我的女儿参加完夏令营回到家，带回了一件艺术品——六朵用红黄两色点彩画成的小花。她把它放在餐桌上，那神情就像她一整天都在等机会展示给我们看。
My daughter came home from summer camp with a piece of art — six little flowers, dot-painted in red and yellow. She set it on the dining table like she'd been waiting all day to show us.
“这是梅蒂斯人的串珠艺术。你知道它背后有一个故事吗？”她问道，语气里满是自豪。
"It's Métis beadwork. Do you know there's a story behind it?" she asked, clearly proud of herself.
我很感兴趣。她告诉我，以前梅蒂斯猎人的手套上会绣有他们家族特有图案的串珠。在狩猎过程中，男子可能会把他猎杀的动物旁边掉落的手套作为信物，以证明那是他的猎物。随后，他的家人看到这个图案就会知道那是他们的。
I was curious. She told me Métis hunters used to bead their gloves in patterns unique to their own family. During a hunt, a man might drop his glove beside an animal he'd killed as a gauntlet to prove it was his. Later, his family would spot the pattern and know it was theirs.
我当时不太确定她讲得对不对。那天晚上我查了资料，心里还半信半疑地觉得她可能记混了某些细节。她并没有记错。
I wasn't sure she had it right. I looked it up that night, half expecting she'd mixed up some detail. She hadn't.
是我10岁的女儿教会了我这一点。2024年移民加拿大后，我在萨斯喀彻温省生活了几年——先是萨斯卡通，然后是里贾纳，现在是艾伯特王子城。但我却从未听说过这件事。
My 10-year-old taught me that. I'd lived in Saskatchewan for a couple years after moving to Canada in 2024 — Saskatoon first, then Regina, now Prince Albert. But I'd never once heard this.
我为她在学校和夏令营里了解到了原住民历史而感到骄傲。但这也让我感到有些困扰。为什么从来没有人把这段历史教给我们这些成年人呢？
I was proud she'd learned about Indigenous history at school and at camp. But it also bothered me a little. Why hadn't anyone taught this history to us, the adults?
在那天晚上之前，我对加拿大的原住民知之甚少，而且那些印象也谈不上友好。我不知不觉地吸收了当地的刻板印象，就像你在一个新地方生活时自然而然会做的那样——听一句评论，扫一眼新闻标题，或者听一句没人费心去解释的顺口溜。
Before that evening, my knowledge of Indigenous Peoples in Canada was sparse, and not always kind. I'd absorbed local stereotypes the way you do when you're new somewhere — a comment here, a headline there, a passing remark nobody bothered to explain.
我从未坐下来刻意去相信关于原住民的某种特定描述。那些观点只是静静地扎根下来，就像不知是谁买的、稀里糊涂塞进屋里的二手家具一样。我想，许多新移民在抵达时都带着某种版本的这种现实。没有人故意塞给你这些。它们只是随着搬迁自然而然地出现了。
I never sat down and decided to believe any descriptions of Indigenous people in particular. Those viewpoints just settled in, quietly, the way secondhand furniture ends up in a house nobody remembers buying. I think a lot of newcomers arrive carrying some version of this reality. Nobody hands it to you on purpose. It just comes with the move.
我们使用过的各种定居服务机构只涵盖了搬迁的基础知识：办医疗卡、租房、考驾照，并教我们如何在这个比我以往经历过的任何时候都来得更快、更猛烈的冬天生存下来。但没有人提过，我已经搬到了原住民条约土地上。
Various settlement services we used had covered the basics of making a move: getting a health card, a lease, a driver's licence and teaching how to survive a winter that hits faster and harder than anything I'd ever known. But nobody mentioned I'd moved onto treaty land.
没有人说过今年是《第六号条约》（Treaty 6）签署150周年。也没有人告诉我，阿尔伯特王子城（Prince Albert）也是梅蒂斯人（Métis）的家园，这里有着属于它自己的历史，就在我能看到的景象之下静静流淌。
Nobody said this year marks 150 years since Treaty 6 was signed. Nobody told me Prince Albert is Métis homeland too, with its own history running under the one I could see.
所以我自己去了解了这段历史，报名参加了加拿大第一民族大学（First Nations University of Canada）开设的一门名为“推进和解”（Advancing Reconciliation）的课程。
So I looked into that history myself,g up for a course called Advancing Reconciliation that was offered through the First Nations University of Canada.
我本以为这会是枯燥乏味的，但事实并非如此。我了解了这些条约、英国王室（Crown）的承诺，以及至今仍未兑现给原住民的种种承诺。我意识到，过去我对原住民的认知中，有多少内容是错误的或是缺乏历史背景的。
I expected something dry, but it wasn't. I learned about the treaties, what the Crown promised, and what still hasn't been delivered to Indigenous Peoples. I learned how much of what I thought I knew about Indigenous people was wrong or missing context.
我来自孟加拉国，这个国家曾受英国统治近200年，随后又受巴基斯坦统治约24年。我读了一辈子这段历史，却从未将这些碎片拼凑在一起。我的国家曾遭受过殖民统治，正如原住民一样，但我以前从未把这两者联系起来。
I come from Bangladesh, a country that was under British rule for nearly 200 years, and then under Pakistan's rule for around 24 years. I'd read that history my whole life without ever once piecing it together. My country had faced colonization, just as Indigenous People did, but I'd never actually connected those two things before.
这些内容从来没有被刻意隐瞒。这段历史就摆在那里。缺少的并不是信息，而是有人把它摆在我面前，早早地对我说：“这很重要，你应该了解。”我的女儿今年通过学校参加了一场原住民传统聚会（powwow）。我没有去。当时，我几乎没把它当回事，只觉得是又一个学校的活动、又一个普通的事件。我根本说不出它为什么重要。
None of this was ever hidden. This history was all just sitting there. What was missing wasn't the information. It was someone putting it in front of me early on and saying, "This matters. You should know it." My daughter went to a powwow this year through her school. I didn't go. At the time, it barelyed, just another school thing, another event. I couldn't have told you why it mattered.
但几周前，我站在阿尔伯特王子城萨斯喀彻温河（Saskatchewan river）畔的新青铜雕塑“归途”（Passage Home）前。它的形状像是一辆三角拖架（travois）——一种过去曾在平原上由狗和马拉着运送货物的工具，象征着将那些再也没有从寄宿学校回家的原住民儿童接回家园。这座城市于8月揭幕了这座雕塑，以纪念《第六号条约》签署150周年。一年前，我可能就直接从它旁边走过去了。
But a few weeks ago, I stood in front of Passage Home, the new bronze sculpture down by the Saskatchewan river in Prince Albert. It's shaped like a travois, the kind once pulled by dogs and horses across the plains, and it's meant to symbolize carrying home the Indigenous children who never made it back from residential schools. The city unveiled it in August to mark the 150th anniversary of Treaty 6. A year ago, I might have walked past it.
现在我在那里站的时间比原本打算的要长。雕塑内部有几双小鞋，代表着那些没能回家的孩子们。我想起一只落在死去的动物旁边的手套，好让一个家庭能找到它。我想起一门我差点逃掉的课，一个我没去参加的原住民集会。
Now I stood there longer than I meant to. Inside the sculpture, there are small shoes, standing in for the children who never made it home. I thought about a glove dropped beside a fallen animal, so a family could find their way to it. I thought about a course I'd almost skipped, a powwow I didn't go to.
站在那里，我突然清晰地意识到。在你理解一个地方背后的历史之前，你无法真正在那里安家。没有人会把这种理解直接交到我手上；我必须自己去寻找。我希望下一个移居加拿大的人能比我更快地明白这一点。
Standing there, it struck me plainly. You can't really make a home somewhere until you understand the history behind it. And no one was going to hand me that understanding; I had to go find it myself. I hope the next person who moves to Canada to learn that sooner than I did.