instead of doing drugs or alcohol. Praying and believing, growing and growing and growing stronger and so they won't go missing or either, like, what they say, murdered. Indigenous? Yeah. So they can understand what we're going through and where they came from, from way beginning, how, how we came up as Indians, and this is our land.
Valene: Our hope is that the medicine stays the way that it is, and it's not decriminalized. That way it protects this way of life, this way of worship, that a lot of us, as you can see, there's a lot of people here that value this way of life. We're following the teachings that were taught to us as children growing up in this fireplace.
Charlene: We sit on the ground, and the ground is real important. Mother Earth. We're in connection with Mother Earth. And then it's just the teepee. I always think of it like a little microphone, kind of like we're inside and the music goes up and spreads, like, the singing, the harmony, the heartbeat, you know, that it's all together as one and one mind, one accord. And when things like that happen and, you know, we believe, like Creator comes around and he's among us.
Analee: I probably could write it, sing it, say it, talk it, speak it to you. But there's a real big difference between you and I, and that difference is the fact that I am Native American. And when I go somewhere, anywhere, I'm Umoⁿhoⁿ first.
Charlene: Like, if I didn't have my spirituality, like, it's who I am as a human being. Like, I'm not. I'm not a caucasian person. Like, I don't fit well in their culture and their anything, even like a church or something. I try to go over there and I don't fit in with them. But this is, this is where I fit in.
Analee: We are like two minds in one world or.... Things out outside of here, the society outside of here, the culture, the diversity, the religions, the laws, everything outside of here, we had to learn that, too. But here we learned everything Umoⁿhoⁿ. Who we are and how Creator meant for us.
Doran: These roadmen, when they put that, they come from out of state, come from a different tribe, and they come here and put their chief peyote down. That medicine has a real power to it, real powerful power to it. And when they put it on the ground, like that power of that blessing goes throughout our tribe that way. Put it on Mother Earth, because Mother Earth, she's our mother, and it goes, goes to all her children, which is us. We're her children.
Charlene: So we stay close by the fireplace. The light, that's where we go to, is the light, and we're protected, or, you know, whereas if you're out in the world in the darkness, you don't know what you can run into. Because we run into a lot of stuff... I know out there.
Analee: It's written where our history says we roamed. And those types of words, like we weren't roaming. We knew exactly where we were going and why.
