Tsuu T'ina launches new tourism program

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If Eagleribs was alive today he would smile with approval. The vision that the Tsuu T'ina medicine warrior related to the Elders more than 100 years ago is coming true.

The boxes he saw surrounding the reserve - suburban homes, just beyond the reserve's eastern border - are bringing opportunity, not danger, just as he prophesied in 1883.

And right now that opportunity is tourism.

Chief Roy Whitney and the nine-member council recently approved a major tourism development project for the Nation.

The one-year project will pay for two full-time tourism staff, including a co-ordinator and receptionist/secretary, upgrading of road allowances to the reserve's 15 historical sites, a magazine publicity program, and attendance at more Native tourism trade shows across Canada and the United States.

"Cultural tourism could be a vehicle for sustaining ourselves economically and culturally.

"It also gets across our reflection of being Native to the larger society," says Hal Eagletail, who oversees tourism for the Nation.

"You are just going to make Eagleribs' prophecy come true by having (everyone) living and learning from each other," the Elders told Eagletail when he first approached them about tourism in May 1993.

Eagletail won't disclose the dollar value of the one-year project, but says "it's a nice budget," and funded about 80 per cent with Tsuu T'ina money.

The one-year project will build on the existing museum and reserve tour program.

After hiring staff, the program's first priority was upgrading road allowances to historical sites, such as the boarding house site, chief's house and Anglican mission.

"We already have 17 confirmed tours through to August," and another five in the fall, says Eagletail. Two of those tours are from Thailand and Germany.

By the end of the summer, he adds, total tours booked should reach 50 - and that's really conservative.

Tours are handled by local guides. In March, 10 local youths graduated as tour guides from the first certified Tsuu T'ina tour guide course. The program was organized by the Nation and Mount Royal College in Calgary.

"People want to see Native culture for themselves," says Eagletail about the growing Native tourism development.

But he adds: "You have to talk about your own people and culture specifically." Not to do so is to create another Hollywood stereotype.

For the Tsuu T'ina Nation that will mean beginning with the Story of the Great Separation, which tells how Athapaskan people came to live as far south as California and as far north as Alaska.

We (then) talk about how we evolved in Siksika country," he adds.

The Blackfoot Confederacy, unable to dislodge the fierce Athapaskan immigrants, adopted them as their "little brother."

Non-Native tourists may be surprised to find out their Tsuu T'ina hosts think the coming of the white man and reserve life was not all bad.

"There are a lot of balances my grandfather helped me to see," says Eagletail. "We're trying to find that balance between the two (Native and non-Native.)

"One way I've found is to educate the non-Native community about who we are and what we stand for.

"When it comes down to it, we're all human. That's what my grandfather stressed."

The last leg of the tour, a visit to the Nation's impressive administration building, puts the emphasis on the future.

The latest phase of the Tsuu T'ina tourist development is based on more than a year of market research.

In April 1993, NEDCO, a Calgary consulting company, confirmed that interpreting Native culture to non-Native tourists could be a growth industry for the nation.

That conclusion was confirmed again after Tsuu T'ina representatives visited two major tourism trade shows: The Canada-West Marketplace in Edmonton in December, and the Indian Country 2000 show in Denver in March.

"We have about 52 contracts from all over the world that know about us," Eagletail says about the Edmonton show. Tour operators in Calgary, Canmore and Banff visted the reserve last year.

One group that Tour Canada West Ld. of Canmore took to the reserve last fall had a fantastic time, says Robyn Dinnadge, manager of program operations for the company.

"That prompted us to offer (the tour) to more of our clients.

The direct economic benefits of Tsuu T'ina tourism include employment of tour guides and performers, plus revenue from arts and craft sales, catering in Native cuisine, and sales at the commercial centre.

Increased cultural awareness for Tsuu T'ina young people rather than just economic development is very important to the Elders, adds Eagletail.

"They liked the idea of people learning their culture and also sustaining it."

The Elders, however, have set down a couple of restrictions on tourism. All visitors must be accompanied by Tsuu T'ina guides and not wander off the roadways and walkways leading to historical sites.