24-hour candlelight vigil honours Indigenous women
- Jeanelle Mandes | August 16, 2014
One of Regina’s main attractions, Albert Street Bridge, was lit with hundreds of battery-operated candles on August 14th to commemorate the missing and murdered Indigenous women in Canada.
Angela Gray stayed up for the whole 24 hours in honour of her murdered niece, Richele Bear, and she wore a t-shirt with a photo of Bear in her honor.
Gray reflects back of Richelle and remembers her niece as a happy and outgoing little girl.
“Richelle was very talkative and she had a bubbly attitude. She got along with everybody and she was very laid back; she was a very popular little girl,” says Gray.
She says events like the candlelight vigil are important to raise awareness to the public about the missing and murdered Indigenous women. Although Richele’s body hasn’t been recovered yet, Gray believes her niece deserves justice.
“These girls need their justice and I’m their voice. Had it not been for people like us and all these people that came out, people will forget and we don’t want that,” says Gray. “We want to keep girls aware of what’s going on because it’s happening and it’s happening everywhere.”
Bear was 23-years-old when she went missing in Regina’s North Central over a year ago.
The event organizer, Evening-Star Andreas, says it took her and other supporters about a month to organize the event for the families who have missing and murdered daughters, mothers, sisters, nieces, cousins and friends.
“When I talk to the mothers, I could feel and see the pain. When I look into Dianne Bigeagle’s eyes, she walks around lost and I’m trying to help her. I can’t hold her to say ‘it’s okay’ because I know it won’t be okay so what do you tell her? There’s not much you can tell her but just stand beside her and support her any way you can,” says Andreas about her friend Dianne, who has a daughter, Danita Bigeagle, who has been missing since 2007.
“We did walks, feasts and round dances for all missing and murdered Indigenous women but I thought I’m going to throw this right into people’s eyes and I’m going to let people know that there’s a problem in our community,” she says. “That’s why we took Albert Street Bridge so we’ll be here for 24 hours to bring that awareness.”
Andreas and her helpers hung up ribbons on the bridge poles and asked elder, Norma Jean Bird, to bless the bridge.
At 7 p.m., everyone gathered at Creeland gas station and walked back to the bridge where everyone was fed and shortly after they hung up the battery-operated candles on the bridge ledges.
Andreas says she was amazed with the amount of walkers and people who showed up for the vigil.
“Wow! I didn’t expect it to be this big,” she says. “People asked me, ‘Why Albert Street Bridge?’ Well, Queen Victoria is a mother, what if her daughter went missing? We cried to the government but they didn’t do anything so maybe we’re going to be crying to the Queen to do something.”
The Regina Police Service supported the peaceful event and helped to patrol the supporters throughout the night.