Sexual abuse led to streets, drugs

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(The name of the abused woman has been changed to protect her identity. She lives in Calgary and is working with a counselor at Native Alcoholism.)

Feeling terrified, violated, helpless and alone, Karina Foryu once again cried herself to sleep. She had allowed her alcoholic father to have his way with her, so he would not touch her younger sister.

This sexual assault was only one of many Karina experienced from the age of eight to 17. She had one older and one younger sister, who were also victims. Their family life was one of fear, fighting and drinking. During this period, Karina felt shame, embarrassed and responsible for the abuse.

An ex-street person Karina, who is now 33, is a recovering drug addict and alcoholic.

"I knew what he was doing was wrong," she says. (He told me) 'If you tell your mother, she won't love you anymore.'"

Karina always felt her mother was too busy to show her any affection or to develop a close relationship with her, but she didn't want to lose what affection she gave her.

She never told anyone until she was 14. After a fight with her older sister, who said she liked the abuse, Karina decided to tell her grandmother, who took Karina, her two sisters and two brothers to her uncle's house in a different town.

The abuse was reported to police, but since there were no adult witnesses, no formal charges were filed against her father, Karina says.

When Karina's mother asked her what her father had done, she was unable to tell her the whole story. "I don't know if she believed me or blamed me."

The next couple of months, Karina and her siblings lived in fear because her father and his friends phoned and threatened "to get even" for reporting the incident.

Within a year all the children had gone home. They never discussed the abuse. Karina felt abandoned by her mother. The family fights and abuse resumed and became particularly intense over the next three years for Karina.

"I became very rebellious," she says. "I hated everybody and everything, especially myself."

The feeling of being unloved continued and she turned to a life of promiscuity, alcohol, drugs and theft. Mixing with "bad kids" she dropped out of school and hit the streets.

"I felt I was running from reality," she says. "It was easier to stay high than to feel."

She eventually had three children and the oldest daughter was also sexually molested by her father. Karina's lifestyle and addictions got worse with two abusive husbands. The second husband was a drug dealer, who became her pimp. She tried to start life over without drugs and alcohol in various cities with her husband and children but without success - until last year.

After a five day binge of drinking alcohol and taking drugs, Karina found herself aimlessly wandering Calgary's Ogden area. Though she was incoherent and disoriented, she knew she had two major problems; her three children were in foster homes in Vancouver and she needed help with her addictions.

Her choices were to ask Alberta family and social services for a ticket to Vancouver and to try to make a life for her children there or to get some help for her problems. She knew she had to make a decision.

As these thoughts were racing through her, a friend drove by her three times - she didn't recognize him. He realized she needed to dry out, so he rented a motel room for her to sober up.

Deciding to get help, she has been receiving counseling ever since. Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous have contributed greatly to her recovery, says Karina, who is taking one day at a time, learning to love herself and to understand her disease, alcoholism.

"Drugs and alcohol are not an answer, they're an escape," she says.

Karina's children are now in foster homes in Calgary. They're being counseled and the family one day hopes to be reunited.

Karina, who no longer sees her parents, is concentrating on her healing and her children's healing. She is working with a counselor at Native Alcoholism.

Adam North Peigan, a Native alcoholism counselor, says the best way to stop the abuse cycle in an alcoholic family is to seek counseling.

Children in alcoholic families often feel confused. They're angry and resentful towards the abuser but they feel responsible for the abuse or they'll deny what has happened.

Healing is a slow process that can take years but if the person accepts what has happened and is honest, willing and wants to recover, therapy can help, says North Peigan.

"There's always hope even though things may look bleak. There are people out there, who recover."

If you are interested in receiving more information about Native Alcoholism contact 261-7921 (Calgary).

(Cheryl Klassen is a journalism student at Southern Alberta Institute of Technology).

Morley Flats puts Stoneys in the movies

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Dana Wagg, Windspeaker Staff Writer, Stoney Indian Resrve Alta.

The epic production of a Japanese film last fall dropped about $1 million into the economy of the Stoney Indians. And more movies may be on the way.

The money came from land use, catering contracts and salaries -- 300 Stoneys were hired as extras.

The $48-million production of Heaven and Earth by Haruki Kadokawa Films, Inc. of Japan was the largest and most expensive shoot in Canadian film history, involving 2,800 extras, 800 horses, 400 Canadian and Japanese crew and 100 wranglers and stunt people.

All told the shooting of Heaven and Earth -- a 16th-century Samurai epic -- last August and September pumped $16 million into the economy of southern Alberta. The movies is to be released this summer with English subtitles.

Chief Goodstoney Rodeo Centre on the Morley Flats, 65 kilometers west of Calgary, served as the production office.

A Korean company has also scouted the flats for a 1,000 horse Ghengis Khan film. Hollywood is also considering using the site for an epic about Geronimo while a sequel to Heaven and Earth is also possible.

"We had a pretty good working relationship with the apanese company. They indicated they may be interested in shooting a sequel in the summer of 1991," said Ken Tully, economic development manager with the Goodstoney Band, one of the three Stoney bands.

"I think the film may act as a vehicle for greater Japanese tourists to visit the immediate vicinity," he said. "It's questionable whether the film will be a major promoter for the Canadian tourists in so much as it's hard to determine whether Heaven and Earth will be a big box office draw."

Tully said the rodeo Centre and its location on the flats ably showed its worth to the film industry for large movie productions, serving as an office area and wardrobe facility, accommodating as many as 2,800 extras and 400 crew members.

"The corral system was able to accommodate 800 horses and the immediate 1,000 acres offered an unprecedented esthetic landscape," he said.

But while more films may be on the way, the mainstay of the Goodstoney economy is still natural gas. Funds from the sale of the gas to Calgary have been used to build roads, houses, a school, administration buildings and recreation facilities and to provide social services, said Tully.